A Week, Briefly (9/30/19)
I wish I had a simple, happy homeschool week to report.
The "It was a hard week" pattern is getting very old.
But . . . It was a hard week.
As in 911 calls, police escorts, and a helicopter search for my child hard.
Plus more.
There are a lot of emotional and behavioral ramifications for the whole family when Brother dissociates.
A friend--who dropped everything when I called--found Brother at a local park. Two incredibly kind police officers helped us get him safely to his room where Super Star and I saw him through the raging end of his episode.
Our insurance case manager recommended that we turn to CPS for help because we're not making progress on our own, and the Regional Office still hasn't assigned us a Resource Case Manager.
My therapist and I discussed the idea, and we agree that calling CPS is actually not a good idea. She gave us some suggestions for guiding a decision-making process, and Sir Walter Scott and I are praying fervently for heavenly guidance about what to do for our boy and for our family.
How cool is it that this popped up in my blog feed this very morning!!??
I say Heavenly Father hears and answers prayers.
We do our best to have normal life in between the crises.
6 Morning Meetings
6 Evening Readings
3 Academies
3 Symposiums
3 Colloquiums
During one of the Colloquiums, Nature Angel and Little Princess got to experience life with fewer joints than usual.
It helped us recognize the blessing having all of our joints!
We had a couple of Jr. Kindergarten sessions.
We did some science of color activities and crafts.
And the Academy crew wrote a color poem about winter because we read Frederick by Leo Leonni.
We played with playdough and Legos.
We had our extremely cool Tuesday morning adventure!!!
The teens turned in their The Good and the Beautiful Unit 2 art projects.
The teens also turned in essays about Johnathan Edwards' sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
Belle made me actually laugh as she told me, "I love this essay! It's so fun to write this essay!"
It is clear in her writing that she told me the truth. Her essay shines with joy.
We made it to page 278 of The Book Thief. (It's 550 pages long.)
The teens were supposed to turn in 10 page reports on the British Isles this week, but with almost daily emergencies, their study time has been severely compromised. I pushed the deadline out to next week.
Between crises, we all did as much individual school as we could.
Sir Walter Scott took Beowulf to an OT assessment because it seems to me he's losing his fine motor skills.
He sat perfectly still, made appropriate eye contact with the evaluator, and performed every fine motor skill perfectly!
The little monster!
Neither Sir Walter Scott nor I have ever in our lives seen him be so cooperative, organized, or skilled!!!!!!
The evaluator said that sometimes happens.
She did find that even though he passes his eye exams every year, his eyes don't track correctly, and that might be why he fidgets and struggles and messes around during school at home. She referred us to a pediatric ophthalmologist. We'll see where that goes. (No pun intended!)
We only have 4 dance practices left before our first show of the semester. We're in the panicky, we'll-never-be-ready-in-time stage. But somehow, in years past, we always have been, so we're doing our best to trust that Heavenly Father will bless our efforts for the good of the nursing home residents we seek to serve.
It's General Conference weekend. We get to stay home, eat snacks, and have our spiritual buckets filled. We spent the week reviewing favorite moments from April's conference, and preparing questions for which we seek answers.
Anyone can watch! Feel free to join us!
The "It was a hard week" pattern is getting very old.
But . . . It was a hard week.
As in 911 calls, police escorts, and a helicopter search for my child hard.
Plus more.
There are a lot of emotional and behavioral ramifications for the whole family when Brother dissociates.
A friend--who dropped everything when I called--found Brother at a local park. Two incredibly kind police officers helped us get him safely to his room where Super Star and I saw him through the raging end of his episode.
Our insurance case manager recommended that we turn to CPS for help because we're not making progress on our own, and the Regional Office still hasn't assigned us a Resource Case Manager.
My therapist and I discussed the idea, and we agree that calling CPS is actually not a good idea. She gave us some suggestions for guiding a decision-making process, and Sir Walter Scott and I are praying fervently for heavenly guidance about what to do for our boy and for our family.
How cool is it that this popped up in my blog feed this very morning!!??
I say Heavenly Father hears and answers prayers.
We do our best to have normal life in between the crises.
6 Morning Meetings
6 Evening Readings
3 Academies
3 Symposiums
3 Colloquiums
During one of the Colloquiums, Nature Angel and Little Princess got to experience life with fewer joints than usual.
It helped us recognize the blessing having all of our joints!
We had a couple of Jr. Kindergarten sessions.
We did some science of color activities and crafts.
And the Academy crew wrote a color poem about winter because we read Frederick by Leo Leonni.
We played with playdough and Legos.
We had our extremely cool Tuesday morning adventure!!!
The teens turned in their The Good and the Beautiful Unit 2 art projects.
 |
| Belle's |
 |
| Super Star's |
Belle made me actually laugh as she told me, "I love this essay! It's so fun to write this essay!"
It is clear in her writing that she told me the truth. Her essay shines with joy.
We made it to page 278 of The Book Thief. (It's 550 pages long.)
The teens were supposed to turn in 10 page reports on the British Isles this week, but with almost daily emergencies, their study time has been severely compromised. I pushed the deadline out to next week.
Between crises, we all did as much individual school as we could.
 |
| Latin video lesson late at night |
 |
| Because reindeer antlers make science more fun! |
He sat perfectly still, made appropriate eye contact with the evaluator, and performed every fine motor skill perfectly!
The little monster!
Neither Sir Walter Scott nor I have ever in our lives seen him be so cooperative, organized, or skilled!!!!!!
The evaluator said that sometimes happens.
She did find that even though he passes his eye exams every year, his eyes don't track correctly, and that might be why he fidgets and struggles and messes around during school at home. She referred us to a pediatric ophthalmologist. We'll see where that goes. (No pun intended!)
We only have 4 dance practices left before our first show of the semester. We're in the panicky, we'll-never-be-ready-in-time stage. But somehow, in years past, we always have been, so we're doing our best to trust that Heavenly Father will bless our efforts for the good of the nursing home residents we seek to serve.
It's General Conference weekend. We get to stay home, eat snacks, and have our spiritual buckets filled. We spent the week reviewing favorite moments from April's conference, and preparing questions for which we seek answers.
Anyone can watch! Feel free to join us!
Oh my!! Helicopters searching too. I am so sorry. I just spent the day at a special needs transition to adulthood conference listening to person after person tell me there were few to no services for my high function teen. Se la vie, I will just have to do it myself. But, I am so sorry that you are not getting faster help. You do an amazing job of making the peaceful moments beautiful. To try and take care of yourself. It is so hard to be the non stop caregiver.
ReplyDeleteBlessings, Dawn
Reindeer antlers definitely make science more fun! You do such a great job with fun hands on activities. I think I used to but with juggling activities and grand babies I feel like I shorted Emmie in that somehow. I am so sorry that you are still unable to get the help you need. I cannot even imagine the struggles you all are dealing with every day. I am praying for you all!
ReplyDeleteI know there are families who've had to surrender kids to CPS to get them the help they need. Seems like a sucky solution to me, but that's the way the system works. :(
ReplyDeleteThe fewer joints experience sounds like the lightbulb moment I had at Shriners this week. I heard about plug in legs, and asked our prosthetist about them. He explained that they can tell whether you're going up or down hill, how fast you're walking, etc, and you control the leg with an app on your phone. I was reminded how amazing our Creator is to have made us so intricately that science and technology struggle to recreate His work.
My son, Jack, is also reading The Book Thief.
There's a specific test you should consider asking the Ped Op about. Vertical alignment. Made a huge difference for my friend's daughter.
Hang in there, mama.