Well, I said I needed to post so here I am.  I can’t seem to post in the thick of things when all is beyond my head.  So to get us started I’m going to bring the crazy blonde out of me to just see what comes out…closing eyes now.  If you don’t want to read, just go..you’ve been warned.

I finally went to my doctors and requested something for my nerves and lack of hormones.  I did have a hysterectomy way back when.  He told me that he would have expected me about a year and a half ago to ask for something.  He’s been dealing with Jason as well and sees all the hospital reports coming in.

I have to tell you that I finally found a family doctor that I love.  He always asks about each of the family members.  He’s willing to answer all my questions and even in ways that I can understand.  Today, I feel better after six days on this new med.  I take it before I go to bed.  I think Jason reacts to it as well since I’m calmer.

Well..love and behold when I saw the doctor I found out that I lost 16 lbs since December.  I know I’ve lost 2 lbs as you can see over to the right of the blog but have no clue when the 14 lbs decided to leave my body but I’ll take it.

Let’s see where do we want to go next… Faith.

Faith is now in the News Team at school as well as the Running Team.  Basically it means that I have to get up an hour earlier every day to drive her to school instead of her taking the bus.  She’s in Chorus and she has tutoring two nights a week.  That’s three nights a week that I have to pick her up after school as well where she used to take the bus home.

I’m super proud of her though for getting involved in school.  I worry about her all the time becoming lost in the identity of “oh that’s Jason’s sister”.  I feel guilty that Jason takes so much time up but we are in crisis mode.  I pray things go to a happy medium some day.

Faith asked to go to the free reading camp again this year.  That was an awesome camp last year, Reading Camp Rocks.  Faith had an absolute blast.  She went horseback riding, zip lining, swimming and she created a journal.  In the morning, they did things to help with reading skills.  Faith has issues with reading comprehension.  The kids that were there had to be in second grade to fourth grade of that school year.  Faith has one more year and she can’t wait to go back.  If your child has reading issues, I really recommend that you check them out.  (BTW my eyes had to be open to set up that link).

Here’s a blurp from their websites about requirements:

Reading Camp is a tuition-free summer program for struggling students.  While admissions is need-blind, over 90% of the children accepted qualify for free or reduced lunches through the National School Lunch Program.

Children who meet some or all of the following criteria are eligible for Reading Camp:

• Children who are currently in the 2nd-4th grade.

• Children who are one or more grades behind in reading skills.

• Children who don’t like to read or don’t choose to read independently

• Children who feel like they’re “not good at school” or have low self-confidence.

I see they have camps in the following states as well…. Colorado, Georgia, Kentucky (Yeah me), Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, West Virginia, International…. check it out.

Where to next…let’s see..hubs

My husband is down about 50 lbs now.  50!!! to my little 16.  Well I can say I’m jealous that he lost it but I can also say that I wouldn’t have wanted to lose it like he did.  He was very sick.  Today he’s a lot better and health concise.  Thank God, the scare that he has been enough to make him take his health seriously.

He’s getting the boat ready for the fishing season most of his free time.  Other than that he’s working hard.

Next…Jason

If you’ve been reading, you’ve seen that Jason has been in and out of the hospital this month.  I’ve realized today as I try to complete all the paperwork for the Michele P Waiver for respite care for Jason.  He’s been in the hospital 4 times in the last twelve months.  That’s really scary.  I’m trying to get Medicaid to pay for some daycare for Jason in the summer so that he can have some structure part to his life.  Let’s face it… I’m constantly running from here to there.  We have therapy three nights a week.  I need him to have something to replace the structure he has from school in the summer.  Pray that I get it.

Next…

I guess it comes down to me now.  I’m seriously working on a crime/thriller in my spare time.  There I said it out loud.  Truthfully, I use it to get away from the world.  It’s my time down.  It’s so completely not like my life that it’s a bizarre place for me to run.  I’ve learned that I don’t do much other than the kids.  I need to find new hobbies but where do you find such things when your life is a constant uproar.

I want to blog more but I find that when things are really bad that I hide.  I don’t want to talk about the nasty things that come up.  Like the possibility of Jason being put into a group home for three months so we can figure out how to help him.  I’m terrified of that.  He’s my baby boy and I don’t want to do that.    Or that I fell literally apart when he threatened to kill himself but even more so when I realized it wasn’t just something he heard but what he truly thought about.  It’s hard.  It’s hard to think things you don’t want too.  It’s hard to share them.  It’s hard because truly in this position you don’t want to be judged.  That’s the worst part being judged by others.  I do my best.  I love my son.  But yet people think they can judge me.  I wish for one day they could see what its like in my shoes but…  Only if it was their child acting like Jason.  I’m not allowing someone else to do my job with Jason.  They don’t love him like I do.

Ok..off to bed with me.

Will you?

This year has been really hard for us.  Last year ended on, Faith being in the hospital with a stomach virus that they thought was appendicitis.  She was released after two days and was doing better.  Right after that, I ended up at the doctors because my knees were hurting again.  Then my husband was hospitalized because he had blood clots in his legs and his diabetes was acting up.  I had a hard time with that.  I felt like I had stepped back into time with my first husband who had died from diabetes.  Not only that but those blood clots could have traveled farther up his body and killed him.  They went from his calves to his thighs.  The hospital even sent him home since he was young.  Give me a break!  He could have died.  We are still messing with his meds trying to get them right as well as going to training for diabetes.  You have to educate yourself.

Ken is home a little over a week missing work so financially we took a major hit.  Then Jason started acting up again.  He got violent again at home…hitting and kicking me and he hurt our dog.  So he ended up back in the hospital two weeks ago on Wednesday and he got out last Wednesday.  They changed his meds while he was in.  I was hoping like most mother’s hope that he would be ok when he got home.  He wasn’t.

He was jumping up and down..fidgetting with his hands, a bit more anxious, irritable at any moment, disturbing others in school, arguing constantly at school.  At home, it was non stop argumentative and temper tantrums for half hour to three hours long.  To say I was tired didn’t even come close… I was exhausted… sheer exhaustion.

On Friday, enough was enough.  I took him to the closest hospital since I didn’t want his temper tantrums to turn into violent tantrums.  They made us wait for 90 minutes and then told us they could do nothing for him.  They looked at me like I was the worst mother in the world.  I felt so awful.  You have no idea how hard it is to place your child into the hospital.  It’s the worst feeling in the world.  It makes you feel like you are the worst parent in the world.  You should be able to find the solution not have to do this.  God, I hate putting my son into those hospitals but I can’t help him by myself anymore.  I don’t have the tools and I don’t think they do as well.   Special thanks go out to St. Elizabeth Hospital for making the situation worst than it already was.

I went to Children’s Hospital which had prescribed the meds for him.  I thought he was having a reaction to the medication.  When we got to Children’s, I told them what was going on.  By then it was 9:30 at night and Jason literally was bouncing off the walls.  They asked if that was normal…I said no.  It’s not.  He has only done this once before.  He was argumentative as usual.  That’s normal.  Of course, he didn’t recognize when he was jumping up and down on the bed and wouldn’t stop that he was a safety risk.  They had to strap him down to it.  He couldn’t sit still.

Doctor told me that they doubted it was the new medication but he doesn’t seem to be acting normal.  Maybe we should admit him.  My heart plummeted to the floor.  I don’t want him in the hospital.  I wanted to cry but I held myself together.

Then they asked him if he wanted to hurt someone else… He said no.

Then they asked if he wanted to hurt himself… he said “I want to kill myself.”  Those are the worst…absolute worst…thing that a mother could hear.  I started crying which didn’t help matters at all but I lost it when he said it.  My heart broke into a million little pieces with his words.  He’d never said anything like that before.  I would never have expected it.  Even typing this right now I’m crying.  He is only seven years old and he’s thinking about it already.  Then he continued… “I have been thinking about this all day.  I want to get a fork place it right here (he showed him above his heart) and stab myself over and over until I die.”

The doctor told me that she wasn’t sure that he actually meant it but that because he is impulsive that it isn’t something they could overlook.  He had to be admitted.  He’s still there today.  My heart is breaking.  I don’t know what to do anymore.  He has therapy twice a week with one therapist.  He has a mentor that sees him weekly.  He has a case manager.  He sees another therapist once a week.  He sees a psychiatrist once a month.  He has an IEP.  I’ve done everything that I can think of to help him.  I don’t know what to do anymore.  I don’t know how to help him.  I wonder sometimes if he should be with another mom who would know what to do.  Would she love him more?  No I don’t think so.  But would she be equipped to handle his special needs..I think so because I’m sure not.  Shouldn’t I know what to do?  He’s my child.

If you don’t know already my son, Jason, is in the hospital.  In my mind, I know that he needs to be there.  But in my heart, he  needs to be home with us.   Don’t get me wrong I know he will be home soon but he’s my baby and I need him home.

Yesterday I went in for the “family” therapy.  I don’t know why they called it family therapy since they only spoke to me.  We talked about how Jason is and what I wanted from them.  I want them to help make sure that the medicine is right and that both Jason and I have coping skills on how to deal with this.  We, also, talked about the fact that Jason is very difficult to deal with when we visit.  He doesn’t listen to me at all.  He does what he wants.  He’s mean to his sister but its all his sister’s fault.  He threw a game at us because he was losing.  Jason was to concerned that he would miss earning tokens for his prize.  He didn’t seem to care that we were there.

I realized that it could be because he was angry that he was there.  That’s a strong possibility.  But It was really hard to see him like this.  They called him in to tell him that a “good” visit would earn him tokens as well.  As soon as he came in, I could see his mood.  He stood between them.  He started arguing.  He argued about everything to the point of if i had said something was black he would have said white.

They were surprised.  He hadn’t shown them this part yet.  So this was a bittersweet moment.  They would help me more but yet at the same time I was sad to see him acting like this.  I hope he’s home soon.

This was Jason on Tuesday night waiting for him to go into the emergency department at Children’s Hospital.

The day had started like any other.  I was excited because we were going to do some fun things for free on Saturday.  I picked up the kids at school at three thirty and drove to Joseph Beth’s to get the paperwork on what was  happening on Saturday.  I knew that we were going to have to fit in Faith’s hairdressing appointment for her American Girl which was happening at the Learning Express on Saturday as well.  But I wanted to find fun stuff for Jason to do as well.  Boy do we know that boys do not like talking about dolls and hair all at the same time is twice the wrong thing to do.

And then it began:

Me:  ”Whose got homework?”

Faith:  ”Mine is done.”

Jason:  ”I forgot mine at school.”

Me:  ”You know the rules.  Don’t bring your homework home.  You get to do housework.”

My husband and I had finally found something that Jason hates to do.  I didn’t expect what followed.  Jason began screaming at the top of his lungs.  I told him to be quiet because I was driving.  He got louder.  I parked at Joseph Beth’s and told him that if he didn’t calm down we wouldn’t find out about Saturday’s events.  He got quiet.  Then we got out of the car.  Jason refused to budge.  I finally get him inside the store where he promptly takes off running and hides from me.  For thirty minutes, I look for him until finally I find him.  We go home with the sheet for Saturday.  After all, I still want to do Saturday with them.

In the car, I tell Jason that he still has housework to do when we get home.  Wrong move.  I should have waited until I was home.  Jason started screaming and screamed the entire way home.  When we walked in the house, I was beyond my capability of taking this on.  I saw that Jason hadn’t removed his shoes, and coat so I told him to go back for a while.  Jason hates my backyard so he screamed out there as well.  Throwing stuff.  And then he hurt the dog.

When he gets like this, sometimes I can’t figure out what to do.  I called him back in and told him to go get in the car.  I was afraid the cops were going to be called.  Not that I was doing anything wrong but truthfully I don’t want my child with a record.  We get in the car and tell I him that I have no choice but to take him to the hospital.  He tells me he will be better.  I turn the car around and start back home.

He starts again just before we get to the house.  I again turn the car around and start towards the hospital.  I tell him that he’s leaving me with no option.  He stops and tells me he will behave.  I turn around again.  As I’m approaching my street, a cop car is coming down the road.  I pull over and signal to him.  I know he went to my house.  Well as I expected he did.  I thought it would be worse if they thought I had left because of it.  I explained to him what was going on.  He told me that if Jason starts again.  I  need to take him to the hospital.  He talks to Jason.  Jason appears to calm down.

We get home.  Jason begins again as soon as we walk in the door.  I tell him to go to his room.  When I go upstairs with him we are barely in the room when he begins to kick and punch at me.  I push him off me and run out of the room closing it behind me to lock the door.  Yes, he’s seven years old.  Next month he’ll be eight but when he’s in a rage, he’s very strong.  It took a long time for me to finally admit that he will punch, kick, and bite me when I try to restrain him when he goes into these rages.

I call my mentor.  I have one to help me cope with what I am going through with Jason.  She tells me to take him to the hospital if he’s this bad.  I don’t want too.  I might have started to drive there with the intention of telling him so that he would calm down.  But I don’t want to take my baby to the hospital.  I don’t want to leave him with strangers.  I don’t want to do this.    But I didn’t have a choice.  Jason has autism, ADHD (Attention Defective Hyperactivity Disorder), RAD (Reactive attachment Disorder), OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder), ICD (Impulse Control Disorder) and anxiety.  He’s been acting up for the last two weeks again.  He’s gotten bad reports from the school…disturbing the class, bugging students, talking back, screaming, etc.  He’s been arguing with his therapist a lot.  I am wondering if his medicine is wearing off.  I don’t know what to do anymore.  I need help.  I agree that the hospital is the right place for him.  But I don’t want too.

I took Faith to her aunts while we went to the hospital.  Of course, it was packed.  We had to wait almost all night and then he went back home with me.  They had no beds at that point.  Jason was finally admitted into the hospital on Thursday night.

This part is so incredibly hard for me.  I couldn’t sleep last night.  I started to post on Wednesday about it.  I couldn’t bring myself to do it.  I feel like a failure.  I don’t know how to help him.  I don’t know what to do here.  Today the hospital called to go over his meds and talk about him with me.  They are changing up his medicine.  They told that it doesn’t seem to be working so they are going to try something else if I approved.  Of course, I approve.  I need my son to be well.  I will do whatever it takes to help him.  They ask if they can call his other doctors that deal with him.  Of course, they can call them.  It’s about making my son capable of dealing with his own life.

Since July of last year, I have had someone in my house.  At least three times a week.  Jason has seen his regular therapist once a week and his other therapist twice a week.  He sees his psychiatrist once a month.  He has a mentor that he sees for three hours every Wednesday.  I have opened up all the channels for people to help him.   Someone please tell me what to do. Teach me how to handle this more.  Something…please