Don’t Take It Personally

Around this time last year, I mentioned that G has a phobic fear of needles that triggers his most physically violent behavior.  He hits, kicks, headbutts, looks for things to throw and tries to run away.  Fortunately, this reaction cropped up at the very end of the vaccine schedule.  We took him for his kindergarten shots and discovered we could only get 2 of the 3 because the 3rd needed to wait until after his birthday.  So we got the two, which he found shockingly painful, and when we returned for the 3rd he completely freaked out.  We got it done, but it was incredibly difficult.

When it comes to the seasonal flu vaccine, we either skip it and take our chances, or we search out the flumist.  Last year, we went the flumist route and drove 100+ miles to my mother’s county where the health dept had it stocked.  It went very smoothly, G was very interested in how it worked and was relieved not to need a shot.  He was very cooperative and I really thought I had the issue figured out.

With the H1N1 vaccine, the first batches available in our county were the nasal variety and were reserved for the highest risk group, 2-4 year olds, but future batches were uncertain.  Given G’s reaction to shots and my desire to have him vaccinated, I kicked into advocate mode.  I spoke several times to our health dept, shamelessly playing the Autism Card and eventually wore them down.  They agreed that if there was any nasal spray available after their walk-in clinic for the 2-4 age group, then I could make an appointment and get G the first dose of nasal spray.  I figured chances were good that they would get at least one more delivery of nasal vaccine by the time of their next clinic and we’d be good to go!

 I had prepared G for the visit to the health dept and he was agreeable.  Until we arrived.  From the moment we sat down and I started filling out the paperwork, he started getting worked up.  He got tense and fussy and started repeating that this was going to kill him.  I got him calmed down and thought we were back on track but the second his name was called he jumped up and started running out the door.  I got him corralled and walked him into the exam room.  We explained the procedure to reassure him, but it was too late.  He was screaming that it was poison and we were trying to kill him.  He tried running away again.  I got him on my lap and the nurse told me to hold him down.  I had his arms crossed over his torso, my legs wrapped around his  but couldn’t do anything about his head, which slammed into my mouth.  Then he tried to headbutt the nurse.  He got free and tried to trash the room.  After about 20-30 minutes of this, the nurse gave up and said it wasn’t going to work.  We left unvaccinated.

I was crushed.  I worked so hard to get special permission for G so that it would be easier on him.  I felt betrayed and unappreciated.  It was very difficult for me to remember that he was not in control of his actions, that he was in a severe fight-or-flight frame of mind that had nothing to do with logic.  Situations like this are so difficult.  I believe in vaccination and believe that this vaccination in particular is important.  But G’s needs are in direct opposition.  What’s a mom to do?  Should I ask for a sedative of some sort to be prescribed?  Should I bring him in and have him held down for the shot, which is one dose instead of two and requires less cooperation than the nasal spray?  Or should I give it up and keep our fingers crossed that we don’t get sick?

Pencil’s Are Obsolete

G has a recurring problem with behavior and defiance during spelling/handwriting time in school.  He refuses to do his daily spelling worksheet, gets angry, throws things and gets physical with the teacher.  We discussed the inappropriateness of this behavior daily and were starting to get through to him.  So instead of lashing out he started running away – out of the classroom and out of the building.  Luckily, there is a phone in every classroom so his teacher has been able to call the office and get someone to intercept him. 

Whenever I tell someone this story the first question is, “Do you think second grade is too much for him and he should go back to first?”  I cannot tell you how enraging this is.  I feel like the person is questioning my judgement as a parent.  And I’ll admit this is because deep down I am very insecure about our decision to jump him. 

The problem G has with spelling isn’t the content of the academic work.  Of the 100 words all second graders are expected to know without error by the end of the year, G knows 97 of them now.  His teacher has a great program where each child gets a weekly spelling worksheet with 8 words chosen for the individual child.  G is already working off an accelerated list and is doing well with learning to spell them.  The problem is with the writing.  While his mind is in the 2nd-3rd grade level, his handwriting is still in the moderate kindergarten range.  We try to work writing in everywhere we can and he simply refuses to cooperate.  With great effort, I can usually get him to comply at home but in school he’s taken it to extreme levels.

I’ve been very worried that we pushed him too hard when we decided to skip first grade and have been wondering if we should pull him back.  I’ve been going over and over our decision making criteria and each time I reach the same conclusion, that 2nd grade is the best fit for him.  Then he throws another tantrum and I start the cycle all over again.

I went to pick G up from school yesterday and found the Sped teacher waiting for me outside his classrooom.  These impromptu conferences are a mixed bag, sometimes good and sometimes bad, so I started feeling adrenaline rush through me.  This one turned out to be one of the good ones.   She wanted to float the idea of taking G to the resource room for spelling/writing to work with him individually but needed my approval.  She also discussed using that time to teach G keyboarding skills.  If he can pick up typing, then he can get an alphasmart assigned to him and can use it in the classroom to type out his work instead of writing it.  She also reassured me that we had made the right decision to jump G to 2nd grade.  His intellect is too advanced to sit in a 1st grade classroom without becoming bored.  Boredom causes behavior issues and they would have ended up pulling him out of the class for accelerated work, he’d miss social opportunities with his home class, which would cause more behavior issues.  Basically, they believe behavior problems are unavoidable at this point and would rather work them out in the proper academic setting for G.  I’m breathing a bit easier.

I spoke with a teacher friend of mine later that day and she said she’d had students in the past with this kind of  writing accommodation and it always worked out well.  When I asked if we weren’t giving up on teaching him to write too soon, she said the writing will come easier if we don’t try to force it.  That makes a lot of sense to me – I’ve always found that letting skills evolve with little nudges was more effective with G than trying to force it.  I just didn’t think we had the luxury of that in this situation.  I am so pleased that there may be an answer to this issue and that the school proposed the accommodation.  I’m really impressed with their desire to meet kids at their individual level rather than trying to press them into the mold of a model student.

Now we just need to teach him to type!!

Help, Please

Two days of school.

Two visits to the Principal’s office.

One phone call from the principal.

One meeting planned for the team to discuss new strategies.

If anyone has any strategies that have worked to address hitting/kicking/biting others out of frustration, I could really use some help.

Summer is Hard

I feel like my title could be my entire post.  Summer break is hard.  Not having a specific routine is hard.  Creating daily schedules so G feels secure is hard. 

G is in a 4 day summer camp this week and it was easy to get back into the swing of getting him up, feeding him breakfast, packing his lunch and taking him somewhere.  It was easy not because I got to drop my kid off somewhere, but because G seemed so relieved to be going somewhere.  In a sense, it’s as if he can’t wait to leave us.  I know it’s because on days like this the routine is rigid.  We have to be out the door at a certain time so all the morning activities have to be accomplished in a timely manner.  Once he gets to camp/school, they have a list of activities to accomplish that requires focus and scheduling.  He thrives on this, and while we try our best, we’re just not able to provide that level of rigidity.

From the parent’s perspective, I can’t wait for school to begin again.  (19 days!)  On monday, after I dropped G off at camp, I realized how much stress I was under when I sat down and relaxed with a quiet cup of coffee.  Without really being aware of it, I had reverted to survival mode.  Where every day the goal is to avoid a major meltdown by appeasing in some places and drawing a firm line in others.  In this mode, I’m not focused on working through issues or teaching new skills, I’m just focusing on keeping G’s mood even.  It is not a fun place to be – and I don’t think it’s a particularly productive place to be either because we’re not really progressing in any way.  It’s like we’re just holding our breath all summer. 

I wish we could keep him enrolled in camp activities all summer, but that isn’t financially feasible.  We enrolled him in as many as we could, and tried to space them out so there was one camp each month, but this last stretch between camps was a long one.  Maybe next time we move we should consider a year round school type environment.  The good news, is that we’ve almost made it.  In 19 days he’ll have a stable routine to count on.

Until Thanksgiving when the holiday hoopla begins.

Grace Under Pressure

We decided to take G to our town’s 4th of July parade, which is a huge event here.  We had G bring his fur earmuffs, which he loves to stroke as a soother and helps muffle the noise.  Those worked pretty well and we were at the parade for about 30 minutes before problems developed.

The various groups in the parade throw candy to the children.  And the very nice and lovely people around us (said sincerely) made sure G got plenty of candy, probably surmising there was something not typical about our family as our child was wearing fur earmuffs in July.  We intercepted as much as possible and let G eat about every 5th piece.  But sugar shorts G’s system.  For example, after one too many indulgences, my in-laws learned the hard way to tell G the ice cream shop in their town is closed 5 days a week. 

So there we are, in front of the entire town, when we realized a meltdown was iminent.  We started hustling G away from the parade when he started mugging DH for the rest of his candy.  He had his hands in DH’s pockets and was screaming at the top of his lungs for DH to hand it over.  He fell to the ground, kicking and screaming.  He swung out at us and kicked out at us, although he didn’t connect much.  He shrieked for 30 seconds at a time, stopping only to take another breath.  He screamed that he hated us and hoped we would die.  He squirmed his hand out of ours and tried to bolt away.

What was different this time is how calm DH and I were able to be.  Public meltdowns have always been very difficult for me because of the embarrassment factor.  I tear up or I get short with G, making a bad situation worse.  This time we were both able to keep our voices calm but firm.  When G swung at us we calmly took a step back, keeping him from feeling crowded or cornered.  When he ran from us we were able to scoot ahead and cut him off, changing his direction without touching him.

We got him back to the car and got him calmed down.  These events are always a bit depressing.  I feel sad seeing first hand the difficulties G has from time to time.  But I feel pretty good about how we handled it.  Maybe we’re finally learning a thing or two.