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Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Back To School

B was aggressive and violent with me last night. I spent the whole time thinking, "Please, do not step on my broken toe. Please," and she didn't, although there was lots of hair pulling, hitting, and kicking. I hid some Ativan in a piece of chocolate bar, and she eventually calmed down and went to sleep.

When she woke up, she went right back at it. She went after me, went after Andrew, and even hit Grandma when she came over. We tried to use the Mandt training that I've learned so far, but got stuck in old patterns of dealing with her, and then had to back off completely to regroup and let her reach baseline again. The new training will take practice, and a more tailored plan that's specific to her needs. She missed her bus, and only  the promise of a new pig pencil case I got a few days ago got her finally dressed. I had to hobble off on my crutches in a cab to get her to school. We certainly can't afford that every day. If I could've walked, I would've gotten her to walk the whole way, to calm her down, but also to show her what a convenience the bus is.

She cannot handle me being sick or injured, and the almost three weeks off school, because of the teachers strike and spring break, will make the next week or two extra challenging. She has such a hard time transitioning.

She had a great Spring Break, though, with lots of fun stuff, and I've put her in a program run by Community Living on Saturdays. We'll see how that goes, and then I'll consider some after school programs.

Monday, March 12, 2012

My Kid

B has found an old cell phone of mine. She brings it out with her and has imaginary harassment calls from creditors in her "Dreamworld" of dragons. She owes a lot of money for her dragon nursery, And there's a Mister Tibiscus that is a real pain in her side. She doesn't like the dragon bankers.

Also, she's devious. :) Today she said:
B: What if we didn't have the nice grandma, and we had a horrible, mean one?
Me: I don't know, what would we do?
B: I'd give her a potion.
Me: To make her nicer?
B: No, to get rid of her. Bwahahaha.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Our Week

Well, we've had an interesting week here. On Friday, I started Mandt training, which comprises a part of our safety plan for B to help me deal with her behaviour problems. They focus on preventative and recuperative procedures, but I will also learn proper restraint practices, should restraining her become necessary. It has proved necessary in the past, but it is a scary thing to do if you haven't had training, and I don't want her to get hurt. Or myself. I can't just leave her, she follows me around and is physically aggressive, and she has also left the apartment, which terrifies me. The training will take one full day a week for over a month, and I will need to take refreshers every year.

I like the behaviour consultant who teaches it. I think it would be a hard job, because they need to connect with both kids and adults as clients, all of whom have a wide variety of disabilities, and they can have very offensive personal views. One of his clients now is a teenage Neo-Nazi. I can't even imagine how I would deal with that.

The work with the behaviour consultant will take almost two years, and they work with her school, and all the family and caregivers, focusing on teaching US to deal with B. I like that approach. Quite frankly, I think a lot of this training would be useful for all parents, and it sucks that it is so hard to access.

On Friday, while I had my training, Andrew took B to some appointments I didn't want to reschedule. One of the things we needed done were some blood tests, and so I told him to give her Ativan before the blood tests, as she is needle phobic. Badly, although there has been some improvement lately. Still, holding a screaming kid down for blood tests is not fun. For anyone. However, some of the tests needed to go out with a courier, and so they told him to bring her back later in the day. In the interim, he asked her GP if he could safely give her MORE Ativan later in the day and the GP said yes. Unfortunately, the lab had misinformed him about the later time, so she still didn't have the tests.

And the doctor was wrong, because it was far too much Ativan, and she felt very ill later in the day. I felt bad for her AND Andrew. We'll have to schedule the blood tests properly this time. I had never heard of blood tests that needed immediate couriering.

She hasn't had any noticeable seizures lately. Now that I want them, of course, they go into hiding. The sneaky bastards.