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 |  Being a stay at home mom is never as cut and dry as you think it is. |
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Originally my pregnancy blog, now continuing on as the life of a mom and her two wacky kiddos thing till I don't want to write in it anymore  . So come on in and see what's going on in my world for a bit if you like...Be careful where you step, as the kids have all their Pokemon cards out! Feel free to hug a Hello Kitty plush! Come join in the fun, Super Mario Bros. and Hello Kitty style!![Merit Badge in Parenting
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Congratulations on your pregnancy*^*Smile*^*. You already are a wonderful mom to your son and I know this baby will be very blessed also
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In the midst of how you are feeling right now, know that it can be fixed & I'm proud of you for writing the poem that reflects how you feel. The love of your children clearly shines through. *^*Heart*^*](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/genre-Family-584.gif) ![Merit Badge in Journaling
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I'm so glad to be back blogging and reading yours. The kids have grown so much! I'm so glad that you, myself and T are still here journaling together!](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/type-Journaling-2180.gif) the wonderful badges my "Sister", silversara, graced me with. Thanks Sis, I  you! ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Thanks to all of you for your support, your comments, your love, your generosity and your time! Never met a greater bunch of people then on here! Besides, who else would want to listen to a rambling crazy mom, both during and especially after pregnancy?
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| Today is my day of boredom, waiting on tomorrow to come, and then this weekend, and then next week, Christmas. It's all in front of me, but I can't quite touch it, because today is in the way. Tis life I spose. Everything comes in due time. I'm just impatient! Still waiting on a few things to show up for my Christmas shopping to be complete. I need to get the kids some socks and underwear for Christmas, and they still need to get each other a gift as well. I ordered a couple of things that they could give as gifts if they want to, or they can't find that special thing. I've told Don since he's so insistent on getting me something that it needs to be $30 or under and a surprise. He's completely stumped. I got him quite a few things this year, and he knows about all of them because i Had to ask sizes and whatnot. I know he's really thrilled to have them though, which I'm glad about. What I'm also glad about is that I did all this shopping early, and a little at a time, when we have money. We've been in some pretty sticky situations as of recent, where help that we usually get was taken from us, so we had to go to other sources to try and get help instead. I'm grateful for friends and favors. Tomorrow's the day I finish up my shopping, and then I have to wait for the kids to go to bed so I can wrap everything and hide it again. Wrapping is the hardest part, as I'm not very good at it. Don's not very good at it either, so I do most of the work. It comes out kind of shoddy, but I suppose it's mainly for keeping the present a secret until they unwrap it, so as long as everything is covered, you're okay, right? Well, at least that's what I tell myself. I almost kind of wish my mom was here to wrap...but I'd do the taping, because she tapes every possible piece that can be opened, I don't like that. I want them to be able to tear it open, not have to get scissors to open it. Christmas morning was hell with my mom wrapping presents, because we could never get to the presents as fast as we wanted to with all the tape. I hope to not do that with my kids. I guess it's a sacrifice...either have my mom do it (if she were here) and deal with a million pounds of tape, or I do it, and they're wrapped crappy, but easy to open. Meh.The kids are excited for Don's Christmas party tomorrow. I set up everything for the parents for the class Christmas party tomorrow while we won't be there, and they're freaking out as if they've never been left to their own devices on how to run a party before. I didn't know or realize I was that instrumental to party success. After a few emails and calming people down, I think I have it straightened out for them. Whoever shows up at first can start off snacks and then when a couple other people get there, they can start off the game. Easy peasy. I know I'm usually the one who starts off the ceremonies, and get it all tied together, but they're just going to have to do it without me this time. I hope it doesn't come out a complete disaster...I mean, it shouldn't, it's really not that difficult to put together I don't think. I have mixed feelings about this weekend with the baking and everything, but I'm supposing it's for personal reasons. Something just doesn't feel right this time, and I don't know why. We'll see when we get there though I spose. And then, the great part, the kids sleep in and I sleep in on Monday. Unfortunately, Don has to go to work, but he took Christmas Eve off to spend with us, so I'm happy about that. Then Christmas day, I'll be making our turkey and all the fixings to go with it. The kids love the holiday meal so much, and I'm glad I get to cook it. Hopefully this time the gravy isn't extra salty like it was when I made it for Thanksgiving. Can't wait to see the look on the kids faces when they open their presents! It's so worth it. |
| Girl Scouts can be very overwhelming. It seems there's always something going on, and it all happens at the same time. I haven't even had a moment to breathe and already cookie time is here. I don't know when I'm going to find a chance to finish our snack badge, much less our journey. I thought picking a Wednesday would be a safe bet to maximize our meeting opportunities, but we've already been minus a few. I have to talk to the school office to see how we would go about the meeting on the 8th of January, as Journey won't be in school that day due to an appointment in Baltimore. This is all happening so fast. It's overwhelming, and I feel like I'm not prepared for any of this. We've yet to have one meeting that didn't have some sort of agenda to it. I mean, I know that you're supposed to have an agenda to your meetings, but it would be nice to have a carefree happy little meeting where you can make a craft or something. Like I said, I don't even know how I'm going to find the time to finish the snack badge. Now that it's cookie season, I have to teach the girls all about cookies, and get them their financial literacy badges. All these patches that take all these steps, and I don't even know how to get through all these steps to get them the patches in just one meeting. Auuuuggghhhh!!! It's maddening. It's frustrating. I only have so much time to do things, and I feel like it's never enough. Maybe if we had 2 hour meetings, I could actually get stuff accomplished, but this is just ridiculous. Maybe an hour and fifteen minutes worked for Daisies, but it certainly doesn't seem to be working for Brownies. I feel like I don't have any time to get them any badges, and we're just flying through everything. It's one event after the other, and there's very little time to stop and try to figure out what's going on. Soon, I have to schedule cookie booths. I need to figure out how many of those I'm going to need. I jumped at the chance to get the girls their painting badge in that workshop, because then they could earn a patch to go towards the front of their vests in a matter of a day, and I wouldn't feel so horrible that we're not earning patches fast enough. This was so much easier in Daisies. You could earn a patch in a day. Now you have to try to earn a patch in a matter of 3 meetings. I knew I should've forgot about the journey this year. Now I'm stuck having to try and find a way to finish it by the time the Cadette troop comes in to help us. How am I supposed to do the snack badge, two badges to the journey, a financial literacy badge and a cookie business badge in three months? Ack, I am so stressed out about all of this. I don't know if we're going to make it to the end. I'll be heaving and groaning, but somehow, in someway, we've got to make it to the end of this year. Next year, I'll be a little wiser, a little more intuitive, and have better ideas for what to do. Maybe after this journey, we won't do one next year, and we can just focus on badges. That sounds like a better idea. *Sigh.* I don't remember there being so many opportunities for events last year like there was this year. Maybe Jenn tried to keep it simple for all of us so we didn't feel overwhelmed. I'm certainly feeling it now. I want to allow the girls to have the best experiences they can, but yeesh. There's got to be a break somewhere where we can just work on one badge and get it over with. That would be nice. That's enough ranting for one day. Sorry, I didn't mean to be a Debbie Downer with all my Girl Scouts stuff. I guess what I was trying to say is, it's a full time job, make sure you can dedicate yourself to it exclusively, and know that there are many opportunities and events, and they all fall one after another. There is very little turn around time. Next year, I'll remember this. |
So here it is, December. I felt like November went entirely too fast for my liking. Years are flying by at top speed, and my children are growing by leaps and bounds. I can't believe that in a whole 19 days, Christmas will be here. I love this time of year.  As always, I've asked my kids to write their holiday lists back in October, and have been steadily shopping since then. Seeing as we only get so much money in at certain times, it makes shopping all that harder. I have to hope that the gift I saw a week ago will still be there when I finally get the money to buy it. So far, I've been very lucky, and everything has either been found somewhere else if missing from one place, or it has been procured just in the nick of time. I'm quite jealous of my friend, who was able to spend nearly $600 in one go round. We don't even make that much money on one check. That price is higher than our rent payment. Craziness. But I'm really glad her Christmas is going to be a very big, full and happy one for her family. Since the kids didn't ask for any big electronics this year that required layaway since September, I've found I've been able to spend a little on Don as well. We may or may not get me a Yankee Candle for Christmas...it all depends on how finances go. I would love to have a present for myself, but if it means my kids get the annual underwear and socks instead of my wants, then so be it. They're so sweet in their lists, they don't ask for anything that all expensive (the highest priced item Journey asked for was $38, and Ryan is getting a video game that costs the same amount as Journey's gift), and there are only a few things they're asking for. It makes me feel guilty when I'm unable to get them something, because they're not asking for much. I'm so glad they're good on clothes right now too. Ryan could use some new sweatshirts and sweaters, as he's grown out of most of his, and I hope that I can find some when we get our free check on the 20th. Journey could really do with a couple of sweaters as well. We'll see what we can find by the time the 20th rolls around. Hopefully there's something somewhere that's not all that expensive for them to be able to get, as far as sweaters and sweatshirts go. Girl Scouts is big and busy these next two weekends. Sunday is a Gingerbread Workshop, and then next Saturday is Christmas caroling at an old plantation. Plenty of activities for the girls who are coming to do! Journey's also been invited to a birthday party on Sunday, which we'll have to show up late to because of the Gingerbread Workshop. I let the girl's parents know that we'll be late, but we'll be there. They were fine with it. For our meetings, I've planned a few different things. On the 11th, we're going to practice caroling songs, at least 6 of them, and then we're going to make a cute snack that I found on Facebook, Grinch kabobs! You take a cocktail skewer and place a grape, a slice of banana, a strawberry with the top sliced off and a mini marshmallow on the tip. They're super cute! I'm going to let the girls cut the bananas and the strawberries, as the Brownie guide book says they should be practicing these skills right now to get ready to use them as they get older. I'm also having them pick a name out of a bucket for each girl, so one girl gets a gift for another one. It's only going to be $5 or less, and can be something either made or bought, whichever they prefer. I thought it would be a nice thing to do for the girls. I've also bought some clear glass ornaments and metallic acrylic paint and ribbon from our troop funds for the girls to make an ornament to take home and hang on their Christmas tree. So the 11th is practicing songs, the Grinch kabobs, and drawing names. The 18th is the gift exchange and ornament making. I think they'll have a good time! One mom was talking about getting cookies made, or bringing in an extra snack. I would love if someone got cookies, as I'm thinking of the girls bringing in a cookie recipe to share with each other over Christmas break, as part of our snack badge. The Grinch kabobs are also part of the snack badge. I'm hoping to get two parts of the badge in in December so we can finish the other three parts in January. We'll be working on cookie sales at that time, so I have to bring that into them in January as well. Girl Scouts is so busy, and there's only so many meetings, so there's a lot to do. We're one of the groups that meets the most often, but yet I feel like it's not often enough, as there's so much to try and do and get together. I feel like my girls are missing out on a lot of experiences because I can't quite put everything together for their journey, and for their badges, and for cookies, and for field trips. I almost kind of wish we met for longer than an hour and 15 minutes. I kind of wish we met for 2 hours. We could get a lot more done that way. Oh well. So, keeping busy here! I'm enjoying that Christmas is right around the corner! We put our tree up the day after Thanksgiving, the way we usually do every year. The kids are very excited to see it. Now I hope that we can get our house in order and get it cleaned by the 17th, as we have another inspection coming. We'll be going to Don's Christmas party on the 20th, and then he has the rest of that day off once the party is over. He put in to have the 23rd and 24th off, so he'll have a 5 and a half day break from work. It'll be nice to have him home that long, the kids will be really glad! We're going marathon cookie baking at my friend Jenn's house on the 20th, so we'll be there all weekend making tons of goodies! Very excited to see her and bake with her! |
| Here it is, yet again, Thanksgiving. So much to be grateful for this, and pretty much every year. I'm grateful my health is in no horrible condition. Yes, I'm taking more pills and more shots, but I'm stable. I haven't been to the emergency room or the hospital at all this year, and I'm very grateful for that. We don't have time for me to go down like that. I must keep on top of myself to make sure everything is okay, and that it stays that way. Very important. I'm grateful that I have the option of taking care of myself, and am conscientious enough to do so. I'm grateful Don has a good job, that provides us with enough money to pay rent and bills, and put some food on the table. I'm grateful for my parents and his aunt when we're short for helping us out and giving us back some breathing room. I'm grateful for the roof over our heads, a warm place to sleep at night. There are so many people out there wishing for that luxury right now, we're very lucky that we have it. I'm extremely grateful we have such a wonderful working car. Roz (as I've affectionately named her) has held steady and been dependable for another year *knock on wood*. I'm grateful to the school for their diagnosis of Journey. I'm grateful for all the help she's receiving. I'm grateful for how wonderful the teachers are. We hit the lottery living over here, allowing the kids to go to the best school in the county. I'm grateful Don's aunt is healthy and safe. I'm grateful my parents are both now healthy and back on track. April was a very scary time for both my parents, as they were both hospitalized and nearly died, so I'm eternally grateful that they're still alive, and now healthier than they were before. I wish I could see them again though. I wish we could see Don's aunt again too. I'm so grateful for Don and the kids in my life. They give my life meaning and purpose. I'm surrounded by love, and I can't help but feel love radiate from them to me, and me to them. It may not be the best life, but to me, it's a good life. I may not have everything, and sometimes we have to go without, but we're in a stable place, and I'm grateful for that. |
| Girl Scout activities go on FOREVER. Seriously, there are a million things to do, so it keeps you very busy! My entire November was booked, all my meetings had a plan in them. Wednesday we're going to the firehouse for our field trip, and then on the 20th we're having our court of awards. After that is Thanksgiving break, and then we're into December. I haven't even plotted out what we should do in December. Of course, there's only 2 meetings in December...oy vey. I'm not sure how much time we have to get stuff done. I have to work on part two and part three of the journey, I still need to get the girls working on their second round of pen pal letters, and somehow we've got to find the time to get to our snack badge. Seriously, I thought meeting every week would be best to work on badges, but I'm finding that badges take awhile to earn. Maybe one of the meetings we'll do parts of the snack badge. Or maybe both. I'm not sure. There are so many activities to do within Girl Scouts. Just today, we marched in the Veteran's Day parade. 7 of my 9 girls made it. They all did a fantastic job on the march, they stayed back far enough, and they held the sign high enough, and the two that got to wave the flag did a great job. I'm very proud of them! I almost started tearing up as we were marching along, seeing my sweet little Brownies marching with their sign, so proud. I love these girls so. There's a gingerbread workshop going on December 8th, which I'm trying to see if anyone wants to go to, and then I scheduled us to sing Christmas carols at Sotterley this year. I hope I get quite a few girls doing that as well. I was glad to get answers from people about today, but I haven't heard anything back about these two activities yet. I'll give them till the 20th to let me know. Journey's IEP meeting is tomorrow. They sent home the draft of it a few days ago, so I pretty much know what's going in it. I'm going to bring up about the handwriting thing, which is that Journey got an NI on her handwriting on her report card, and since her occupational therapist and I are working extra hard to try and get her to write correctly, it would help a lot if someone kept an eye on her to let her know that it's getting a little out of hand. I don't mean to have someone watch her every second of the day, but just get on her when it looks like it's getting illegible. When she's left to her own devices, she tends to go a little wild. The reason her homework doesn't look like it is because I work with her one on one. Speaking of, she has a big tree project due at the end of the month. We have to get on that. Ack. |
| Journey got evaluated for ADHD, and it was found that she has a very hard time focusing. Her teacher said it was the number one cause of her not being able to finish her work. The autism specialist said that it's hard to tell what's ADHD (which many autistic kids have) and what's autism, but she was given the tests to see what they could do for her. There was one part of the evaluation that had me cracking up, as she took a test that she didn't care to take, and thus the findings were voided. She was caught saying "this is taking forever" and counting down on her watch. It's so unlike Journey to say those things and do those things, but there it is, all in writing, that she did them. I know I shouldn't, but I couldn't help but bust out laughing when I read it. I wonder what she was in such a hurry for? They're putting in a lot of support for this for her. I feel absolutely horrible that I've doomed her teacher to all of this. Between the diagnoses, she needs some work, and I feel like I put all this pressure on her teacher to have to deal with her and all her needs, and I feel terrible. I know that she wouldn't have offered to take it if she wasn't able to, but that doesn't make me feel any better about it. Journey needs a lot of attention and re-direction, and that's tough to give one little girl when you've got a class of 28 kids. I'm really glad she has her special ed teachers coming in, but the IEP has stepped back from academic support to support her more in social settings and behavioral needs. When she gets that re-direction and one on one attention from her special ed teachers, she understands what she needs to do, and she works well on it. Any time she's left to her own devices, nothing gets done and she ends up sitting there, stuck on problem #2, unsure of what to do. I wish I could be there to walk her through everything, but she's never going to make it through school if I'm there with her all the time. She's got to learn how to do this for herself. It's so strange, because at home, when she does homework, and she doesn't understand something, she comes right to me and asks for help. I explain it to her, and we sit down and go over the homework. At school, she just sits there, lost on what to do if she's stuck. She never asks for help, but she also doesn't attempt to rectify the situation by herself either. Her behavior is so much different at school than it is at home. At home, I feel guilty putting her under the autistic umbrella, because though she shows signs of it, she's so much more open with us and willing to talk. She attempts things like taking turns and talking through a whole conversation. She doesn't do that at school, and I don't know why. She's familiar with her teachers, she's familiar with many of the kids...but she just doesn't do it. I don't know if it's because she doesn't want to, or if she just feels uncomfortable trying, or if it's a mental block that she has, but it just...it's weird to me. She seems like such a different child at home than she does at school. I dunno. I can tell that she's different, and there are a lot of things that she shows at home as well as at school, but it's like, she's so much more willing to try at home than she is at school. Maybe it is more of a comfort thing. The kids got their report cards, and as usual, Ryan is straight A's. I'm very proud of him! I think his 4th grade teacher graded him harder than any other teachers he's had. He got two B's in her class on report cards last year. He's working really hard to keep his grades up this year. I'm so proud of him! Journey's doing satisfactory on most things, which is good. She got a "needs improvement" on a few things though. Her reading fluency is one of them, which I find strange, because her 1st grade teacher said she had no problems with reading fluency last year. I'm going to ask her teacher about it. She also got a "needs improvement" on her handwriting (it's not legible...which, I think it sorta is, but I'm not sure. When she takes her time to write, you can read it. She's got a double whammy that she's left handed and she has poor fine motor skills. Though, I'm left handed, and many people compliment me on my handwriting...) and on "number-counts, writes and represents whole numbers to 1000, money, fractions." I'm not sure exactly what that means, but if it's about what her teacher told us with her stick counting process, then I can see it. Gratefully, these are her only "needs improvement" areas. She got straight "satisfactory"s on all her student qualities, which I find amazing because last year with her first grade teacher, the "completes tasks on time" and "listens and follows oral directions" were serious issues that we needed to discuss. All in all, everyone seems to be doing okay. We go in to discuss her new IEP next week. Today is my busy day, as I'm taking Journey to occupational therapy, then doing the Brownie meeting, then picking up Don from work, then going to the campgrounds for Girl Scouts tonight to do my training on "My bag of tricks", which should help me find some time killers to fill meetings that don't go all the way full to the end. So far I've been doing a good job on it, we've been running meetings to the end, and whatever leftover time we have we play games or sing songs. This is basically what this class is going to teach me, more games and songs, which I need. I have to real quick eat a pb&j sandwich to take my pills for dinner, as I won't be home till sometime after 8:30 pm. It's my night to put Journey to bed, so I'm going to have to real quick brush her teeth and put her to bed, no Hello Kitty Cafe tonight. I'm officially exhausted already, and the running around hasn't even started yet. |
| As of November 14th, Journey's IEP will be developed with the classification of autism. This means, by educational standards, that yes, she is autistic. She is not the full blown, whole enchilada autistic. She is, as the autism specialist said, a "sneaky" autistic. She may have Asperger's. When they did the testing on her, they saw that she had a LOT of characteristics and traits, but there wasn't enough evidence to classify her one way or another. And then the school psychologist and the autism specialist heard from her speech therapist. And then they heard from her teacher. And then they heard from us. They heard the things Miss Kristin had talked about with me about Journey, like her poor motor planning, and...there was something else, but I don't remember what it was called. But it was in the report, and I showed it to them, and with all this information, they got the entire picture of Journey. The home part, the classroom part, the occupational therapy part, the speech therapy part, the social opportunities part, ALL of it. With each piece of information they got, they exchanged meaningful glances, and that's when the autism specialist started asking us questions. A lot of questions. It started when we mentioned that Journey always puts her shoes on the wrong foot. "Does she say 'ouch', or realize it hurts her feet? Does she ever complain about it and figure it out?" she asked. "Nope," I offered. "She just kinda goes about it without any emotional meaning to it. You have to be the one to point it out first, and then she'll just kinda look and go "Oh," and then put them on the right feet." This intrigued the autism specialist. Her teacher piped up with a similar experience with something she was working on in class. Then the speech therapist offered something similar within her speech sessions. There was a pattern. We all didn't see it, we just thought it was a quirk...but it was something that she did in front of ALL of us. We started sharing stories like that. The autism specialist asked questions, and we answered them, offering stories, instances when things like that happened. "I just have to tell you," the autism specialist said "you're amazing parents. You've done everything you possibly could to make her world a safe, predictable, stable environment. You've basically re-invented your entire lives to create a world where Journey can succeed. You've given her some amazing coping mechanisms and skills...they were so good, we didn't even catch them on the autism test. We knew she had tendencies, and we were on the fence on if she actually had it or not...but all of you have confirmed today that yes, Journey is autistic. We'll be putting an IEP into place specifically for her autism by November 14th." Her speech therapist, her occupational therapist, and Don, Ryan and I have basically taught her the things she needs to know in order to succeed in this world. We've given her skills to help compensate for the issues she has, and give her a better chance of being able to do something just like a normal person would. (Not to say that Journey's not normal...she's just a little different is all). When she doesn't know what to do in social situations, we contact her speech therapist. We work scripts with her to get her prepared for the situation. Sometimes there are curve balls, and those throw her off a little, but she manages to find a way to make it through without too much issue. Everyone that knows her just thinks she's a little quirky. She actually has people tricked, because she uses those skills to help her through the situation. Sometimes she'll be caught off guard, but people will think it's just an odd behavior, nothing too serious. The autism specialist says that under the new DSM, autism is just autism. There used to be a difference between Asperger's, autism, and autism spectrum disorder. There were varying degrees of autism, high functioning, etc. There's not anymore, but the autism specialist said that if she were to pinpoint what Journey has, she said she would lean more towards high functioning Asperger's. So what does this mean as far as a medical diagnosis? Well, since they already did the two tests on her and they came back inconclusive, there are no other tests that anyone can give her that they won't get the same answers from. The autism specialist suggest we take the notes of the meeting to a doctor, and see what they have to say medically for her. So far, she is only educationally classified as autistic. I'm hoping to bring the paperwork to her developmental pediatrician and have him take a look at it and see if he won't make the diagnosis medically for her. I have a feeling he won't though. We may have to look into a different doctor altogether though. No one ever said it would be easy. I'm so very relieved. |
| Got the evaluations back from all Journey's teachers. I'm really nervous that they are going to take her IEP from her. The academic one says that she's pretty well on track, minus a few things here and there, but that she's capable. The P.E. assessment says there's nothing that she can't do in regular class, so they don't see a need to pull her out for adaptive P.E.. The school psychologist did an autism assessment on her, and found that no, she does not have autism. So I guess they're calling in the autism specialist to tell us why she tested no for autism. Personally, I don't see why they're calling a specialist to tell us she doesn't have it when hearing it from the school psychologist is enough proof for me, but whatever. I think they could've held our meeting at 11:15 am like they were supposed to, considering we don't really need to hear from the autism specialist. I get it, she doesn't have it. They're not the first few people to tell me she doesn't have it. I know she has SOMETHING, I don't know what it is, but I know it's something. The only promising evaluation she took that could help her hold onto her IEP is her speech. It showed that she's still in need. At least, that's what I made out of it. That's why I'm so nervous about if they're going to keep her on it or not. Journey's old special ed teacher said to keep her updated and let her know what's going on, but I haven't had a chance to talk to her since the evaluations came out. I would today, but I have to run the Brownie meeting. *Sigh.* About the "something she has", Journey's occupational therapist has offered to help me find out some things about Journey, what things she could fall under. So far, she says she has some issues with motor planning and sensory processing. I don't know if that means she has the disorders, or if it's something under a bigger picture, or what, but she says from working with her, that's what she sees her demonstrating so far. I've offered to bring in a list of quirks that Journey has to her so we can try to get an idea of what this all could mean. She's by no means a diagnostician, but she can kind of see where the problems are. Maybe we can take her case to someone and see where all this fits. There are so many pieces of this puzzle, and I just feel like it's a jumble of pieces that don't fit in any particular fashion. Kinda frustrating, as I've been looking for something, anything to answer all these questions and put this all together. The most we've gotten is a diagnosis of "developmental delay", but that just means that she's behind her peers in development, it's a really broad umbrella. There aren't any particulars that she's been diagnosed with. I'm not saying that there's going to be that one particular thing that encompasses everything she does and is, because there's probably not, but to get a broad diagnosis and then be told "it's not autism", okay, it's not autism, that's great, I'm relieved, but WHAT IS IT?! Is it numerous disorders? Is it a particular problem of stunted growth in her brain? What's the answer to all of this? And what if there is none? And what if they take her off her IEP because there isn't one? What do I do then? So frustrating. Back to square one. This time, possibly without help. I guess, it's been a good run. We'll see how she gets along in school on her own now. I wish they'd have someone come check on her to make sure everything was okay still though. I have nothing left in my arsenal to fight with anymore. I'm all out of options. I need a doctor that's willing to test her for more than just autism. |
| Not a whole lot going on here. I'm mostly writing because I don't want to see the "update blog" email in my email box. Brownies is well underway. We had our investiture/re-dedication ceremony last Wednesday. Even though it was simple, and there were some things I could've done better, it was still a good ceremony, and most of all, I'm thrilled that all my parents showed up for my girls! Everyone was there, and I was so happy to see them all! The girls were too. It's a big high to go up in front of everyone, get pinned for your Brownie ceremony, and get everyone clapping for you, and then get your picture taken with your parents for it. I hope the mom that took the pictures for the event posts them soon, I'm so anxious to see them! We're going to start on our very first badge, which I'm excited about. It seems like everything has been such a big rush, but I'm glad we can calm it down and get to work on a few things now. I'm kind of half hoping that the pen pal letters take a little time, because I want to get this patch under our belt, but at the same time, I hope they're on time, because if one of my meetings runs short, i need a time killer to get us through. I really wish that class I was taking on time killers was the one I took on the 5th. Gotta wait till November 6th for that class though. Oh well, we'll make the most of it, see what we can't do. I'm hoping to find some things to do for the Juliette Gordon Low birthday party at the end of the month, which is also part of our patch that we're earning. I'm researching on the internet what we could do. I hope I find stuff! We have parent/teacher conferences on the 14th. I was surprised when Ryan's homeroom teacher said she wanted to meet with us. For the last two years, his teachers didn't want to meet with us, didn't feel it was necessary. Now suddenly he makes it to 5th grade, and she's asking to see us. Makes me wonder if she's having problems with him that he needs to fix, or what the case is. I hope everything is okay, and that there are no problems with him. I expect that we'll be talking to Journey's teacher, since the lower grades almost always have parent/teacher conferences. Journey lost her form to let me know when the conference was, so luckily I emailed the teacher and found out the time. Glad I thought to do that instead of waiting till Monday to ask what's going on! Kids already got their costumes for the year. Last month to be exact. Ryan is going as Ash Ketchum from Pokemon, and Journey's going as Pikachu, his Pokemon buddy. They're going to look so cute together! I'll probably take pictures of them before we go trick or treating at Wildewood again this year. I can't wait for a year when Halloween falls on a Friday or a Saturday, so we can go up to Jenn's house and trick or treat there instead. Other than that, not much else going on. |
| So, I was going to write in here another time, but I figured if I waited until the evaluation results IEP, that it would be too long. Some interesting stuff going on with that. At first it was a meeting set to discuss the evaluations they did on Journey, and to see where she sat with needing an IEP, scheduled for 11:45 am, and then suddenly they decided to bring in an autism specialist, and change the time to accommodate her at 1:15 pm. I'm extremely curious as to why they're bringing in an autism specialist. I mean, it's possible that they would bring one in to tell me "We tested her, she doesn't have it", but couldn't they do that without the specialist being there? Which leads me to believe that maybe they see that she does have it, and they're bringing in the specialist to let us know that they found she fits on the spectrum. I don't know, it could be anything, but I thought it was pretty interesting. If they do find that she fits on the spectrum, I'm definitely taking that diagnosis to her developmental pediatrician, and letting him know that they found it, and we need an official diagnosis from him. I'm not going to get too excited or worked up about this though, like I said, it could be any reason why they bring her in, and I just don't know. That's the reason I can think of though. Maybe I'm wrong. Our Brownie investiture/re-dedication ceremony is going on today. I'm really excited for the girls! They get their vests today, and all the insignia that goes with it. I can't wait to see little Brownie vests at our meetings! I've gotten all my patches in so far, so all I need to do is get ribbon and create sashes for our Court of Awards ceremony to hand out the girls' patches to them. I'm very excited! I hope the girls are too! We'll be starting our first badge this month, right after the investiture/re-dedication ceremony. I already ordered those patches too! So excited! (I know I keep saying that, but I can't help it!) Off to go get some stuff ready for today... |
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