There are a lot of things that have happened over the last few months worth mentioning, but if I talked about everything in detail, I'd end up writing about 10 pages worth! So, I'm gonna try to keep each "bullet point" short and sweet so you don't get bored or tired reading my blog =)
1- Beauty started preschool in early September. I thought she'd have a hard time adjusting because they moved her special ed autistic class to a different school, but since all her teachers and classmates were the same, she got right back in the swing of things.
2- Beauty is finally drinking from a regular cup! She won't drink anything except water in a regular cup (her brain thinks that milk should be in a bottle, juice should be in a sippy cup, and water should be in a regular cup). I'm just happy that she's finally taken that next step.
3- Macho has been weened off the binky. I wish I could say that it happened because I had the willpower not to give it to him. The reality is he got real sick a couple of months back and was unable to sleep with it, so I just took it away and never gave it back. Now he goes to sleep all on his own without sucking on a binky.
4- This may not seem like a big deal for most people, but this was a HUGE step forward for Beauty; she finally started eating Ritz crackers! It's a really big deal because her mouth sensitivity issues keep her from eating SO MANY things. To finally be able to give her crackers to snack on means that eventually (hopefully), she will learn to eat a wider variety of foods.
5-Beauty made a friend in preschool - a boyfriend. According to the teachers, they do everything together. They swing, play, take turns on the computer; they're pretty much inseparable. It's really cute when I drop Beauty off at school, he'll see her and run away from the teacher towards my daughter so he can say hi. Young love =) If you'd like to see a picture of Beauty and a different boy (that's right, there's more than one), my Hubby has a picture posted on his blog: http://robert.walkertribe.com/2009/09/reeling-them-in.html
6- Macho won't shut up! lol Seriously though, I love that he talks and attempts to say new things all the time, but sometimes I'd really like some peace and quiet! I guess I won't get any of that until the kids are out of the house. He is doing really well though. He'll be two in a couple of months, he's almost 30 pounds, 34"tall and he's built like a linebacker! I wouldn't be surprised if he plays football one day, I think he'd be good at it.
7- A downside lately is that both kids have not been sleeping well. Macho usually sleeps from 7 pm to 7 am every night, straight through. But lately he's been waking up around 5 am and not being able to settle back down. It's mostly because he's had really bad "intestinal issues," so I've been changing his diaper every 20 minutes. Beauty's issue has been night terrors. She's been having them more often so she'll wake up screaming at all hours of the night and getting her to calm down and fall back to sleep takes a long time. Needless to say, I'm tired =(
8- Hubby and I have decided that we really need to be more proactive with helping Beauty get better. We realize there is no cure for Autism, however there are treatments available to help children get over some of their autistic tendencies. The downside is the treatment we're looking into (ABA= Applied Behavior Analysis) costs roughly $30k a year. It's an in-home program where specially trained instructors spend about 8 hrs a day with Beauty to work on her weaknesses, such as communication. We're looking into ways to come up with the financing. Please pray that we are able to make this work!
9- We recently had to take Beauty in for a couple of foot x-rays. Needless to say, it was rather difficult making her sit still. Hubby posted a rather amusing blog about it: http://robert.walkertribe.com/2009/10/five-stages-of-x-raying-child.html
10- Beauty had her first school pictures taken last Wednesday. According to the photographer (who called me because they were having a problem getting my child to sit still), Beauty kind of freaked out when she saw all the lights and the step stool they wanted her to sit on. They sent her back to the class, waited for her to calm down, then brought her back with a toy for her to play with. Eventually, they got a good picture. Once I get it, I'll show it off =)
11- Mommy moment: I put Beauty to bed the other day and without any prompting, she looked right at me and said, "I love you." It made me all teary-eyed.
12- I'll try to make this short: The mother of Beauty's friend (the boy) contacted the teacher the other day asking if there was a girl in the class named "Beauty." The teacher said yes and the mom requested to speak with me. I gave her a call and it turns out she found out about my daughter because her son said a prayer for her the other night. Isn't that sweet?! He also has a doll with brown hair and when he plays with it, he pretends it's my daughter. I think it's really cute, although Hubby said, "You know, if he were older, I'd say he was a stalker." I got a laugh out of that.
13- And last but not least...I'm finally off that horrible medication that was blowing me up like a balloon! I transferred to a new doctor and he told me to stop taking Lyrica and to try a new medication to help with my Fibromyalgia. The only negative side effect is nausea, but a major positive is that it helps you lose weight. I'm happy to report that since I stopped taking Lyrica (which was almost 2 months ago), I've lost 17 lbs. Whoo-hoo!!! I'd like to lose another 13 lbs (which would put me back at the weight I was before the medication), but my ultimate goal is to lose 23 lbs, which would put me at my ideal weight. Wish me luck!
Okay, I think that sums it all up. I'm gonna try to blog more frequently so I don't end up with these enormously long story-like blogs. Oh, one more thing I have to say...WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS, BABY! Congrats to my Yankees on winning the WORLD SERIES!!!!!!!
(BTW, check out my autism blog: http://speakingonthespectrum.blogspot.com/ )
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