Update on Joey

I have been meaning to sit and write another update on what has been going on with Joey, but things keep happening and I push off the post so I can include everything. Well, this won't have everything included in it, as I have his first IEP meeting on Wednesday and we get the feedback from his psycho - neurological evaluation on Friday, but this will catch everyone up some.

A few weeks ago I was helping out in the boys' school's book fair. My boys were so excited I was there and could spend their lunch breaks with them. Halfway through the week Joey asked me to go outside for lunch recess with him and I told him I really needed to get back to the fair, I wish I would have went to recess with him. After being back at the fair for about 10 minutes I see Joey walking down the hall crying, he should have been at recess. When I went to see why he wasn't on the playground, he told me that he had to sit in the principal's office and wasn't allowed outside with the other kids. According to the story Joey told me he was chasing some girls around the playground and the girls collided. Both girls and two of their friends told the recess aid that Joey smacked one in the face and punch the other one. Joey does have his moments when he'll strike out, usually at his brothers, but never a girl. After the principal couldn't get Joey to change his story and confess to hitting the girls, the principal called the school psychologist in to get Joey to "tell the truth". Usually if you confront Joey a few times he'll back track and tell you the truth (if he is lying). The principal also pulled me from the book fair for a meeting about the zero tolerance policy. During our meeting that lasted over an hour Joey was left sitting and crying in the office thinking he was in trouble. The principal confessed that no one really knows what happened on the playground, for no adults seen what happened. They had 4 girls saying assaulted two of the girls and only him saying he didn't do it. They needed to have something to tell the parents of the girls, should they call and ask what was being done with the brute that targeted their sweet little angels. The school's solution was that Joey really should lose his recess for the remainder of the week, but due to his issues that they would allow Joey to have his 20 minutes of recess by himself after the other students have had theirs. They figured Joey would be more of a behavior problem if he was not able to release his extra energy. They called Joey into our meeting and explained that he would still have recess, just that he would have to have his by himself for the safety of the other students, but that he was not being punished. Sounded like a punishment to me, so for the next two days I met Joey on the playground so he would have someone to play with (seems it wasn't a punishment). I'm sorry, but no child is going to burn off energy playing by themselves. Joey still stands by his story that he did not hurt those girls; I believe him. This wouldn't be the first (or last) time Joey got blamed for something by his classmates, just so he would be told to stay away from them because he's weird.

During our meeting the principal and school psyc. advisedme that Joey needs to be on medication. They went so far as to recommend two medications that are not stimulants, because I told them (repeatedly) the stimulants don't work for Joey. It really irks me that these two people (along with his teacher) who have known my child for mere months think they can diagnose and recommend medications for my child. The school psychologist also mentioned that some of Joey's issues and aggression may be coming from home and the way his brothers interact with him! I'm trying to keep in mind that I'm "working with" these people to help my kid, but sometimes....

I said it in my last "Joey update" and I'll say it again medication is not ALWAYS the answer! I just had a conversation with the boys' doctor about the school's push to medicate Joey. There are many cases where the schools will not allow students back into class until the parents have the child on medication. So the parents put their kid on the meds the school (where no one has a medical degree) have told them to and the kid gets into the classroom and stabs the teacher with a pencil, when previously the kid was not violent. The side effects of these medication affect people differently.

I'm not ready to resort back to medications. Joey has been doing better physically without them. He actually can fall asleep within a reasonable amount of time and sleeps uninterrupted during the night. He has always had an appetite, but now he is actually gaining weight. He has been on medications for 5 years and still had the same behavioral problems he has now. Granted he sat still a bit more in class, but he wasn't retaining any of the information due to be exhausted from not sleeping. I'm looking into alternatives to medicines. When he was first diagnosed with ADHD I was told our option was medication. Now I know better, I have seen changes in him (as well as my other boys) from removing food dyes, that I didn't even know about until 2 years ago. Which got me thinking what other options are out there we haven't tried. I'm not saying that if he needs medications to help him function that I won't give them to him. I just want to run out any other methods before saying medications are the answer for him.

Two weeks ago I was a gas station and noticed a business called Life Balance across the street. Thinking it may be another place to try to get Joey in for his occupational and behavioral therapies I stopped in. (He's still on waiting lists at two different places) Turns out they do therapies, but just not the kind I thought. They are a brain balance center. While the receptionist explained how they go about balancing one's brain, I started thinking this is too good to be true. It's the simplest thing, my kid sits and plays a video game, reads a book, or whatever, and they put headphones on him. Through the sound waves and some computer it will find what ever imbalance my kid has and will corrected it by making the brain connections that his brain isn't doing on it's own. Here's the catch, it only has an 80% success rate and most people need 12-15 sessions. Each sessions is $100, and most insurance companies won't cover it!! I have heard some about Brain Gym sessions that are all over the place, my friend's son's Choi class offers them to their students. So there seems to be some science behind why this may work (some, but not enough for $100 per session). I vowed to look more into it.

That very same day, I came across a book at the library about brain balancing your child with ADHD, ADD, or Autism. The books claim was it could cure all this things and more. I didn't quite believe that it was going to cure Autism or ADD, but it was an opportunity to get a better understanding of this brain balancing thing is about. I've gotta give the author credit, it makes logical sense that in theory this could work to some degree. I filled out all the checklists and had Joey do the assessments. I figured we'd give it try, after all it was a library book and we could try it for free. While the theory behind it makes sense, some of the exercises don't seem like they would help much other than to get my kid doing regular exercises. How doing 45 sit-ups in a minute in going to balance my kid's brain is beyond me. While others I can see the connection to why they may "balance" my kids. I did learn some interesting things about Joey I never thought check, like his sense is smell is off. Which explains why he will eat weird concoctions of foods or eat just mustard if its on his plate. He's sense of smell effects the way foods taste. There are a series of exercises to do to strengthen his little sniffer. (Actually those exercises were a favorite amongst all my boys.) We are two weeks into the exercises the book recommended for Joey per the results of the checklists and assessments, the book says that he should be mostly if not completely "fixed" by the end of 12 weeks on the program. I'm not expecting to this thing to work as it claims, but it's worth a shot to see if there could be any improvements on Joey's behavior. I'll keep you updated on how well balanced our brains get :)
Joey can now after two weeks identify 9 different smells while blindfold when held 6 inches away from his nose. He has very recently started trying small amounts of new-to-him foods, and liking most of them. Otherwise I have haven't noticed any changes that make the think this could be the Holy Grail for Joey.

A week ago was suppose to be our first IEP meeting and after sending a email to the school psychologist, we decided to push back the meeting until after our neurology appointment. Our IEP was for 10:00 am and the neurology appointment was for 2:45 that same day. I had made phone calls the week prior to the neurology appt. to make sure that the feedback from the psycho-evaluation would be sent to the neurologist by our appt date. I was assured that the results were completed and would be available at our appt. Long story short, the results were not sent to the neurologist and Joey and I wasted over an hour for nothing. Only good thing that came from the appt was the Neuro. told me that she would not prescribe any medications for Joey that if I wanted him on medications I would need to go through the pycho- neurologist. SO when the school called about rescheduling Joey's IEP and if I received the results of the evaluation and were they going to medicate Joey again. I could tell them flat out the Neurologist would not medicate him, and they backed off about when I was going to get him back on his meds. :) Seems Joey is not going back on medications (at this time) it didn't matter if we went ahead with the IEP before hearing the results for the medical evaluation that was done and could just base Joey's plan off what the school concluded. However, depending on what I learn on Friday from the psycho-neurologist I may need to set up for another IEP meeting.

I am excited and scared about our first IEP meeting. I am so very ready for us to figure out what will work for Joey to get more out of his school days. I've nervous because this is new to me. I was part of my nephew's IEP team when he was in my care, but his accommodations and goals were clear and easy to address. Also I knew my nephew's teacher (they were fellow staff members and we had been in the school for 6 years) and they were willing to work with me (and Matthew). Joey is a bit more fuzzy when it comes to seeing what will work for him. We are still relatively new to the school district and the school itself. So far this year I haven't seen much in the way of open communication or willingness to assist Joey from his main classroom teacher. In the last 10 years (since Jordan started school) this is the first time I have encountered a teacher that willing to work with me. I do have my list of demands....I mean, my requests for modifications and accommodations ready for our meeting.

Side note:  His teacher is still marking spelling test wrong due to handwriting issues.

Not a Typical Day at the Park

Over the weekend we marked off our non-board game day. We switched things up a bit; instead of having every one gather around the table or on the living room floor we headed to our favorite Metropark. The plan was to spend most of the day at the park and we loaded up our non-board games, bikes, and barbeque supplies. With everything packed and everyone in the van we headed for a day of fun. Then it started to rain.

Rather than tossing in the towel and heading back indoors, we took a quick inventory of how many ponchos and umbrellas we had and went to the park anyways. We were already packed, and looking forward to our visit, if the weather got to bad be would just come back home. By the time we reached the park the rain had stopped and the sun was trying to peek out. They boys really wanted to start with a family bike ride seems it was still too early to start setting up for dinner.

While we love spending time at this metropark, it's not one of favorites when it comes to bike rides, there are so many "hills". Poor Jacob tried keeping pace with his older brothers and had to tackle the hills on his one speed bike. Jacob's bike had collided with a friend's runaway skateboard a few weeks ago resulting in the brake cable getting tangled under the bike chain. We swapped Papa the broken bike (in hopes he knew how to fix it) for Jacob's "old, slower" bike.

Things were off to a rough start, as they tend to be at the beginning of our rides together. Jordan wanted to go much faster than this brother were physically capable of. Joey and Jacob wanted to be the "leaders". The one behind the leader would be riding to close causing the leader to become nervous. (Bike rides for us are rather difficult due to the different stages and ages.) After everyone found a place and pace they could deal with it was smooth riding. I' m so proud of my boys, we managed a 5.2 mile ride with minimal breaks (I think I was the only one requesting the breaks. I'm not nearly as conditioned as the kids are).

After getting the bikes back on the rack we were off to set up for dinner. We went over to "our spot", which is a quite, seldom used picnic area just off the main drive. Every time we have stopped either for a quick picnic or to spend hours there, there is never any major gatherings nearby. The boys have the run of the whole area to play games in.

While we were waiting for our coals to be ready, we brought out the non-board games. With there being so much room to run we could really challenge each other in the game Hyperdash. Family games means everyone plays, which means after our long bike ride even Mom had to dash about. With our muscles already stretched there wasn't any complaints of  cramps during Twister. Having thoroughly working out our bodies it was time to work out brains with a couple rounds of Connect Four and Jenga.  No picnic is complete without a few ants, so Ants in the Pants was a great way to end our outdoor non-board games. Our games come to an end when dinner was ready.

Seems the coals were hot it was time for S'mores. I was trying out an experiment on my kids and the open area we were in was perfect for it. As many of you know we are a dye-free family (not sure what I'm talking about? Check out my post here) and try not to consume any foods containing artificial dyes. There are very few times that exceptions are made or something will sneak past us. I just kills me that there are dyes in marshmallows! Don't believe me? Check out the ingredients the next time, most (but not all) contain Blue 1. Anyways, we happened to have a package of these blue 1 marshmallows and I wondered if it was just enough dye to send to boys into a hyperdash of their own. After the boys having 3 s'mores I had to empty the coals for fear of someone toppling into them. It only took 15-20 minutes for the dyes to take hold of my children. Ever see the Chipmunk movie where they have double cappuccinos, my boys looked just like that. (I'm sure the chocolate played a part too). Joey was the only one who kept himself mostly under control (he doesn't eat marshmallows, it's a texture thing). SO, it appears blue dye effects me kids just as strongly as the red dye, even in small doses.

We used the open space to expel some of the extra energy. Knowing there was no one else around to question why my children were so unruly was just one of the perks to "our spot". Once everyone had more self control we packed up to spend some time at the playground. Our plan was to stay long enough to watch the sun set and also mark that from our bucket list, but the weather decided we had a long enough break and it started to rain again.

Will Work For Screen Time

Like most moms I spend a good amount of time doing household chores. I don't require my boys to do chores, but they are expected to clean up after themselves. My take on "chores" is that if something needs to be done, then do it. They also don't receive and allowance for two reasons 1. you shouldn't get paid for what you should be doing anyways. 2. I honestly can't afford to give them money for helping with anything above what is expected. Usually they are pretty good about helping when asked (even if I have to ask more than a couple time). However they seem to be slacking a bit lately and there are some things I usually do that they could help with.

We have a strict no electronic policy Monday-Thursday. Yep, no TV, DS, IPods, or computer (unless it is school related and mom approved educational) . Which makes electronic minutes a great currency.

I posted a Work for Hire sign and some tasks that need to done. They are given 48 hours to claim a job before I'll pull them. Every job lists what the payout will be upon completion. The more time consuming the higher the payment; 30 minutes for putting away everyone's laundry and sorting all the socks. Every job is first come, come first serve. They must complete all their homework before starting a job. They can choose whichever jobs they would like or none at all, there are no consequences for not taking a job. If they don't complete their job within 24 hours of  choosing it, it will be reposted for the remaining 24 hours so the other boys to have an chance to earn the minutes. Also if they need to "hire help" from a brother, they have to pay that brother half the minutes for the job.

When the boys came home from school Jordan was the first to notice the opportunity and snatched up the job with the highest payout. The other boys soon followed. While they were all busy doing their jobs I actually enjoyed a hot cup of coffee while I sorted the paperwork from their backpacks. After a quick check from mom to make sure they completed their task the best they could, they receive a "mom money" for the allotted amount of minutes.

I had the whole kitchen to myself to prepare dinner, the boys were quickly burning through their minutes earned. Joey was disappointed when his time ran out halfway through a race he was playing. He said "Don't turn it off, I'm taking another job!!" I HAVE TO FINISH THIS RACE!" Luckily today there were enough jobs, so he could earn more time.

Thanks to the boys helping out we were able to finish the evening duties early and had some extra fun with mom time. Jacob saved some of his electronic minutes so he could have me play a video game with him.

While I don't really like any electronics on during the week, I can live with it knowing it will not be an everyday opportunity. They don't have to use their time earned that day, they can roll it over. The boys were excited about earning electronic time, they wouldn't have jumped at the chance to clean the litter box otherwise. It was like they were "getting away with something" by playing the video games during the week. However everything is all caught up and they'll have to wait for more job to be posted before they can earn more time.

Linked up with Our Busy Homeschool for Sharing What Works.

Fall Fun Bucket List Update

The other week during our nature walk we collected some items from along the trail. Mostly acorns, some leaves (at different stages of changing colors), sticks, twigs, small pebbles and even a couple feathers. This weekend we used our assortment of "cool nature stuff" to create nature pictures. Our pile of stuff in the center of the table, they quickly determined what it was they wanted to create. They all came up with different ideas. Jordan made a nature scene, Joey created a picture frame, and Jacob made UOLO (suppose to be YOLO, but he insisted that it was a U for YOU. It was his masterpiece I wasn't going to argue with him.). I went with a picture of us walking off the path at the nature center. There were so many acorns and Jacob was curious as to what exactly was inside them. He was surprised they were so hard to open, he figured he should be able to do it easily because squirrels can do it. :) He tried cutting them with scissors and sent a few flying through the kitchen.  After Jordan took a hammer to it for him, he was disappointed that it was only a tiny little nut and it didn't like appetizing.

We had a rough start finding a family book to read. Most of the classics we have already read or seen the movies for. Also Jacob doesn't like books where the girl is the main character or there are too many girls in the story.  I have had a difficult time finding new books to share with my boys. We settled on Spy School by Stuart Gibbs from our librarian's recommended list. They love playing spy games, so hopefully this book will live up to their expectations. We got a good start on the book this weekend, completing the first four chapters. A plus to this book compared to the one we chose for our summer bucket list, the chapters are much shorter and the story line moves along quicker.

We also tackled make caramel apples. Some really neat ideas had found their way to me and we incorporated them in what should have been a simple activity. We cut our apples in halves and dug out the centers using spoons so they could be filled with caramel and later sliced into smaller wedges. I heard about making our own caramel by heating condensed milk, figured it could something fun to try. Not being able to track down the post I saw it on, I researched some different methods. The stovetop seemed liked the easiest route to go, with the exception of  if the water didn't cover the lid of the can at all times it could cause it to explode. So I boiled the water, then dropped in the cans, and turned the heat down. Unfortunately I was a little worried about an explosion occurring in my kitchen and turned the heat down a bit too far; we basically ended up with really warm condensed milk. Figuring all is not lost and dumped some in a bowl and tossed it into the microwave. The kids liked watching it fizzle up and stirring it back down. However we just weren't getting the caramel coloring we had hoped for. After filling some of our apple halves with the concoction and set them in the fridge to chill, I came up with a brilliant idea. Instead of cooking the milk in the can on the stove, I would just pour it into a saucepan to cook, that way I could see when we got the color we wanted. It worked out pretty good, there was more of a brown coloring but it thickened really quickly. Jordan held onto the apple halves as I attempted to get our gloopy caramel into them. It was a bit challenging and being so focused on the task at hand I forgot that I had just removed it from the stove and used my finger to smooth out the caramel. I managed  to give myself a nice 2nd degree burn along the side of my finger and underneath my nail. OUCH!! So I took the opportunity to teach the boys the proper way to treat a burn. (Teachable moments happen all the time). After dinner we tried to slice our apple halves, the caramel was too hard and sticky to cut through so they at them as they were. The caramel made in the microwave tasted more like caramel, but the stovetop one looked and felt more like caramel. I think we'll stick to the store bought caramel from now on.

 

Soda Geysers...More of a fizzle

A few years ago my cousins did this really cool soda geyser. This thing shot many feet in the air. The boys and I thought we would give it a try. Even though we didn't have the neat little tube my cousin had that stopped the mints. Joey came up with using an empty pill bottle upside down with a hole cut into it. It only held 5 mints so we fit a toilet paper tube around the bottle so it would hold all the candies. Jordan made a stopper out of cardboard that we could pull out of the way with a long piece of yarn. We gather some original Mentos candies, some soda, and our own homemade tube, and headed to the park. (There was now way I was chancing having soda explode all over my yard). We set them up, Joey was first, he yanked the string and we watched the soda shoot up a whole foot from the bottle. Not what was supposed to happen. Jordan thought he'd try dropping the mints in with out using the tube. He managed to get 5 or 6 in before it started to erupt, again only about a foot high. Jake used our contraption but only put in 5 candies. His only bubbled out the top. Determined to make this work they even tried shaking the bottles with the mints that were already in there. They tried to shake up the soda and drop in a few more mints. It just wasn't happening for us.  

Although our geysers weren't nearly as impressive as we had hoped they would be, they were glad we had attempted them. At least they did something, even if it was just a fizzle. We  are going to  shop around for one of those tubes, so we can send soda flying higher than our heads. I have heard that the trick is to use Diet soda, so we will give that a try too. It may take us a couple tries but eventually we'll figure it. I'll post pictures when we finally get the good geysers going.