Josiah and Therapy

We had attachment therapy last week Thursday.  We talked with her about what we've been going through with Josiah.  He's really been out-of-control lately with agression, constantly wanting control and when something doesn't go his way we're having to deal with an all out tantrum.  I've video taped some of them just to document what he's been doing in case we have to take him to Children's.  She wound up telling us that she thinks it's nearing the time to put him in a placement to further drive home that there's consequences for his actions.  That was really hard for me to hear.  I'm fighting it as I don't want it to come to the fact that he may have to go out of state for a year or longer.  He's my little boy and I want to keep him home with us. Andy told her that we had been thinking about hiring in some extra hands.  She thinks that if we're going to try to keep him in the home that would be a smart idea so that everyone is supervised and get some attention that they need.  She brought Josiah in and talked to him about his behavior and told him that if he didn't shape up that we were going to not have a choice, but to put him with another family to get him the help that he needs for awhile.  He didn't like that.  She asked him who Daddy's favorite person was and he pointed to himself.  She told him "no, who has Daddy been with the longest?"  He again pointed to himself.  She told him that Mommy and Daddy started a family together long before any of our children were around.  He didn't like that at all and you could see how angry he was becoming.  She told him that he was being mean to Daddy's favorite person who he loved very much and that didn't make Daddy happy.  She finally asked him what was making him so angry and he didn't say anything.  Her and I both were on the same page though...he was mad that it wasn't all about him...he wasn't center-stage.  That's always a trigger for him.  She could see that he was about ready to lash out and start punching someone so she wanted Andy to drive him home separately and have a talk about how Mommy was the love of his life and that he needed to be good to me and that if his behavior didn't change that he was going to have to be put somewhere else to get him help.  She told me that if we were going to try to keep him in our home, that I needed to step up the paper trail and she told me that when he does "x, y, and z" that I needed to take him up to Children's to see the psych dept.  I was having a really hard time wrapping my mind around everything and was really dealing with alot of emotions.

Friday, the morning started out really rough...he was getting upset over really little things and he was banging and kicking everything and just trying to be destructive.  He picked out clothes and then refused to put them on, trying to get out of taking his meds, banging the furniture into the walls.  He finally refused to put his new clothes on and so I told him that he couldn't do that in front of his sisters and he was going to have to go to his room until he wanted to make the right choice.  He wound up peeing in his pull-up and then ripping the pull-up off and throwing the fluff all over his floor.  Once he saw that he was going to have to clean up his mess, thankfully he did it.  After that, he decided to pull it together for the rest of the day.  He tried to be helpful and he had a willingness to do what was asked of him. after lunch he came up to me and started to cry and told me that he was sorry for doing all sorts of bad stuff.  He sat on my lap and rested his head on my chest and let me soothe him and hold him and love on him.  He hasn't let me do that stuff in years.  I held him and he fell asleep on my chest and we just stayed that way.  I cried and prayed and thanked God for giving me those moments with him.  I spent the rest of that day just cuddling and loving on my kids and trying to process my emotions.  I knew one thing for sure though...I feel God telling me to keep Josiah here with us.  I felt God telling me to hang in there and that He is working in our lives.

Saturday, we went to see the dr. for neurofeedback therapy.  He said that he could see that things were triggering Josiah every few minutes, but that he was trying his best to hang in there.  After he did 8 reps, he told me that he wanted ice cream for his treat.  I told him that it was just morning and we didn't get ice cream for treats in the morning, but we could go to the restaurant that he picked and get breakfast on the way home.  The dr honestly thought we were going to deal with a major meltdown.  Instead, Josiah, let out a big growl and sigh and he pressed forward.  Wow!  I told him that I think it scared him when we had the talk with him about having to go somewhere if his behavior didn't change.  We talked about a lot of things and he told me that he knew that was such a big decision to make and the parents struggle with a lot of guilt, but that he was trying to help us with neurofeedback and we added the emotional component to it so that he hopefully could get a handle on better dealing with what was triggering him.  He also told me that he ws surprised that with the dr even sitting beside him in a position of authority that he was still continuing to disobey.  I told him that's him every 5 minutes.  He doesn't like boundaries, rules, told what to do, not being first.  None of that stuff.  He told me "God is with you, God sees, God will help you."  I told him what was concerning the dr with safety for all of us and that I still don't really think that he's doing it all to hurt everyone...sometimes he is, but sometimes he doesn't think it through, he just acts on his anger.  He's never known any fear or his own strength, but I see the drs concerns too and I will act on those as well just so that I make sure all the bases are covered.  I also sent an email to his psychiatrist with his behaviors as well and wanting to make sure that it's not a medication issue that could be causing them.  He did well for the rest of Saturday and Sunday.

Here it is Monday morning, he still is having a lot of anger issues and he's trying to test boundaries.  However, he's not having all out temper tantrums.  He's growling and letting out screams here and there, but he's trying to hold it together.  That's progress and I am so thankful for that.

Lord, thank you for giving us this team of drs to support us as we go through the process of trying to help Josiah.  Thank you for healing Josiah and I know that You will continue to do so with every therapy session that he has.  Amen

Neurofeedback Therapy

Josiah is showing that he's making progress.  however, like he's done with speech and OT, he tests and tests and tests and his behavior gets in the way.  Last week, the dr. told me that I needed to come up with some incentives for Josiah to do a good job in therapy.  He wanted him to have at least 6 good sections of the 10 that he does each time he goes in.  Obviously, more is a plus.  I talked to Andy and we agreed that if he did a good job he could pick something off the $1 menu for the ride home and if he got good marks all week he could get a happy meal for his hard work.  Saturday, Andy went with me and he did a great job.  Yesterday, he was out of sorts all day.  We get to therapy and he saw that they had a tv sitting in the middle of the floor (it wasn't set up) and he decided he was going to watch that tv.  I told him it wasn't set up nor did it belong to us and to leave it alone.  He proceeded to get mad, try to bend the prongs on the plug, and threw the cord across the room.  I had to peel him off the floor and put him in my lap where he proceeded to try to head butt me, kick me, and was just being loud.  The dr. came out to get us and brought us back...Josiah seemed to have calmed down and so we started therapy.  The whole session he was trying to mess around.  He was trying to pull the sensors off his head, scratching at his head, pulling at the wires, opening and closing the doors, rambling at the dr.  The dr told him multiple times that he wasn't allowed to touch the wires where the sensor plugged in to the computer.  That was the firmest I've ever seen the dr get with him.  The dr. is pretty patient.  Josiah finally announced that he wasn't going to do it anymore and he wanted his treat.  We both told him that he wasn't scoring enough points or working hard enough to get rewarded and that only he could change that.  He proceeded then to pull the tag off his shoe and acted up some more.  At the end, the dr. had him do one more session to try to make up for one of them that he barely scored any on.  No go.  Josiah finished and wanted his prize.  The dr told him that he didn't earn it and he looked at me and said "he'd just go to Whataburger then."  I told him he didn't work hard enough to get a treat.  He threw himself against the wall and the dr. was trying to talk to him as well.  He was concerned about if he was going to be ok on the ride home (an hour to an hour and a half) and I said that we'd just have to see.  I wound up having to carry him out of the office as he wouldn't walk and kept throwing himself onto the floor and I almost went with him once.  I cannot afford to fall and hurt my knee again when I'm still not over my knee sprain from March.  I carried him out to the car and he proceeded to cry and try to kick me the whole way out.  The dr. gave me a pat on the shoulder and told me to hang in there.  He told Josiah that he was disappointed in his behavior and that he felt bad for me because of all I was trying to do for him and he was acting that way.  It didn't matter.  We got to the car and I got him inside and he proceeded to kick and scream.  I had to climb back there to put him in his seatbelt.  5 min down the rd he fell asleep.  3/4th of the way home, the tears came rolling down my cheeks.  All I want is for him to get better...but this is up to him.  The dr is there to help him, I am there to help him and take care of him, but this choice on how he acts and whether he wants to do the work to get better...that's all up to him.  I get that.  I really do.  It doesn't make dealing with it any easier for me.  He pushes me away, he pushes any efforts to help him away, he pushes and pushes.  I'm so glad that we have attachment therapy this week.  The neuro dr is going to try to compile some data from yesterday too to help me see what's going on in his brain when he acts that way.  He asked me how frequently he gets like that and I said "anytime he doesn't get his way."  We switched where the sensors go yesterday as well to work on his moods and "angries" the dr. said that he didn't think we'd see any benefits from yesterdays session because he just didn't want to do the work, but that he would compile some data from the session to hopefully give us some insight as to what is happening when he gets like that.  I guess I already said that a little bit huh?  Oh well...I guess I needed to say it again for my own benefit.  It's really trying to deal with his "angries" over everything.  I just hope and pray that he will begin to want help and will work to get better.

Neurofeedback therapy

We got the results last night that it is working.  The dr. had left the graph at home on accident, but I should see it today, but I do see some small results too.  So that is a good thing.  :-)  He is calmer a little bit and you can see that he is starting to think when he gets angry, before he just starts reacting.  He's not always successful, but you can see it a little bit.  I'll take it.  I can't wait to see the next few sessions and the changes that are made.

Josiah's First Neurofeedback Appt

We had a really hard day yesterday and I couldn't wait to go to his first appt. He couldn't either. It was yesterday at 5 pm. It was interesting watching him play a game with his brain. No hands, just his brain. If he did what he was supposed to the game progressed. He played a game called Highway. He had certain color boxes on the bottom that he had to keep within the black box that was around it and it told us if he was paying attention, one was whether he was relaxed, and I forgot what the middle one was but he had to keep it stretched out between the other two. If he did everything that he was supposed to, it would put the white strip down in the middle of the highway and as he earned points he was rewarded with stars in the sky and if he got so many stars, it would give him rewards of other things to see. He got to see 2 hot air balloons. The dr said he did very well. However, it was very interesting to see that he sometimes he's paying attention, but it's not for long at all. And most of the time, he's just zoned out. It helped somehow to make me realize that I really need to ask for eye contact and give him short 1-direction commands. He came home last night and was very calm. This morning, he got up and where he's normally jumping around and very loud...he's a calmer kid. He's still loud, but he's calmer. I don't know how to explain it, but it's something that makes my heart soar. I'm proud of him. I have hope. I feel really good about this.

Granted, he did have an angry outburst this mornign over it not being his day and that he couldn't go first and that somebody took the cup that he wanted and he started screaming and ran behind the chair, but I was able to pull him into my lap and he was able to stop before it escalated into him flipping furniture at people or over. The neuropsych told me that as he gets better at doing what he's supposed to do on the games, that it will carry over to help him not fly off the handle over every little thing and we'll see an improvement there too. I can't wait for Saturday when we go back.

Tracie's all done with OT...

Tracie is all done with OT now. They felt that she made enough progress to be dismissed. She's been in OT since she was 23 months old, so I've been ready for awhile now to not have to live according to a therapy schedule. But, I am very proud of her and that she is finally all done with therapy. YEAH!

Tracie and OT

I got a copy of her 6 month re-evaluation. She's still scoring as low as 36 months and as high as 4 years and 2 months. She's 5 1/2 this month. Today, she really struggled with therapy with not wanting to listen, couldn't focus, giggling about everything. The therapist said she's finally starting to see some of the stuff that me and Joannie told her about her originally, but it's taken this much time. I told her that Andy and I can see plain as day when she's playing her games, but others just think she's being cute or funny. Drives me crazy. One day, I really hope that we can be done with therapy. I am glad that she's done with speech so that we can just focus on OT for now. I am happy about that. But, I really would like to be done with therapy so that we can move on to other kid activities and just let them be kids. It gets frustrating for me. However, I have to accept things for what they are and we will keep doing OT and hanging in there. She is making progress, it's just slow. And it bugs me too that last 6 months, she was still testing at 36 months in some areas. I'm thankful though that she is making some progress. I think some of it is just her will...she doesn't care to do it or if she can do it and some of it is that she'd rather play the part of the baby...she wants everyone to do everything for her or she cries and I'm mean...she cries, she goes to her room. She's got to find the will to learn to do things for herself. Melina runs to do some things that I ask Tracie to do. That would drive me crazy to see my baby sister doing things that I can't do yet, but I know that they don't think that way. Anyway, we'll keep plugging away.

Tracie graduated from speech today!

I am so proud of Tracie. They came out to do her speech re-evaluation testing and she got the all clear. She graduated from speech and her last day is Wednesday! She's come so far and I couldn't be more proud!

Guess it's Tracie's turn...

She was in the middle of occupational therapy and she came in the kitchen to ask if she could be done. I went out to find out what was going on and the therapist said she wouldn't participate and she kept saying she was just tired. I noticed that she was looking a little pale and I felt her head and she felt warm. I said that was fine and apologized as she wasn't like this earlier and I really don't want to pass on our germs to anyone else. The therapist left and I took Tracie's temperature. It's only 99.4 and she's just saying that her tummy hurts. I have a feeling there is more to come though as this is exactly how Deidra started out. I had her lay down on the couch while we watched Alice in Wonderland and I rocked her for a bit.

Lord, please help my babies to feel better and please help these sickies and germs just leave us be. We need a healthy streak in this house! Please heal my babies and help them to feel better. Thank you, dear Abba!

Attachment-Focused Parenting Day 15

Today was an awesome day!

7:30 am Josiah getting into Tracie's room

8:15 am Tracie getting into Mom's computer

8:40 am Josiah getting into peanuts on the table while I took Melina upstairs. He was just told prior to that that snack time wasn't for a little bit yet.

9:30 am Josiah giving toys to Melina after I said no. (he keeps wanting to give her toys with tiny pieces even though we keep explaining that those types of toys can make her choke)

10:20 am Josiah not stopping when I said "no."

4:00 pm Deidra, Josiah, Emily, and Tracie all had great days at school. Well, Tracie didn't have school today, but she did have therapy and normally she's been throwing huge fits on the speech therapist. So her deal was that if she wanted a reward, she had to nicely do speech. She did! They all got to pick out of the reward jar. Deidra earned music time. Josiah got coloring time. Tracie got game time and she picked to play play-doh. Emily gets to make a special snack with Mommy. Since, we didn't have anything on hand to make what she wanted, I told her that we'd go during the week and she could pick an activity for that night to do with one of her siblings. She picked to color with Josiah.

Tracie and Speech

Lord, please help me with Tracie and her stubbornness. She doesn't want to do things and she either plays cute and smiles and laughs at everyone when she either doesn't know something or doesn't want to do something or she starts to cry or whine her way out of it. Neither one works to get her out of doing it, but it doesn't stop her from trying. She's throwing fits at the therapists and trying to get out of doing her speech and when we try to practice her sounds she's flat out refusing to do it or she's throwing a fit. I turned on a show called "Brainy Baby" today. Josiah was saying all the vocab words outloud and I wanted Tracie to do the same. She struggles with knowing the words for things all of the time even though it's in her brain and something she's known before, she struggles with knowing the word at times. It's one of her little quirks that we're still trying to figure out. She needs a lot of repetition to learn things. Anyway, I wanted her to say the vocab words with Josiah, she looked at me and gave me that "nope, I'm not going to." look and I told her that it was just practicing...it was fun. She refused to do it. I don't know how to get her to learn her sounds and her words and I wish she'd let go of this stubborn attitude. Please help her to realize that we're all just trying to help her so that she can be better understood.

Conference with the Behavioral Therapists for Josiah and Emma

We met and talked about our goals and the progress the kids have been making in therapy over the past 3 months. Emma has come a really long way. Whereas we rated her in 2s and 3s in some things in the beginning, she is now at a 7 (10 is the best). Sure, she still has her moments where she's quick to tantrum and not want to use her words and she has a hard time sharing and playing with others if they're not doing what she wants them to do, but she's come along way. She's a lot more compliant when asked to do something and most of the time will follow through now, whereas before she was very oppositional when we asked her to do anything. I still feel that she acts a lot younger than she is, but that's to be expected with her history and again she's come a LONG way and I know that it's just going to take some more time.

Josiah we gave an overall rating of 4/5 this time. We both agreed that he cooperates with what he is asked to do about 40-50% of the time. We didn't really have an initial rating to compare how far he's come as he came right out of family therapy into this progrma whereas Emma had been doing this before about 6 months ago and Josiah just started doing PEP 3 months ago. Anyway, I voiced some concerns that I had about diagnoses stuff that I still had fears about (RAD, bi-polar, is this really ADHD?) and they said that time will tell as he's still a bit too young for us to get an accurate diagnosis right now. She said that she wouldn't want a psychiatrist to come out and diagnosis a 4 year old with bi-polar and that I just needed to keep collecting data. I told her that the psychologist had told me to chart his behavior and I was starting to see some patterns and that is what is making me wonder about bi-polar and it has the psychologist wondering too, but she just gave him an umbrella diagnosis of mood disorder as bi-polar does fall under that. I understand being hesitant to diagnose him this early, but I just have a lot of fears and just want to get him the best help that I can. I need to just keep going in the direction that we're going though and quit worrying so much. They feel that he is making some progress, we feel that he is making some progress too and we both feel that while it's slow, it is something and for that I am thankful. We will keep working on our relationship, keep doing the behavior stuff, and collecting the data to take to the doctors. They told us that we're on the right track and so we'll continue on for another 3 months until our next conference and then decide where we need to go from there. The behavior therapist that primarily works with him said that she's noticed that he has a LOT of energy and that he does require a lot of one-on-one and close supervision. I just laughed and nodded. I told her that he's the one that makes me doubt myself sometimes as I don't understand why we have some of the same battles everyday, he gets the same consequences, and yet he will still do it over and over again. She told me that I'm not a failure and that some kids just are like that and that it will eventually click at some point. So, we'll continue with behavior therapy and hopefully at the end of the 3 months we'll see some more progress being made in the 3 core areas that we are working on...compliance, regulation, and my mind just went blank on what the other one is. lol

Prayer for my Children

Lord, I lift up my children to you in prayer today. I pray that you will be with Deidra, Emily, and Josiah at school today. Help them to have a blessed day and be with their teachers too as they instruct them throughout the day. I pray that you will bring a Christian friend to each of them so that they will have someone that they can count on throughout the years. I also pray that you will keep them from evil influences. I pray too that you will give them joyful and obedient hearts to learn and to be good influences to others.

I pray for Tracie as she stays here at home with me. She totally doesn't know what to do with herself once her sisters and her brother go off to school. I pray that she will adjust ok and that she will flourish as we work on things and teach her things at home to help her and that she will enjoy her alone play as well. She is a great big sister to Melina and I think they will have a great friendship as well once baby girls gets a big older. Tracie loves to help with her and talk to her too.

I also pray for little Melina. She is such a happy and content baby and such a joy. We all just love her to pieces. Help her to continue to grow well and be healthy and to meet all of her milestones. She is just so precious. She makes us all smile and laugh everyday.

I thank you dear Lord for all of my precious children. I am one very blessed Mommy. I also pray that you will heal Tracie and Melina from their boo-boos this weekend and that they will heal nicely and fast. I thank you that Tracie didn't need stitches either and that we were able to go another route. And I pray that the owie by Melina's eye will heal quickly and that she will quit rubbing it and irritating it.

I also pray that we will be able to get some answers to therapy for the kids, so that they are able to continue getting the services that they need.

Therapy

Trying to get some answers today...I had asked at meet the teacher night if it would be possible for Emmy to have her occupational therapist come up to the school on Mondays during rest time to do her therapy. The teacher didn't think it would be a problem and told me just to send a note. The principal called me last night and said that the school isn't allowed to do that and if they let all the outside providers come in for all the kids that do therapy at children's house and so forth, they'd be losing out on a lot of academic time. I told her that I understood that, but Emmy's been in therapy for almost 2 years and she's about 18 months behind...the only way that our current therapist could continue to see her was if she came up to the school as she's only in our area on Mondays. She said that she talked to the superintendant and he said no and she couldn't go above his decision. I then asked her if there was a way that the school could provide her therapy and she said she couldn't say yes or no. She'd have to be tested and there would have to be a need. Obviously, she hasn't been in therapy this long for her not to need it. It just makes me angry. So, I left a message for the superintendant to call me and let me know what he's willing to do. I guess if it comes down to it, I'll have to pull her out of school every Monday for her to receive her therapy...does that make more sense? or does it make more sense to allow the therapist to enter the school? UGH

Then, Andy went back to work today and said that our therapy company had left a message for him saying that they had a question about Josiah's insurance as they noticed that Medicaid was no longer their primary insurance and they don't work with United Healthcare. Obviously, they still have Medicaid...so I need to find out what to do there too.

Boundaries and Respect

I told Andy the other night that after listening to myself one day that I really think one of our major problems is the kids lack of respect for every one elses things and with each other's personal space. I don't know how many times I can say "don't touch that if it doesn't belong to you, we don't have to sit on top of each other, back up, got out of each other's faces, you don't have to be right on top of someone to talk to them" just stuff like that at all times. And it's constant. We were talking about this somewhat in behavior therapy last week as well and I just said that sometimes it can be really hard. If I sit down, they all have to zoom right there. It doesn't seem to matter if I try and give them oodles of attention or not, they just zoom right in. I love them to pieces but I do need my own space sometimes too. The therapist mentioned that she understood that we have 3 with varying attachment issues and she knew that had to be hard as they always were trying to get our attention and affection. And of course, they have no fear of strangers either which I don't know what to do about. It doesn't matter how many times I've told them that we don't open up the door without Mommy or Daddy or Deidra being right there, Josiah will open the door to someone that we don't know. Granted, I know boundaries is really something a lot of kids who are/have been in foster care struggle with and so I've patiently been hanging in there, but it's just really difficult sometimes. But, I think this is one of our major issues so I'm going to give them a goal to work on this month with keeping our hands and feet to ourselves and I also made a rule for the kids that if Melina is laying on her baby blanket on the floor that they cannot be on that blanket or that will earn them a time out. She loves them to death and they love her too and I'm glad for that, but anytime I put the baby on the floor, Tracie has to sit right on the baby blanket and she puts her butt right up against the baby's head. And Emma will lay down on the floor and put her face right in the baby's to talk to her. Not to mention, Josiah wants to be helpful but he crams the pacifier in the baby's mouth and makes her gag on it. Trying to teach him to be gentle, but I've told him that he has to ask now before he does it and I had to do the same thing with Tracie for similar things that were happening. I'm glad that they want to help, but we have to start working more on personal space as I really do see that it's becoming a huge issue. They wander around and sneak off into Deidra's room or our room or my bathroom and there's no reason to be in anyone else's rooms but their own. Too many things of Deidra's have gotten broken lately as well because they are constantly trying to get in there and won't leave her things alone. So, we have some things to work on. I pray that God will help them understand more as we work on it as well.

Home Visit with the Behavioral Therapists

The Behavioral therapists came out for 2 hours yesterday to meet with us about Josiah. We talked about his developments, past history before he came to us, since we've had him...all of that. We talked about what he had been getting therapy for, what our concerns were, and their observations that they've seen as well. We talked about his typical day, what his strengths were, and a lot of stuff that we had been working with him on. They gave us a huge packet of information that we need to fill out and they gave us a form for his teacher at Mother's Day Out to fill out as well. They also are going to get his medical records and look at his occupational therapy notes as well as talk to the psychiatrist. The psychologist told me that she had several things that have gone up on her radar, and some of those are concerns of mine as well. Andy said that he thought whatever I read lately, I thought described him. They laughed, but said I was on the right track as several of the things can overlap and co-exist together. I'm really hoping that some of my thinkings aren't right, but from something the psychologist said, I'm thinking that she's thinking it too. I don't want to say what that is right now. I'm going to see what his testing next week says...he goes in for 3 hours next Tuesday to do all of the cognitive testing and then the following week we go back in to get the results. She said they don't diagnose lightly, but they have several concerns. So, I'm trying to wait patiently to see what happens. I'm not out to get him labeled for the sake of labels...I just want to know what we are truly dealing with so that we can help him the best way that we can and get him on the path to healing. My Dad told me yesterday..."I know what you're dealing with...a 3-year-old boy." I just about hung up on him. This is why I don't talk about what we go through with him as I can't handle hearing that. He doesn't listen, he thinks that he can do whatever he wants, he's agressive, he jumps all over, is constantly into everything that he's not supposed to be, he requires constant supervision, you tell him not to do something...he's going to do it. He can verbalize what the right choice is, but he can not follow through with that choice...we put him in time out or tell him to physically make him stop doing something and that will set him off into a rage that will last anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours, he tears his bed apart, scrapes up his bedroom walls, he's got his windowsill all torn up, he kept breaking his blinds until we just had to take those down as we didn't want him getting hurt, he tears his hangers down in his closet, he is loud and is constantly jumping and climbing all over everything and everyone. He has no fear of anything and you can tell him things until you're blue in the face...it doesn't matter to him. He's cute, funny, and very smart and seriously that is his saving graces. I worry about him...it scares me to death to think that if we can't get him to start making good choices that he's going to have some serious troubles for the rest of his life. He's going to be 4 in a few days...I see the other kids his age starting to calm down. I have to wrestle him to the ground some days as the minute he knows that I'm going to stop him from doing something, he will run from me or he will start kicking and flailing at me. This is not your normal typical 3-year old. My Mom will not watch him because he scares her...I was horribly embarrassed that the person who watched the littles while I was in the hospital had him and he wound up breaking a bunch of her pictures and candles and stuff because he wouldn't calm down. I know his sensory integration disorder is part of it, but it doesn't seem to matter how much sensory stuff we try to do...he's getting worse. I told the therapist yesterday that there were signs when he was little, but I didn't see them...granted hindsight is 20/20. I'm really starting to see the effects of neglect and non-parenting. I thought we got him in time...but I'm starting to see that it all matters way earlier than that. I just want to know how to help him and to help him get better. I did get some other information off of my sensory boards too for a couple other things that I e-mailed some therapists on to see about today. I'm hoping that I will get a reply. My Dad keeps telling me to wait for him to grow out of it...the older he gets the worse it gets and from the reading that I've done over the past little while on some things that I think we may be dealing with it says that it's not something that gets better and will only get worse without treatment. So, I don't think that's the answer. I think what we're trying to do for him is the starting point. We're going to have a lot of hard work and prayers ahead...

Insightful...

We had behavioral therapy yesterday and we were talking about a lot of things. It was very insightful. To me at least... I realize how much fostering has brought stress into our lives. It's been a blessing too...or we wouldn't have some of the children that we do. It's just the pressures and the stresses that it's brought into my life that I didn't even truly realize until we got to talking about everything. I am so worried about being reported for something that I am stressing over everything...the house being clean, the kids being perfect when others are around, getting them all caught up, and trying to do the best by everyone. They told me that I have to start letting the therapists do their job and quit feeling like I have to do all this extra stuff on top of it... I think I am trying to be the perfect MOm and I just cannot be. I just feel like I have to measure up to everyone. We were talking about how we deal with blow-ups from Deidra one way and we just brush it off and when they happen with the others, we deal with it completely different. I told her that I want to let them be kids, but Josiah doesn't always know his own strength and he can hurt people and since I still have to do incident reports on the girls, I guess I put more emphasis on that because I don't want anything to happen that would hurt anything. They understand that is a real fear that I have and that I worry about getting reported for things or false allegations. I think I will start feeling better about everything once the girls are finally ours and we can just be a real family without having to feel like we have to please everyone else all of the time. I have come to the real conclusion that I think we're done fostering after the girls adoption is finalized. I may do respite from time to time for some of our other foster family friends, but I think we'll be closing our home once the adoption is final. I'm ready to start getting our life back and being able to do family things without having to worry about getting judge approval and all the red tape that is involved in some of this stuff. The behavioral therapists feel that we are doing a great job and that we're wonderful parents and that we just need to trust in ourselves. I think when we first started all of this, we felt that we did trust our parenting, but after being in the system so long, I've started to doubt things...one person says we have to be more consistent and discipline for every little behavior, one person says we're too strict, all these comments coming from here and there and it makes you start to wonder after awhile if you are going about things the right way. One thing that really struck me last night was that they told me I'm putting too much pressure on myself and that I needed to take care of myself better so that me and the baby were taken care of. I get to worrying so much about the months ahead and behaviors and so forth, that I need to quit doing that and leave that to the teachers and the therapists to do their jobs. I don't buy totally that I need to quit doing some of the stuff that I am doing with them, as I do want to get them caught up so we can get away from doing SO much therapy and get them into doing more little kid stuff that they want to do, but I will try to not to push myself so hard to do every little thing that I think that I need to do.

OT Therapy Re-Evals

Little E and Baby T had their re-evals for occupational therapy a couple of weeks ago. Every 6 months they are re-evaluated so we can see how much progress they've made or new goals that need to be on their plans. I asked the therapist about them this week and she updated me on their progress. 6 months ago, they were about a year and a half behind. This time...

Baby T--41 months of age.
Developmentally she's scoring as low as 22 months old and as high as 36 months old. She's scoring at 22 months of age with her fine motor skills and 36 months old with self-help skills. OT says if we can just get her to potty train, she'd be where she needs to be with self-help skills.

Little E--4 years and 7 months of age.
She's scoring in the bottom 1% of her age group for visual perception skills. That blew me away! She's scoring at a 36 months of age for visual motor/perception. And at 42 months for fine motor skills. She's on target for her self-help skills.

The OT did tell me that she appreciated that we always asked questions and that I did carry over with them as they are coming alot farther with the stuff that I do with them too. She said that she had 3 families that were really good about that stuff and that we were one of them. That made me feel good. I told her I get frustrated sometimes when I hear their progress reports as I don't understand sometimes why we do x, y, and z and they still are struggling so far behind. Granted, when I received their case files and I was able to see the initial evaluation notes, I was able to see the bigger picture and I know deep down that they really have come a LONG way, but sometimes I get frustrated that we still have SO far to go. I am proud of them though and we will just keep working really hard.

Behavior therapy...

I think the kids finally showed their true colors at behavior therapy last night...it's taken 6 weeks to get it out of them. I was horribly embarrassed and Andy thought it was a good thing that they finally got to see what the kids were like. Me...I thought it was funny that Andy is always quick to say that the kids don't act certain ways when he's home and I do realize that kids do function differently around Mom than they do with Dad...but I thought it was funny that both of us were there and yet they were all cutting it up. I've been telling him for months now that they wait until I'm distracted with trying to talk to someone and they start acting out to get the attention back on them. They've never done it that way for him quite like they do for me, but they did last night and I guess I'm wrong for gloating about it, but I thought it was funny.

Baby T did so well in speech today...

I had asked earlier this week to see about getting some articulation added in Baby T's speech. She chops her words so badly that most people can not understand her and even me at times struggles with understanding what she's saying and I'm with her all day. I know she's kind of young to do this, but something has got to give. I'm really wondering if a lot of her temper tantrums aren't due to the fact that she feels misunderstood, although I know a lot of it is behavioral as well. Anyway, they said they would work on it and make it a part of her goals but that it may take her longer to catch up in speech. I said that was fine, something has got to happen.

She sat down with the therapist today and they were going to work on k and g sounds, but she thought maybe b and f would be easier so they started on those. She chops the ends of her words off as well and so they were working on that as well. The therapist spent I don't know how long trying to get her to say "bite." Towards the end of the session, she was trying to tell the therapist something and said "bite" perfectly and without any prompting at all. The therapist was jumping for joy and I was just smiling away in the kitchen. Mommy is so proud of her!

Quirks and Behaviors

Andy and I had a big talk last night about the kids and their behaviors. Little E and Josiah have been major handfulls and into everything. I love them both to death, but I need to find some way of disciplining them that gets through to them that they can't do certain things. It's getting to a point where I cannot even leave them out of sight for a couple of minutes or they're running to get into everything that they're not supposed to. These are my 2 with ADHD and ODD. I watched a Super Nanny episode a week or two ago where SN was telling the parents that they were expecting too much out of their son who had ADHD and when he acted up, they just needed to give him a hug and talk to him about what he did wrong. He wasn't meaning to act up and he just couldn't focus on what he needed to be doing. She did an experiment with Mom where she wanted her to read a book, listen to music, she had all the kids come in and do various things to her at the same time, and then she asked Mom to tell her what she had read. I understand that these kids have problems in that dept and I am sympathetic to that. But, I think they need to have consequences just like any other kid does. I think they need to learn that they still have expectations in life, rather than just learn that because they have ADHD that they have an excuse not to do those things.

I had started to give them little tasks and if they could complete those without incident I was rewarding them with 2 gummi bears. It was working for the most part. Then, we went to a training and one of the caseworkers mentioned that he didn't think that was a good idea as it was setting the kids up to expect something each time they did anything. I quit doing it and the kids went back to being major handfuls. Into everything, running wild everywhere, refusing to listen, being defiant, making big old messes, being agressive with one another at times, and after Andy and I's talk last night, I decided that I'm going back to what was working. Once I get their behaviors under control for awhile, I'll start cutting back on the gummi bears, but for right now them earning gummi's, tv time, and extra perks seems to be working and I'd rather give them something extra for now if it will reap the rewards of good behavior. I need to be able to go sign forms for the therapist without them making a beeline for the refrigerator, pantry, or DVD player to make a mess and wreck things. I need to get a handle on this now, so that when the baby comes and I need to sit and feed the baby, that I don't have to stop every 2 seconds and go get them out of the bathroom, out of the pantry, or out of Deidra's homework.

And before anyone says this is normal kid behavior, if it just happened here and there throughout the day, I would understand, but this is constant over and over and over and it doesn't matter how many times they lose a privilege or wind up in time out, it doesn't change the behavior. I think when we go to behavioral therapy tonight, I'm going to see about adding Josiah to the behavioral class rather than just go to skill building so we can get some ideas on how to handle some more of his refusing to listen and the 45 minute screaming fits (no tears, just screaming) that come with him not getting his way. He has no self-calming techniques either and I just talked to the occupational therapist about how I understood the massages and squeezes she does in therapy to help calm him, but I need ideas on how to teach him to self-soothe as otherwise he just screams and screams. She told me to keep removing him and putting him in his room so he learns he's not going to get negative attention either. I told her that I do go put him in his room, but he destroys his room during his screaming fits. She told me to put a mini-trampoline in his room so he can get some sensory input from that, but that seems more like a reward to me. I think I'm going to bring this up at behavioral therapy when we are in our parenting class and see what they think. But, I do think he needs to join the behavioral class so we can see the progress that he makes in learning those skills and be able to see how the counselors deal with some of his quirks.

They are making some progress with social skills. All my littles have a really hard time with boundaries and what is appropriate with strangers and others personal and private spaces. I found a social skills for early learners book in a teaching story that I picked up and we have been learning one social skill each week and I give them little reward strips each time I see them do the appropriate social skill that we have learned already. They are slowly improving and I am SO proud of them!