So I clearly should not have said something.
Around 1:30 AM, the Monster woke up and started talking to himself, despite the melatonin. By 1:45, it was clear that we had to leave the hotel room, or he’d end up waking up R, and ensuring that his mother would be up all night. So, as happens when we go on vacation, I decided to take him out in the car and pray that he’d go to sleep eventually.
Yeah… ‘eventually’ was about 6 AM. Continue reading
The biggest problem we’ve had, since the diagnosis, honestly is traveling. We usually handle the ‘travel’ portion of the entire itinerary just fine, but as you, my faithful readers, have seen, it’s the overnights that give us trouble.
I can handle meltdowns in amusement parks, and I can handle the Monster’s finicky eating when we’re out and about. What I can’t handle is a constant lack of sleep. Continue reading
When I was a kid, like almost everyone else in our country, I used to go somewhere to see the fireworks.
Ironically, for us, the issue is actually not the Monster, because he loves fireworks. The issue is R, who can’t stay up that late routinely if we’re going to want him to be useful the next day. Continue reading
I’ve been very big about the fact that I’m not willing to do things without decent scientific evidence. Our kids are vaccinated, for instance, because the overwhelming evidence is that it’s what is best for them (and that it doesn’t cause Autism). We haven’t gone GFCF because there’s no evidence that the diet does anything to help with the symptoms of the Monster’s Autism.
But there are things where there’s a suggestion from a few decently-done studies that indicates that something might work… and you just have to try it. Continue reading
Now that it’s hot enough on weekends, and we’re past Memorial Day, we’re finding time to go take the kids to the pool.
The Monster is swimming twice daily at his day camp, but there’s no reason for us not to go swimming ourselves at the JCC… and they do have a fabulous outdoor pool complex here. Continue reading
I’m fortunate enough to work for a large company that has one of the biggest, rarest perks in the business world – a paid sabbatical program. Once every five years, I get a four-week paid sabbatical from the office (besides all of my copious PTO)… and my fifth year anniversary with my company passed in November. It’s time for me to take the break.
My wife and I are planning for an actual “adults” vacation – we’re going away without the kids. Continue reading
If it’s summer, it must be time to go catch a ballgame.
As I mentioned multiple times last season, I do love baseball. I grew up mostly listening to baseball on the radio – I still don’t exactly “get into” watching it on television – but there’s still just one real way to experience the game, and that’s at the ballpark. Continue reading
So, as I mentioned on my tweet feed, I’m on a business trip this week. I don’t travel often for work – perhaps two or three times a year – and it’s as disruptive as you can imagine.
As I write this, I’m looking out my hotel window at La Vista, Nebraska… and the mostly empty terrain around my hotel. (Apparently there was supposed to be a shopping district put in here, but it fell through.) I’d be out doing something else, but I’m more than a little tired due to the hour I had to get up so I could get here, so I’ll be going to bed shortly to try to get myself reset for tomorrow. Continue reading
Hopefully, this is my last IEP-related post for a while. 🙂
As most parents of special needs children with IEPs know, the process can either be very easy or very tiring, with most tending towards the latter rather than the former. It’s the reading over the reports before showing up at the meetings, figuring out what the reports are missing and where you have documentation to fill those gaps, where you have evidence to contradict the reports from the teachers, where you have doubts… and then showing up for the meeting to slug it out and sure that you’re writing a document that has the child’s best interest involved in it. Continue reading
Today’s IEP meeting was not really much of a change from what we had before.
The goal, to us, was to get the Monster an aide for next year. He’s moving back to his zone school, and while that’s a Good Thing, we’re really sure there are enough supports in place. Continue reading