My Chaotic Life....

And I thought it couldnt get worse than yesterday...

2012-01-18T17:30:00.000-08:00

So, yea.. imagine my surprise when today turned out to be about a million times worse than yesterday???
This morning with Chrisser and Dylly getting their teeth worked on was ok until they got to the office. Then all hell broke loose because they wanted to eat and not be there. So, they got sedated and took forever to calm down. Once they went in the back they were fine. Once they were back in my custody however, not happy at all. I got to hear whining and crying about being hungry the whole way home. Not to mention they were not allowed to have their meds until after the surgery so they were a little off to begin with.
So, we get home and they eat and then run amok all over the house hyper as all hell. Yes I gave them their meds however, did not help much. So, there was intermittent "my mouth hurts", "i'm hungry", and basic whining. Which I can take. I have no issue with that.
We pick up 3rd kiddo at school and head to Mr Shrinky Dink. Thats when all hell breaks loose. It's like my kids decided today would be the perfect day to act like they were raised by wolves and not listen to me whatever I had to say. Not to mention they did not listen to Mr Shrinky Dink either which made me even more upset. So, heres a rundown on what happened during the appointment. Chris broke his glasses because he threw a beanbag chair at Dylynn, all 3 kicked and hit each other, they had a pillow fight and beanbag chair fight, they tried to trip Mr Shrinky Dink... among other numerous antics that he recorded on paper for their files. Which all ended with him looking at me and saying "Make an appointment for youself please".
Ok seriously how am I supposed to take that? Am I not a good enough parent? Am I screwing something up? *sigh*

Dentist appt... oh hells bells...

2012-01-17T16:20:00.000-08:00

Ok so there are few things in life after having 3 kids that seriously make me cringe and want to run in the other direction when I hear the name. Dentist is one of them. It doesnt even have to be for me, if someone I know talks about having to go to the dentist I seriously feel weak in the knees and like I'm going to puke. So, today when all 3 of my kids had an appointment you can imagine what I was feeling. Yea, I wanted to be anywhere but there. Hell I'd of taken on a whole school and let all of the teachers take a break just to get out of there. I wasnt so lucky... nor were my kids.
My kids go to a speciality clinic for kids. They specialize in special needs kids and accommodating scared kids. OK so pretty cool right? Not so much. All 3 kids did awesome getting their x rays. Then all hell broke loose. Dylynn didnt want to behave and kept running around, Arek was being sensitive Arek and hitting his head on the wall, and Christian had so much anxiety he started chewing the skin around his fingernails because his nails were already chewed as much as they could.
Now heres the thing. You would think that because I knew this would happen I would be "strong mom" and be able to save face and tell them to keep cool and everything will be ok. Yea not so much. The more they acted up the more anxiety I had. Didnt help my BIL was there telling me horror stories from his visits. UGH! Anyway... so Chrisser does well no issues, Dylly just doesnt want the pick thing in his mouth and thats all he kept saying. He did well in the chair though. Then we get to Arek my NT kid. All hell broke loose. Yes I mean all hell. He started screaming and there was 4 of us holding him down. Meanwhile, Dylly was yelling dont hurt my brother. UGH! Arek about a year ago had to have surgery to remove 5 teeth and get 6 fillings. When he was born for some reason his teeth had no enamel so he's got jacked up teeth. Anyway, he was remembering the pain and he freaked out. We had to get him checked so we had to hold him down. I felt like the worlds worst mom. I was a basket case crying and wanting to get every damn person off my baby and leave him alone and I just wanted to run away with him. I knew how he felt. I've been there it's why I'm scared of dentists to this day. Trying to be strong for him was one of the hardest things to do today. He was ok when we left but oh my god my stomache sank to my knees and I just felt my heart breaking. I hated it every minute of having to be the adult and make him go through it.
He's not mad at me and he had art therapy tonight which is probably a good thing but I ended up coming home and crying for a good hour. I just hated having to be the adult when all I wanted to do was be a kid and run away.
Good news is Arek has no cavities. Chrisser has 5 and Dylly has 4. They get to go back in the morning and get partial sedation and have theirs worked on. Arek gets to go to school and forget about the dentist for a year.
I get to sit and dwell on how today sucked and I just wish it were over...

Sickies Suck

2012-01-05T18:08:00.000-08:00

Yea I titled it that... so sue me...
One of the things that gets to me the most about dealing with my autistic kids is when they get sick. This is also where I feel incredibly bad and like a horrible parent even though it's really not my fault. You see when they get sick their pain tolerance is so high that I pretty much do not know they're sick until the last minute.
For instance Dylly was fine a few hours ago. Now he's puking his guts up. Did I have any indication that he was sick or getting sick. Nope none at all. So as I write this I am feeling like a horrible parent because I didnt see the signs to make him feel better.
Another time my oldest had an ear infection but because he has a huge pain tolerance I didnt know until he started running a 104 temp. Took him to the ER and the triage nurse made me feel horrible and called me a horrible parent. I explained calmly that he was autistic and that unless he showed signs I did not know if he was sick. Thankfully some of the nurses knew us and got us back right away. However, we got a douche of a doctor and he stuck this pointy instrument in Chrisser's ear and punctured his ear drum. Needless to say Chrisser was in a HUGE deal of pain all of which I felt responsible for. It's no wonder he hates doctors.
This is just one of the sucky things that I get to deal with at an autism parent. I wish it were different but it's one of those things I guess.

Friends...

2011-12-28T19:50:00.000-08:00

I'm just forewarning you... this post is sooooo going to piss some people off and I realize that. It's not intended to it's just me venting. Just dont say I didnt warn you. :)

So, lately I've been thinking about the friends that I currently have and those that I had and lost and those that really werent friends in the first place. Before I learned that any of my kids were autistic or special needs having friends was so easy. Then, when we got the diagnosis for Chrisser things started to change. I didnt know how to explain what was happening with him and so I kept very quiet. I didnt know how to deal with it and let my "friends" know. Once I started to reveal things going on with him I started getting questioned. Like majorly. I didnt understand why they wouldnt accept my son as he was or why they wouldnt believe me. This is what I like to refer to as my "god I was such a dumbass" phase. During this point in my life we moved from TX back to OK and my husband was sent to Korea for a year so I was dealing with all 3 kids alone. This is just months after Chrisser's diagnosis. Imagine my surprise when DHS knocked on my door one day. Turns out someone I thought was a friend wrote a letter to them and stated that they thought I was drugging my kids and had Munchhausen and was making everything up about Chrisser. Naturally nothing was founded because I had paperwork and so on and so forth. The fact that someone who I thought was a friend did that to me stung bad. So, I did what anyone would do. Stopped making friends. It's hard when someone puts your kid in the middle of it. So, basically I talked through a blog but even then people were awful to me so I even stopped that and stopped trying to meet people that might understand what I was dealing with. Which I think in a way hurt me more than I care to admit. I spent 3 years not knowing anyone else that knew what I was dealing with. People who didnt know would say oh I know what you're going through but they had no idea. It kinda sucked.
Lately though I have been sharing more by way of a group of amazing moms and dads. You know who you are and I'm thankful for you. It's been a huge help to get to know people that understand. Maybe not completely but they get it.
When someone doesnt get it, I dont understand why they waste their breath and say they do. Because honestly until you've lived mine and anyone elses life that has autistic or special needs kids you have no clue at all what its like. To semi quote Jamie McMurray it's just a different lifestyle. There is so many things I have to do before we even decide to go somewhere. Theres so many things I have to think about when it comes to where we are going. *sigh*
What I'm saying is... those friends that you hold near and dear to your heart. Enjoy them and let them know. Those that were or arent anymore... forget them, it's not worth the trouble.

Prayers and Presents...

2011-12-24T21:11:00.000-08:00

I gotta say I really really thought that today was going to be horrible and I'd end up having a migraine from hell. However, I was pleasantly surprised that all of my fears were unfounded for once.
My kiddos went with my mom and stand in dad to my sisters about 2 hours away to have the traditional Christmas Eve dinner of hotdogs and fries. My husband and I did not partake because well... things are on the outs with my sister and because I lost my one and only ID and i'm on lockdown on the base because I cant get off and back on without the ID. Soo..... that left me and Jeff alone to get things done around the house. It was nice. I took a nap and he did laundry. Works for me! :) Wow I got off topic. Anyway...
So, they went and started a new tradition. Since my daddy died it wont ever be the same on Christmas Eve but new traditions are a good thing I think. Means new beginnings. :) So, since I'm on lockdown we have Christmas dinner here and it's going to be lasagna instead of the traditional ham or turkey. Works for me. Like I said new traditions.
Anyway... back to the kids. I was sure that they were going to either A: freak out because they didnt like what they got or B: scream that they wanted more presents or C: both A and B. However, none of the above happened. They were absolutely well behaved and happy with everything they got and polite and listened to what my mom and stand in dad told me. I was shocked. Once they got here we opened gifts here and they were once again happy and excited.
I sat there wondering who in the heck these kids were. I'm thinking god wanted me to have an easy day and I am so incredibly thankful for that. It was a really nice thing watching things play out without worrying for once.
I rambled sorry but you get my point. Thankful that today was spent with those I love and it was a GOOD day.

Dreading Christmas Morning...

2011-12-23T18:47:00.000-08:00

All 3 of my kids have nurmerous quirks. Most of which I tend to go with the flow about and we get around them and move on. This time of year brings on the one quirk that I absolutely dread the most. You see my kids get overly excited and stimulated because of presents and knowing they get something and then the adhd sets in and the more presents they get the more excited they get to tear open(i really thing it has something to do with making a HUGE mess also). Which leads to the dreadful no more gifts and alas they then act like they dont like anything that they got. I dread this because it always hurts the person that the gifts originated from. Including myself. I dont know how to get them away from how they act or how to reverse the effects.
I think I stress over the holidays alot because of these quirks from the boys. Actually I know I do. It pretty much makes the week leading up to Christmas pretty much hell because I dont even want to think about it so I fill my days with anything to get my mind off of it. *sigh*
I know my kids are thankful. I just wish this issue would go away and they wouldnt hurt people's feelings.

Your Adopted Family...

2011-12-21T18:03:00.000-08:00

Ok so since it's the end of the year I wanted to write one more post about the people in my life that arent blood relatives but are so very important to me and my family. It's my adopted family.
After losing my daddy almost 2 years ago I have an amazing stand in dad whom I dont know what I would do without. He's not replacing my dad in any way just being a father figure and I admire him and love him so much for thinking of me as his daughter and my kids as his grandkids. He has no clue what it means to me.
Theres my besties and my soon to be besties and my twitty crew. I can not in anyway thank them enough for loving me and all of my faults and my kids. This last year has been a rollercoaster for us(another post for another time when I'm in a ranting mood) and I really would not have made it without their help. I have laughed, cried, ranted, bitched, and whined to which they all listened, gave their advice and simply were there for me and my kids. I love them all so much for the support and love they shared. Really from the bottom of my heart thank you so much.
What I'm saying is... sometimes its not your blood family so much that end up being your REAL family. Sometimes you find your family where you least expect it. Keep an open mind... sometimes it'll surprise you for the good.

Hand to forehead... HEAD SLAP

2011-12-19T20:39:00.000-08:00

Seeing as how with special needs kids I really have no choice but to go with the flow... there is very little that really annoys the crap out of me. However, in the last 2 weeks I've been presented with probably the two major things that really annoy me more than anything.
(Just so you know I could give a crap less if my punctuation or sentences are done right... just sayin')
In the last 2 weeks a family member decided to inform me of everything I have done wrong. I dont have a job so I'm worthless, my husband makes the money I dont, I dont know how to take care of my children, my children dont have autism or ADHD I'm just a lazy mother, I am not informed enough to know how to take care of my children, I'm lazy and on the computer all day so I do nothing, my kids deserve a better mother and the last big thing she said was that she's tired of me wanting a pity party because of my life... thats pretty much the jest of it. She repeated herself and really if I wrote it all I'd get pissed all over again and really I'm over getting mad at her.
Let me explain something about this family member. She's not around my kids for more than 2 days at a time and thats every 6 months if not every year. Also, she does not in no way know what I handle everyday. She thinks because she reads about the latest things involving autism that she knows everything. No, sorry she knows nothing. Infact, I'd say she knows jack shit. She can tell me all she wants how to run my life but she knows nothing about it plain and simple. Ok so any job I had would never understand about all of the Dr appts we have so why work? I do happen to believe I am informed enough to make the right decisions for my children. I know not all of them have been the right ones but life is not perfect sometimes shit happens and we regroup. I admit I am not a perfect mom. I make mistakes. I will tell you that everyday I try to be the best mom to my kids that I can be and if I make a mistake I fully admit it. Now as for the pity party. I'm sorry my children define me so when I introduce myself to someone I explain that I have special needs kids. I'm sorry is that so wrong of me.
This pisses me off that people do this. Until someone who has no idea what the life of an autism parent is walks a month in our shoes hour for hour they have absolutely no right to tell us how to live our life or tell us what we are doing wrong. Sorry doesnt work that way.
The other thing that majorly pisses me off is when a parent of an autistic child tries to make it out like her child is worse than yours. No two austistic children are the same. No two will ever be the same. There are none that are worse or better than the other. GET OVER YOURSELF WOMAN!
With all that said... I feel better for venting...

Thankful...

2011-12-18T20:43:00.000-08:00

I've done alot of juggling with my blog. Alot of writing posts and deleting alot of double thinking... I'm happy to say I'm here to stay this time. Only took about 4 years to feel comfortable with it...
Here's why:
So being an autism parent is not in any way the easiest job in the world. When Chrisser was first getting diagnosed I didnt devulge alot of information because I honestly didnt know how to deal with it and his behavior was very erratic and scary. I was pregnant at the time and got to know alot of women whom I thought were forever friends through a pregnancy website. I slowly started talking more about Chrisser over the next year and learned the hard way that people that have never been in the situation I was in dont "get it". Needless to say alot of crap went down and I was reported to Child and Youth Services as a result. The only thing founded was that I was stressed because my husband was doing a tour in Korea at the time. (NO REALLY???)
So, I started to hide things alot more again. I had a very very hard time trusting anyone. Even the friends that I have in town I stopped talking to because I didnt know how to deal with it and I didnt know how to get them to understand what was going on in my life. So, once again I started blogging and talked about all of my kids to use it as a way of stress relief. Lets face it talking about it even if you're blogging helps alot. Well, then I got hate comments on how horrible of a mother I am and how I should have my kids taken away. All I did was tell facts and make light of it. It's what I do it's how I cope. So, yep you guessed it once again I pulled back into my shell and didnt talk alot about my kids. I made the mistake of talking to a family member and she had the same opinion of the blog comments but thats totally for another post.
Wow this is getting long... sorry I'm getting to my point I swear...
So I joined twitter and randomly was told to follow @autismfather because he was recommended. I did and from there it ballooned to finding other moms and dads that were like me with autistic or ASD parents. I didnt talk to them alot but I read what they wrote. I soon started tweeting back and realized oh my god these people "get it". I soon started coming out of my shell and being me.
In doing so I have met some of the sweetest most caring people. I know I can say what I want and need to say and they will support me in any way that I need. I also know that if I have a problem they will be there any way they can. I never in a million years thought I would be able to be "me" and talk about my kids and my fears and my stressors and meet other people that would share theirs with me. It's been a blessing and I honestly dont know what I would do without them. They are my autism family and I really have no clue what I would do without them. They make me laugh, they make me cry, and they make me wish I could send real hugs a million times a day.
Thank you all for letting me fell like "me" again!

2011-12-17T19:28:00.001-08:00

I’ll start off with Chrisser. He’s my almost 9 year old and what I call the “trial run kid”. At least thats what what it was supposed to be. Didnt turn out that way. He is absolutely amazing. He has PDD-NOS, ADHD, sensory issues, and development issues(thats the short list). I guess you could say I knew something was wrong or not right with him when he was about 8 months old. He started having rather odd behavior. Some of which are eating the gel inside his diapers(no lie we had to duct tape diapers on him), breaking 3 metal cribs, only sleeping if he was in a baby swing in motion(ran out 5 motors on that), and once he did start talking it was like he stopped. I took him to the Dr and I got the run around stating he was a boy it was a phase blah blah blah. I was not convinced. Soon I had my middle son Arek. I’ll get to him in a bit. Then came Dylynn also get to him soon. Once I was pregnant with Dylynn, Chris was 3 and it was becoming increasingly apparent that something was definantly wrong. He pulled up the carpet in his bedroom pad and all in the 10 seconds it took me to pee. He threw an 80lbs mattress at me like it was nothing. He stopped sleeping and god forbid if someone wasnt awake there was no telling what he would do. I broke down and talked to my PCM about it and she referred him to a child specialist. We went to the appointment not really thinking much since we didnt know anything at the time. Within 10 minutes of the specialist starting the tests she said your son absolutely has some form of autism. I was stunned, shocked, floored. The only thing I knew about Autism was that an old Football player named Doug Flutie had a foundation for it. I didnt even know about RainMan at that time. So I was pretty much in shock. During the course of the episodes with Chrisser I didnt tell a whole lot of people outside of the dr’s and my family because in the beginning I thought I was doing something wrong. I thought I caused it. I thought I was a horrible mother. Which bit my ass in the end but thats for another post. Chris was unformerly diagnosed when we were in Lubbock while my husband was recruiting for the Army. He got orders for Korea so I decided to go home to Oklahoma with the kids. By this time Dylynn was born. I started the leg work on getting things situated with Chrisser. It took it’s toll on me and I ended up getting on happy pills because I was on my own with my husband in Korea. We went through 3 psychologists who basically made it worse by just adding med upon med to him to the point where he had to put him in inpatient to get him detoxed off all of the medication. That was probably the worst point in my life. Our insurance released him from the hospital because he wasnt suicidal. HELLO he was freaking 7 years old. WTF? We now have only a PCM and a Behavioral Therapist that are his doctors and I’m so thankful. He’s come such a long way. I’m amazed at the kid he’s turned out to be.
Next we have Arek or as I like to call him Chicken Little. He’s pretty darn funny. He’s definantly got the middle child syndrome and ontop of that he doesnt understand that his brothers arent like him. So he gets overlooked at times. We’re working on that but its a hard balancing act. He’s such a sensitive kiddo though. He’s loving and accident prone. He’s had stitches twice in his 7 years. If he can hit his head with it he has. He loves sports and his Nintendo DS. (whoever invented the damn DS needs to be shot or something ugh) We just learned he's got ADHD and also ADHD sensitivity. He's in Art Therapy too.
Then comes Dylynn. He was basically my miracle baby. We learned during my c-section that my placenta completely calcified and the doctor had no clue how he was still alive. He ended up in the NICU with a partial collapsed lung. After that he was just fine. Until we were back in Oklahoma and he was about 13 months old. I started noticing things I noticed with Chrisser. I cant say I wasnt heartbroken. I was. We got the ball rolling with Chrisser’s behavioral dr. He was diagnosed at around 2.5 with PDD and ADHD. Anxiety issues was just added in the last month. I’ve been having to fight for him. He was in a state program for speech therapy and occupational but it ended when he was 3. They did some testing and said he needed to be in school so I made an appt with the school and they did a 45 min test instead of the 4 hour test they were supposed to do and since he could count to 5 he was too smart and I was supposed to put him in pre-k. I was pissed. I knew he needed speech, and OT and to be in school. I knew because of Chrisser. So for 2 years I’ve been fighting them. He’s not potty trained yet so he cant go to school unless he has an IEP. Cant get an IEP if he’s not in school. So, this thursday he’s going to get tested again in hopes they finally say ok he can go to school and into a program he’ll excell at. At the last appt where the anxiety meds were added I learned he regressed back to a 2 year old. So needless to say I’m pissed at myself because I keep thinking I could have fought harder, pissed at the school system for saying no. It’s been a mess. Hopefully we’ll get some answers soon.
So there ya have it. Theres my kiddos. Theres alot more I could tell you about them but I’ll save it for other posts.