Last week

The last week has been a blur and this one is going to be worse- the crazy dance recitals are this weekend, and I am swamped.

Akila was gone on an overnight last Thursday night. All the 5th graders go to a YMCA camp and do the Underground Railroad simulation. I did this in college and it was an intense experience, and also brought my high school students I worked with to do it several times. I am hoping to connect with the staff today to see how Akila handled it. They start it at dark and it is very intense, did I say that yet?

We were told to pack two pair of shoes, one that can get muddy. I did. She of course wore her new pair for the simulation, and they have you walk through a swamp during the escape. Shoes are ruined. She started raging immediately on Friday a fter school that we needed to go buy new shoes. Yesterday was 50% off at Unique Thrift Store, and thankfully we found a pair there.

Saturday night, Akila and I went to one of my old student's houses to babysit her 19 month old son so she and her husband could have a night out. It was a nice peaceful evening and Akila played really well with the little sweetie pie.

On Sunday after church, we were going to some neighbor friends for a late lunch barbecue, they live on our same block. They gave us the choice of lunch or dinner, we choose lunch thinking we could be there on medicated time. They live on the same block as us and have a 3 year old birth child, and adopted a baby in December who is 6 months old and is African American. On our block, there are three families who have adopted children, and we all happen to be white with Black children. Interesting!

Anyway, Akila was having a hard time. She started fixating on wanting to play with a toy that was special to the 3 year old, and she would not move on. It was not fun.

After we left, I had to go and pick up Raven, the senior in high school that I mentor. She has until this Friday to finish 3 extra courses on top of her normal daytime load. One class is on-line, and the other two are at a transition school, where she has to complete packets and go and take tests. She was over last Monday, Friday and Sunday until 11:00 pm working on all this stuff. She was suppose to come over last night also, but did not.

Last night, at bedtime, Akila had an extreme rage and thankfully, Michael was the one on location. I was upstairs getting the other kids in bed when it started. It started outside and Michael eventually ended up restraining her in the living room. I went outside and picked up the stuff she had been playing with, and came inside to tag team. He went upstairs to finish bedtime, and I tried to get Akila calmed down.

This was one of the first times Michael has restrained her alone, and it seemed to work really well. When I am restraining her, she can't stand it when he comes around as she is a mommy's girl for sure. It takes me forever to calm her down, even after the restraint. When he left the room after restraining her, I had her come and sit in my lap and I stroked her and gave her some good old fashioned sensory touch, and she calmed down much more quickly than I have ever seen.

I would not want Michael to always be the one to restrain her, but this experience showed that he should be the one to do it more often so we can work so well as a team and de-escalate her more quickly.

Today after school is going to be tough, I am anticipating it. My neighbor has to drive her FAS daughter to southern Wisconsin to a residential treatment facility, and her two younger children are staying over night with us. This will cause lots of conflict with Akila, and it is Michael's super late night to work of the month. I am going to check the weather and hope for no rain so we can go to the park and try to keep busy.