Calendars, tokens & lists, oh my!

The below picture of our two month calendar (which is on a wall that I started to peel wall paper on over 7 years ago- ugh!), is a tool I love. All of my kids look at it daily to see what's coming up, and Akila especially loves it to know what is going on. It is magnetic, and we will attach other things on the bottom of it.

The next picture shows some post it notes with "calming techniques" that Akila is suppose to use when she is getting upset. Nice in theory, but she has not once used the ideas when she is getting mad. When I suggest them, it infuriates her. But we still refer to them and keep them.

The next two sheets explain her token system. Not a big fan of it, but we are giving it a try for the umpteenth time. It has helped a little.


This is my favorite thing hanging on the board right now. Last week one day, the boys asked to use my laptop. I thought they were playing a game. Instead, they typed up this list titled "Things To Do If We Are Board". I did not tell them to do it, I did not suggest it, they weren't even complaining of being bored which makes it all the more precious. I am going to type the list below in case you can't read the picture.

• Play the Wii
• Play Bionicles/Legos
• Play spies with stuffed animals
• Play with Nerf guns
• Wrestle
• Play super heroes
• Color super heroes
• Look at the internet on mom's laptop
• Memorize our bible verses
• Play PSP and DSI
• Watch movies on Netflix
• Play a board game
• Play outside
• Fight with light sabers
• Play table football
• Do latch hooks
• Watch TV channels
• Build with big and small blocks
• Help mom or dad
• Sit in beds and read
• Play hide and seek
• Make paper airplanes and fly them
• Play catch with a football

How precious is this? I was very impressed that they were doing this without prompting, and I was even more impressed with the list they put together. I am truly blessed!

Zeke, the chef!

Zeke's 3rd class has a partnership with a food co-op and have been studying food and sustainability and healthy eating. Several weeks ago, he came home from school and started cooking. He made a really healthy meal full of vegetables and we all loved it. I had posted a picture on Facebook, but I don't think I blogged about it. He has cooked at least 3 times since and uses leftovers and other odds and ends to make his meal, which always includes rice cuz he loves rice.

On Christmas Eve, we have appetizers and I was in the kitchen all day getting them ready and some food for Christmas Day. Zeke wanted to make his specialty also and I welcomed the help. The little cutie then set forth in getting it all organized at noon. He got out the cutting board, the herbs he would use, the knife, the can of beans, etc. He made a list of what he would need (which he added to several times throughout the day.

He made his meal which we all genuinely loved. Akila especially likes it and the great thing is there was a good amount of leftovers and it will feed us for a few days.

Merry Christmas!!

We had a very lovely and uneventful Christmas. Praise the Lord!!! Akila did a fantastic job and was actually better than normal. She did wake up at 2:15 and 3:15 on Christmas morning, but I was able to get her back to sleep and I was very thankful for that, since I had just gone to bed at 1:00.

We spent Christmas Eve at hour house with just our family and went to Michael's brothers on Christmas Day. The kids received gift cards to Target from both of my brothers and today I brought Akila to spend them. I hate doing this. She does not understand money concepts well and it usually takes at least an hour. We move from the clothing section, to the toy section, to the electronic section to the make up section to the baby section and then start the rounds over and hit them all at least twice, if not three times. But today, we started in the baby section, she chose a preemie out fit for a new doll, we then moved on to the toy section where she picked out a barbie, and two Liv doll products. It took awhile, but not forever, and she did not throw a single fit. Thank you Jesus!!!!

She has been playing with them since we got home, 3 hours ago. Imani has been helping her and playing with her. That is all I need for Christmas, several hours of play without her throwing fits. Yahoo.

Here is our Christmas card picture. The exposure lighting didn't turn out very good on the ones I sent out, but it works. Merry Christmas to everyone.

Knitting

I have mentioned that since Thanksgiving or so, Akila has been trying to knit. One of her PCA's knits and did it with her at the end of the summer. On Thanksgiving, she worked on it forever with my sister-in-law's help. I don't know how to knit, and I really am not interested. It is not my thing. But I may need to learn.

I did get her some knitting needles-I know, I'm living on the edge. They could become quite the weapons. I have warned her that she will not see them again if she even threatens to use them as a weapon. She has went to Grandma Kathy's next door for help on it- Kathy has helped her twice. Her in-home therapist last week helped her and for nearly two hours, Akila knit. The therapist was blown away by her attention span. It is truly amazing.

One day this week, Imani even agreed to knit with Akila. Imani took a knitting after school class a year or so ago, and has some great beginner knitting skills. She has helped Akila on and off the past few weeks. But the two of them sat in the living room and knit for quite awhile. Here are some pictures:

I think with some of her fine motor challenges, it is not something that she is picking up on very quickly. After many hours and lessons with various people, she still needs constant supervision with it. It is similar to when she took piano lessons years ago. She really struggled with putting her fingers on the right keys. I would help her to place them on the right keys, and they would immediately go back to their regular position.

You might also notice that Akila is wearing a coat. We do have a drafty old house, but she is constantly cold and asking me, I mean yelling at me, to turn up the heat. I tell her to wear a sweatshirt or sweater, but she never wants to. She prefers her winter coat. I have never been able to get her to wear a weighted vest, or use a weighted blanket, but I think the coat serves in the same capacity.

Barbie play, and I'm not talking about myself(never call me Barbie!)

This is Akila playing with her Barbie's in the living room. It is a mess, and we are not allowed to touch it or move anything. And yet we get in big trouble if someone accidentally steps on a piece and breaks it.

What is amazing is the length of time she can play with these, and I mean by herself. She played with them the majority of the day yesterday. She woke up and has been playing with them for 30 minutes already, and hasn't even taken her morning meds. At some point today, Imani will be gracious and play with her for awhile. It is never long enough in Akila's mind, but I am always very thankful and proud of Imani for doing it, as she does not like dolls very much.

I am thankful that Akila has the ability to entertain herself for periods of time. It would be really smooth if she were not bothered by the rest of us breathing, let alone walking through the room to go to a different room, or jumping on the floor above her. I think I may have mentioned before that we have big problems over her trying to find a certain barbie accessory, like a shoe. If she can't find it immediately, the entire family is accused of stealing it in an attempt to "terrorize" her. Everything has to be halted and we need to search for the missing item. When I am not willing to stop everything and help her find an item, look out. We are sure to end up in a physical altercation. She is usually happy with just an attempt, if unsuccessful in the search, she will be mad and have some more choice words, but she usually won't get physical.

She of course remembers every detail of how a certain barbie came in the package, and wants to find the original shoe or earring they were wearing when they were new. She will end up spending forever trying to get all the pieces she wants to play with, and then when it is bedtime or time to go, she freaks out because she hasn't gotten to play yet. This really confused me for awhile, as she had been playing with them for hours, literally (while she takes frequent breaks to yell and scream at us for living). I then realized that she was upset as she had spent the majority of the time gathering the items she wanted, and didn't end up playing with them as much as she wanted.

But, this Christmas season, I am truly thankful that Akila is home. I am thankful that she has not gotten as violent as she was before she went to the crisis home in early September. I am thankful that she is playing well even though there are plenty of hiccups, her ability to play is a true blessing for which I am thankful.

Harassment

Akila's class must recently have had a discussion on harassment. She now thinks she is the queen of calling out when she thinks someone is harassing. Yet she is totally oblivious to the fact that she is in fact the queen of harassment in our house. She is constantly harassing all of us, but especially the other 3 kids.

Today was day 6 of a 17 day winter break. Yes, 17 days. I know that must be making all of you sick to the stomach, like it does to me-unless you're a teacher. We had a PCA at the beginning of the week, but today was day 1 of 5 days with no PCA. Lord help me.

This is how the day goes: Akila brings all of her barbie doll stuff down into the living room to play. She wants to be as close to me as possible and I am usually in the kitchen area. She will not play them in her room- drives me nuts. The kids usually play in our pool room (a big family room with an indoor pool, which has been drained and is now our toy pit, with area rugs in it). Imani has been gone at a friends for two days, a kind of respite for her. The boys sometimes go up to their bedroom to play. When they are upstairs, they can get loud. They are boys. They horse around, wrestle, have fun. Akila can't stand it. She goes nuts every time they go upstairs and make any kind of noise. If Hezekiah jumps out of his bunkbed she loses it. She is constantly harping on me to go harp on them. Even when I explain to her that they are fine, there is no need for me to yell at them.

But this doesn't satisfy her. She gets extremely worked up, and decides to take the matter into her own hands- which means I have to intervene or she will go up and start a fight with them. This happened today at least 15 times, I think way more than that actually. They were playing quietly in the pool room at one point, and she went down there and was yelling at them for the way they were playing a game. Then she starts to accuse them of harassing her. This, after about 10 minutes of harassing them.

On Sunday, Akila was in the pool room with the kids when she started to accuse them of harassing her. They were telling her that she was the one who was harassing when she calls mom a stupid white woman. I have said the same thing to her, several times and tried to have a discussion about harassment. She never listens. But she did kind of listen to them and agreed with them. It was kind of cool. But I am still being called names, and so are they.

The part of the lesson from school that seemed to stick in her brain is that if you do or say something over and over again, it is harassment. So, when she starts to call me on harassment when I am giving her a direction, and repeating the instructions, I then point out to her that she just threatened to kill me three times in a row. Clear cut case of harassment. Not in her court of law. I lose every time.

Gory details, sorry in advance

I have not been feeling well for over a week, hence my silence. I feel better, just in time for a two plus week break- yey!!! NOT! My kids have the next two weeks off plus the Monday after New Years. According to my calculations, that is 17 days- way too long!!!

I debated over filling you in on the gory details, and since I don't have good filters, I am going to share a little. I have learned I am prone to cysts. I had one last June that got infected, the weekend of our spring recital, by my eyebrow. My entire eye was swollen shut one day, and it was a mess for over a week until I got on antibiotics. I have always had a tiny one on my lower rib cage, for at least 7 years. Well, it decided a few weeks ago to get infected. It also decided to be very painful and grow to the size of a golfball. And to come with other complications like a fever, body aches and cough. It was not fun. It was not pretty. I finally had to go to urgent care to have it lanced. Round of antibiotics. Totally disgusting.

Today, I had my annual dermatology appt since I obviously have skin issues (I have several moles that are suspiscious also, so I do get an annual check up). The cyst has been draining and gross for two weeks. The dermo said it is still not good. She drained a bunch more. More gory details. It hurts really bad. Imagine the underground zits that are uncomfortable, times 1,000. Maybe 100,000, or more. And imagine coughing with a golf ball size infected disgusting thing on your rib cage. Nuff said. I have been miserable.

I guess it is not nuff said. I was hoping the dermo would cut it out today. They just keep re-occuring til they are completely cut out, like a baloon that keeps refilling. Gross, I know. Well, she said it is so big I need to have a surgeon remove it. Not happy about that. I have already had 10 surgeries in my life (not to mention how much it is going to cost!). None of them are big deals either. Six knee surgeries, appendicitus, tonselectomy, thyroid nodule removed- stupid stuff like that. Now add removal of disgusting fowl smelling sack of pus to the list. I am one hot chick I tell you. Now, nuff said.

Akila has been home for over two weeks. We have had our rough patches, that is for sure. There were a few days in a row, where she was quite violent, not til after one good week. I was very nervous, still am. But she has had 5 good days in a row. Doesn't mean I haven't been hit. I was hit and poked several times tonight. But with different intensity. And the previous 4 good days, I was not hit at all. I am so grateful for that.

I think the Lord knew from prayers that we needed some good days. It was very scary to see her heading to the extreme violence again. She did not get there, but she was headed there. I am not saying that we are out of the woods. I fully know she will get nutty again, and probably soon. But I am so thankful when the Lord knows we need the break.

Last week, Imani was praying at the dinner table when Akila was gone at dance. She prayed, "Jesus, thank you for this break tonight from Akila- even though we just had 3 months of a break". That said a lot. We talked a lot with the kids about what it would be like when Akila returned. I don't think they fully understood. Even though they know all too well what it is to live with Akila, they were so longing for her to return home, that they didn't really remember what it would be like. Now they do.

We have had to remind them all multiple times a day, to not "respond". When Akila is going off on them for riducous things, they need to not respond. When she is going off on Zeke for the way he is making Ramen noodles, he needs to not respond. When she is calling me a "stupid white person", I need to not respond. When she is going off on Imani for watching too much TV, she needs to not respond. When she is going off on Hezekiah for eating food she thought was hers, he needs to not respond.

She is trying to get a reaction. She will sit and argue back and forth a million times. She has to have the last word. She is always right. No matter how stupid what she is saying is. I just agree. I'm sure it looks ridiculous to most outside people. But it is not worth the fight. Yes Akila, "there is school tomorrow". Even when there isn't. I don't say that right away, I try to help her see the truth. I show her the school calendar hanging up in the kitchen. I bring her to the computer and show her the facts. If she is still arguing, I just agree. At this point, before this point, she is escalating big time. I agree all the time to try and avoid the escalation. It only works maybe 1/2 the time. But that is more than all the other methods (like trying to get her to count to 10, take a break in her room, do jumping jacks, squeeze clay, etc.).

She has started to see an OT. The best line of the week last week was when the OT was asking her about some of the foods she likes. She asked Akila if she likes licorice. Akila said, "No, but my dad let me try liquor once and I liked it". I thought I was going to explode from trying not to laugh or react. We have no liquor in our house. Her dad has had one beer in his entire life. You may be thinking she was confused as the two words sound the same. She knew what she was saying. She went on and on fabricating a story about how her dad gave her liquor and she liked it. She was laughing in a sort of evil way also. She refered to it as alcohol at one point. She knew. She knew.

White elephant, explain that to a FASD kiddo

On Friday evening, Akila is going to a retrogressive dinner with the church youth group. They are suppose to wear ugly Christmas sweaters and bring a white elephant gift. I didn't realize they were doing the white elephant gift thing until tonight. I might not have signed her up and told her about it if I knew they were doing that.

She will not understand this "game". Especially if she ends up with a gift, and someone "steals" it from her. Hahaha. I am actually laughing hysterically at the thought. The irony of "stealing" a gift from someone else, considering her issues with stealing. People all have different ideas of how to do a white elephant gift thing. Lots of people do it where you find something you already have and wrap it up, the goofier and more humorous, the better. Some people don't get that, and buy nice new things. Value is suppose to be $5 max, but I have seen people give nicer things than that.

Akila will not get that. If she gets stuck with somebodies used coffee mug, or something corny like that, she is going to be mad. And sees another kid get new lip gloss, or some other cute thing. I'm going to send an email to the youth group leader in charge of the event, to just give him a heads up. If you're not familiar with the gift exchange, here is how it usually goes: some kind of order is decided on in who chooses a wrapped gift first. The first person chooses a gift and opens it. The second person can "steal" the gift from the first person, or choose a different gift to open, and it goes like that. The last person to choose, can "steal" any gift they want or take the last wrapped gift.

And if Akila gets a gift that she really likes, and someone steals it, I pity that person. Akila will be mad, she will not hit them or anything- but she will remember it for the rest of her life and will loathe that person. She will put up a stink though, and carry an attitude the rest of the evening. I am quite relieved that I will not be there- if I were there, she would put up more of a fuss if it does not go her way.

Hopefully, I am worrying about nothing.

All things fun, I mean dumb, I mean fun, I mean...

I made it to the Hollidazzle Parade event at school last night. So fun. Not. Events like this are planned for to bring the kids and their families together for a social gathering, to build a sense of community and spirit. It just doesn't work for families like ours. If they didn't pump it up so much and get the kids so excited for it, we wouldn't go. We do skip a ton of the activities, and sometimes I feel like we owe it to the other kids to make an effort.

They had raffle tickets for sale. No room in our budget to buy any tickets. Kids could fill out one free ticket if they answered some questions right on a holiday quiz sheet. There were probably 15 questions, I only knew the answer to one. Akila was furious. Obsessed. It was not fun. An activity that was meant to be fun, and was for 99.9% of the kids there, was a nightmare. I finally started sending out mass texts to friends asking questions like "what was the name of the rabbit in Frosty the Snowman". My brain was totally dead, and I haven't seen any holiday shows this year. Thankfully, several friends answered and we got Hocus Pocus right. Thanks friends!

So eventually she got the three answers and turned it in and got to put her name on a raffle ticket. They had a couple of little baskets with junk in them, and an Ipod. The free tickets were not valid for the Ipod drawing, just the baskets. Then, Akila wanted to show the kids her honor roll certificate. I told her that mom and dad brought it home. She disagreed. Adamantly. More than once. Then talked a staff into bringing her up to her locker to get it. I went to the bathroom. The raffle ticket drawing happened during this time.

Akila won a basket. I should have known, she always wins stuff. The basket had a chocolate bar in it, a pack of hot chocolate, and a few coffee packets. A mom and her two kids were sitting a the table with us, very nice family. The son is in Zeke's class, and the daughter is in Imani's grade. That daughter happened to win the Ipod. When Akila came back and the kids told her she won the basket, she was mad as she wanted to win the Ipod. Of course.

I had told that mom I wasn't even entering the drawing for the Ipod as it would only cause major problems as to who would get it (plus I didn't have money in the budget). When Akila saw that this girl at our table won it, she became obsessed. She asked the girl if she would trade the Ipod for her basket. The girl laughed, it was funny after all. Not to Akila. She was serious. She doesn't see the difference in value, although she desperately wants the Ipod.

So, the rest of the event, was not fun. I was thinking the entire time, why did we come? Why do I do this to myself? The little boy in this family wanted to stay with Zeke at the parade and the mom said we would walk together. This ticked Akila off as she now hated the Ipod girl with a passion. We started to walk to the parade, and Akila was furious and jealous that Imani was walking with the Ipod girl. At the parade, all Akila could do was yell at the kids for anything she perceived they were doing that was wrong.

I just hate how all things fun like this event, almost always turn into a disaster. The good thing though, is that the other 3 kids had fun despite her issues. They are pretty good at ignoring and looking past her behaviors. Driving home, she was talking about what a horrible day it was. This made me chuckle, inside of course. She had the honor roll ceremony in the morning, and in her after school class, she had completed making a boombox out of a lunchbox. It is super cool, it has a speaker in it, and an MP3 player attached to it. The kids got to solder it together and do the wiring. She got to go to the parade. But she didn't win the Ipod and that is what ruined her day. It kind of ruined mine too. But I'll get over it. I am still so thankful that she is home, and not violent. Thank you Jesus!

Honor roll ceremony

A few of her teachers are speaking about her on the top, and the next picture is the Principal and Associate Principal handing out the goods.

This morning was Akila's honor roll ceremony, it was very fun. Her school has uniforms and the students who make the honor roll receive a shirt that says "I am the definition of ambition" and some other school stuff on them. They can use these as uniform shirts. All 3 of my other kids have one and have been on the honor roll. This was Akila's first time, and she was pumped. I am so proud of her!!!

I have been fighting a strange mini cold this week. Started on Monday afternoon with a slight cough, not in my chest, but throat. Bit of a hoarse voice started also, and woke up Tuesday morning with body aches. No fever, no runny nose. Just slight cough and body aches. Body aches are the one thing that make me crazy, I can function pretty well with all the other stuff.

We increased Akila's Abilify on Tuesday and she has been more calm and manageable the last two days. Today she has an after school class and after that, we are going to the school for a meal and the whole group then walks over to the Hollidazzle Parade. Her school is in downtown Minneapolis, just one block from the parade. Of course, it is going to be freezing today, and I still don't feel great. But it beats cooking!

Mommy is out of practice

I was in meetings all day at Children's Hospital and Clinics yesterday- well until early afternoon when I then helped give Julie a ride (she was in meetings with me), and then we went to a late lunch. I got home 5 minutes before Akila got off the bus.

When she got home, she was wound tightly! Hyper, bouncing off the walls, just a nut. Not raging, getting mad a little at piddly things, but was just plain goofy. I wondered, did I give her her morning meds? Yes, I remembered doing it. About a 1/2 hour later, I was checking my emails for the first time all day and had one from her special ed teacher. Said they had a really rough day and they kept her from her classes all afternoon.

I then remembered something. I had her take her oral meds, but forgot to put the Daytrana patch on her hip. This is the ADHD med. OOPS. Major oops on my part. The school paid the price, and so did our entire family all night. She was just loony, it was one of those reminders that the meds really do help.

I am out of practice. My 3 month respite was very nice, and I have been trying to prepare myself for the return to what is our "normal". Which means rough mornings, rough evenings, rough weekends. Basically, roughness all the time. And the skating on thin ice and walking on egg shells.

This afternoon, she has an appt for an OT evaluation at Children's. It will be interesting to see what they have to say compared to what the OT at the crisis home said. I wasn't impressed with her evaluation, but this was due to several factors. The main reason is that she did not interview me and made many assumptions that were wrong and ridiculous. I do think that Akila could benefit from some more sensory stuff so I am hopeful that they will have some good suggestions for us.

Skating on thin ice

Treading on water; Walking on thin ice; That is what we are doing at our house. Should think of some song lyrics.

Akila came home on Friday afternoon. It truly is nice to have her home, but she definitely has her edge back. At the appt with the Psychiatrist on Thursday, the crisis home manager said they have been seeing her escalate in her behaviors in the past week and might need an increase in her newest med. We all decided that it would not make sense to do that right away in the midst of transitioning her back home. I can see that she is going to need the increase. I was hoping we could wait longer.

The normal dosage for this med is 20-30 mg and she is on 5 mg, so we have a good amount of wiggle room. Right now, the slightest thing is setting her off and making her quite angry. It was not like this just over a week ago, and it is not just being home. The staff were seeing the same thing all week.

After 3 months of respite, we have locked up the knives. I have locked up my medicine. The little storage room in the basement is locked. What we all need to get back into though, is walking on thin ice around her. Being careful in everything we do and say, and in particular, in how we respond to her, or if we should respond to her. This is one of the hardest things for the kids, especially Hezekiah.

Akila will argue about anything, and she is always right. It is futile to argue with her on some things. When we got home from a school event yesterday, there was a small SUV in front of our neighbors house. She thought it was her son. I said no, it was a different SUV. She disagreed. When she disagrees, she does not do so quietly, or quickly. She is rude, loud and goes on and on about it. I quickly agreed with her (who cares who's vehicle it was!). Even after I agreed, she still carried on and on about it.

She has had multiple situations like this with the kids, and they of course don't back down usually. Especially Hezekiah. He will sit and engage and engage with her, until we have an all out war on our hands. This happens most often when we are driving, makes for a pleasant drive. This is not something new by any means. This is something that the kids have never had a real good handle on, but they are usually better about it. They are out of practice. Not one of the things I remembered to prepare them for.

They had issues at the crisis home with hygiene, like we have always had. They had started to have her shower right after school before she could do choice activities. The last week or so, they had loosened on this and let her choose when in the schedule to do it, as long as she did it. They said this was because she had been doing well lately and had earned more say in her schedule.

Yesterday, I was going to straighten her hair, so I was going to have her shower in the afternoon or early evening. We ended up not doing it and decided to do her hair today. But I needed her to shower still, as I don't want to get out of that habit. She gets two tokens for doing it, same as at the crisis home. We are going to try the token system and see if it will work, it did for them. I finally got her to shower right at bedtime. But bedtime was not easy, either nights. She is in refusal mode on going to bed, even just going to her room. And she is really tired, her evening meds have definitely kicked in.

She has had some nice time playing with the kids, but again, it has to be on her terms. And the boys just don't want to play with dolls. She has been more intentional in helping out a little, and doing some small chores. She is more intentional on showing manners and there have been several times when she has gotten mad about something and 5 minutes later told me that it is OK (usually when she is mad, I get a tongue lashing- for losing her Barbie Doll earring, or something like that she is convinced is my fault).

The hardest thing, is that I know we need to wake her up in the morning on the weekends. They woke her between 7-8 each day. It is very hard to make myself wake her up when she is sleeping in. She slept til 9:30 yesterday when I finally woke her, and I woke her up at 9:00 today. I need to be more disciplined and just wake her up earlier.

I am very grateful to have her home. But we sure can use prayers so she is able to stay home with us.

Coming home

Akila is coming home tomorrow and I am truly excited and ready. She has been doing so well since she started Abilify. We have a chart and graph that the crisis home manager puts together. It logs her behaviors since she moved in there.

Before the Abilify, she was having about 15 issues of non-compliance a week, 18-30 physical acts of aggression towards others, 30-42 episodes of verbal aggression and 10-14 temper tantrums a week. Since she started Abilify, she has had 0-5 non-compliance issues a week, 1 physical act of aggression towards others, 1-4 episodes of verbal aggression and 3 temper tantrums. That is a huge difference- you should see the graph, there is a serious dip!

She is approved to be there until Dec. 9th, but I emailed yesterday and said lets do it on Friday. They agreed. Today was our regularly scheduled two week team meeting. Each time we have one of these meetings, Akila is convinced she will be coming home that day. She has been let down each time. Last night, she was convinced she was coming home today. I kept putting her off, and she was getting upset. So I told her she would get to come home on Friday.

You would think this would excite her to no end. Not the FASD brain. She went nuts. Said I was terrorizing her, disappointing her, etc. This was at about 3:30, and she could not be convinced that one more day was doable. Finally, I said let's talk at bedtime and see how her night went. It did not go really great from what she reported to me. She didn't bring it up again when we talked later.

This morning, I picked her up for a dr. appt. In the car, she started going on about coming home today. I said tomorrow, and she got upset. I finally got her to settle down when I told her I needed time to get a meal prepared that she could choose, and that we wanted to get a surprise ready. Zeke wants to make a cake for her. This settled her down.

I am going to the crisis home while she is at school tomorrow and packing her stuff and taking it home. I will then pick her up after school. Tomorrow morning, will be her last time at the crisis home. I am truly excited to have her home, although I know it will be very hard, I also know it is time. I am praying that she can continue with her more calm behaviors, and that she will not escalate to the point of violence at the same level as before. I am so excited to feel complete again.

Legal Aspects of FASD training- register now!

I wanted to remind everyone that you can still sign up for the training on January 18th from 8-4:30 on the Legal Aspects of FASD. Several of us blog buddies are signed up and would love to see or meet some more of you there. I'm thinking we need to go out to dinner afterwards!! If you do register, remember to mention my name on the registration(cuz I'm a serious big shot- NOT!!) and get a 50% discount. If you need me to send you the registration form, email me (my email is on the right side bar).