August Came in Like a Lion

 How are there words to describe what we've been through?

August began harmlessly enough.

 

Brother continued to be difficult to keep safe, and we continued to have to try to keep the family safe from him.

 

We were able to get his intake appointment for mental health services taken care of earlier by asking to be put on the cancellation list, and we got a call!

 

But then they gave us a first appointment for September 15th!   

6 weeks of waiting for help.

 

Sir Walter Scott and I worked on rearranging bedrooms so that we can create a safe room.  As we worked, I left some potatoes in the oven too long, and they roasted into hard shells.

I threw them all over the lawn, and the kids had a "dinosaur egg" hunt.

The apples on our tree are ripe.

The best day of the week was the day we got new windows and doors in our living room and kitchen.  This has been a long saving and planning process, and I'm super impressed with the company. We love, love, love having plenty of light, changing the flow of the entry/exit spaces so that we have a usable living room, and having the house be more energy efficient.

We got paneling (but not trim) up on the wall of the boys' room (they can't kick through this heavy duty exterior paneling the way they can kick through drywall).  All of the kids had a happy day pulling down wallpaper . . . we have a long way to go to finish!

Ladybug found this dead dragonfly.  It was being eaten by ants, but the kids brushed it off and brought their treasure to me.  Even partially eaten and broken, we were astonished by its beauty.

And then our world was rocked by one of Brother's rages.

The trauma to us all was severe, and we spent the weekend drawing, coloring, sleeping, and otherwise very quietly protecting ourselves and resting.

 

I'm not recording the details here.

Brother spent several days at the acute care psych hospital--I had to beg for an extra 24 hours to try to get some resources in place.  They gave us the hours, but we are only on waitlists, so we have no services.  

 

And we are not eligible for residential care because Brother doesn't have a state-recognized IEP.  Though I am homeschooling legally, our plan does not suffice. 

The hospital released him happily with no recommendations for further care or safety plan whatsoever.  When I said, "We'll do our best to keep him from having to come back, but don't be surprised if he's back in the next 48 hours," they just smilingly promised that they'd be here if we need them.

I was angry.

But we had a hope . . . a maybe plan . . . a dog.

Meet Toby.

He's a 1-or-so-year-old rescue dog.

By description, he's exactly what I was not looking for, but in person, he's exactly right.

Our first beagle (Theo) is energetic, noisy, and adventurous.

This beagle is gentle, quiet, and timid.

As I write, Brother has successfully reached out to give love and affection to Toby and staved off massive rages several times over.

Yes, we are well aware that usually sharing an animal with an aggressive child is a bad idea.  We've gone over the pros and cons again and again, and all I can say is that it feels inspired, and it is working.

Even if this plan isn't enough, we are on waitlists for in-home help.  And if that still isn't enough, and we find a residential care facility that will take Brother without an IEP, then Toby will be soothing for the rest of us.

(We do have to figure out how to get Theo to accept Toby, but as they live on different floors in our home, it's okay so far.)

Brother says, "I'm so glad we have Toby.  It feels so good to hug him."

In addition, Brother gets to take Toby on most of his walks--something that was part of our days in 2020, our best year ever with Brother.  

 

I'm counting my miracles where I see them!

Walks, Toby, waitlists.

That's where we are.

And we're still doing home improvement projects . . .

 

The work is so empowering for the kids.

 

And some good news!!!  Brother was accidentally assigned to a therapist who does not work with children.  The office called us back and rescheduled us for next week instead of September 15th!  If we present our case right, he'll be assigned intensive in-home services and a case manager!

Lola met her psychiatrist.  

I like him.

I trust him.

We're busy with Vanderbilt assessment forms, scheduling her EKG and follow-up appointments, and we're nursing a great hope that Lola will have a working treatment plan in the next few months.

We took a vote and decided to start school.

 

No fanfare.

 

No celebrations.

 

Just pulling out bins and figuring out what to do.

 

Our routine is not in place . . . it will come with time and practice. 

We have a lot of appointments and end of summer activities to finish up, so school is slowly coming.

Belle took Nature Angel, Little Princess, and Friend H-- to Movies at the Beach one night. 

Belle and Nature Angel were able to go to Youth Conference one day.  They worked hard building beds for Sleep in Heavenly Peace, but they also had some classes, some fun activities, and then dinner and swimming at the end of the day.  This is the only pic I could find.

They built towers and let the babies knock them down.

End of summer swim party for the children's program at church.  Older and younger siblings were welcome to attend, so I took 8 of mine and 4 babies.  I didn't get a lot of picture-taking opportunities as I usually had a couple of babies in my arms, but we had a marvelous 2 hours!

School on the living room floor

Sharing school with a little brother while also bouncing Nugget

This is a T-Rex "hotel."  You can see the legs/feet and the tail.  They imagined all kinds of storybook characters living in the 2 apartments made by the legs.

Study carrels are all over the house these days.  Everyone finds them useful.

Language Arts is always more interesting with Sugar Bear standing on your books. :)  I love how my kids don't even stop doing schoolwork when babies are in the way.

Could there be a cuter jr. astronomer?!?  On the left of the pic is Nature Angel on the computer following weather forecasts and viewing predictions for the Perseid meteor shower.  Crazy summer thunderstorms rolled in on the very day she'd long reserved with Sir Walter Scott for a midnight field trip.  He honored his promise, and Belle and Nature Angel tagged along for the ride.  They drove nearly two hours into the country, but they couldn't get away from the clouds, so they watched an awesome lightning show instead of an awesome meteor shower.

Our babies love "doing school."

Nature Angel finished Unit 1 of TGTB high school 1.  She agonized over the insight journal assignment, but she did a great job.  This drawing was her final project.

We're taking 2 walks a day around the block with the doggies.  (Theo and Toby have made friends)  .8 mile per walk makes 1.6 miles per day.  The dogs could use more walking than that, but it's still hot!  For this week we completed 5 days X 1.6 miles = 8 miles.  I looked back at our 300 miles for the year tracking and found I'd stopped tracking at 18.2 miles.  18.2 + 8 = 26.2 miles.  Maybe we'll log some good mileage in the remainder of the year.

Here are the geography books we read this week.  We also started our dinosaur science study and read one chapter from A Child's First Book of American History.

Which reminds me that I need to get the posts about the 2021-22 plans put together! 

Brother has been mildly challenging this week, but we've had not a single emergency since adding Toby and twice daily walks to our schedule.  

Beowulf has been less challenging as I've acknowledged his fear and reassured him accordingly.  He's not doing great with school, but he only had one bad behavioral breakdown, and he's come to me for hugs and physical pressure to stave off panic.

We're still all insanely exhausted.  The kids play quietly more often than they used to, and Sir Walter Scott and I are often found dozing in our seats (usually with a baby sleeping in our arms).  

Our bedtime reading is Perloo the Bold by Avi.  We quite like it.  When we finish it, our reading will have an ancient history flavor as we switch to the novels I've chosen for Little Princess and Nature Angel.