Wednesday, November 14, 2012

End of a semester.....

I apologize for my lack of blogging lately! I had thought of doing an update several times, but it seemed that something else always got in the way. By the time I was done with whatever it was, all I wanted to do was relax and go to bed :). Today was my last final exam for the semester and I am ready for a bit of a break. I think I have all B's in my classes but I won't know for a couple more days yet. It has been crazy around here I tell ya! So let's see, what have we done since the last update?

We had hurricane Sandy make her way to us. We are in NW PA, so we did not get as much of a hit as the coast did, but we still had a lot of wind and rain from it. The kids were only out of school for one day-that alone was enough to drive anyone crazy. Nick was all out of sorts :(  It looked like Halloween would get rained out, but we were able to get up and down the street once before it got really bad. I only took Nick out this year, Michael said he did not want to go, or even hand out candy-which was fine, because money was tight anyway. Nick managed to say "Trick or Treat" and "Thank you" after some prompting and he seemed to have a good time. We filled up his little bucket he got from one of his happy meals at McD's, and then went home. He was dressed in a Robinhood costume :)
When we got home, I actually let him devour most of his candy. We don't keep candy around these parts and it was even easier to do without it since Nick never asks for candy anyway. But, with a little (Ok, A LOT) of prompting, and maybe even a little bribery with applesauce, he enjoyed chocolate after he got the first taste of it. He was very leery of the M&M's, but after a couple of those he seemed to like them as well. Not as much as the mini Hershey bars (Which I had to break into even smaller bits for him), but he ate them.

We had to get new tires for the Jeep. We were going to wait a while longer until we had the cash, but the whole Sandy thing possibly being a snow event for us (it wasn't), made us think we should go ahead and get winter tires. I am glad we did, because it seemed right after Sandy we started getting the first snowflakes falling, as well as more rain. Our tires were nearly bald and traction on them was not so good, even for normal driving. We noticed the difference immediately and actually spent the first time driving on them remarking on how the Jeep definitely stopped better :) and you felt like you were actually still on the road! Simple things like that amuse us.

The boys have been doing well in school. Michael has told me that he is on the honor roll. I have not seen his report card yet, but he informed me the other day they had an ice cream social for all the kids on the honor roll, and he was one of them! Nick is doing, well, okay it seems. The school called us last week saying that they would like to increase his meds because they are seeing more self injury and aggression. I have a meeting with them on the 28th to discuss things further. I know on his daily reports there is usually not a day that goes by where he has not been aggressive at some point. Today, he apparently had more than one instance of aggression and self injury. :( It is just one thing I hate about his autism. Nick has also been sick for about a week or so now. All the boys in my house are. Michael was sent home Monday with a fever and aches. He stayed home yesterday, and went back to school today. I knew he was really sick when he came home on Monday and literally slept all afternoon and all evening. :( He is not one to do that at all. Nick has just had some sinus crap going on for the most part. He was miserable all weekend, and finally seems to be on the mend. I went out and bought a nose syringe (one that is used on infants) because Nick has not yet learned how to blow his nose on tissue. He will blow it anytime without tissue and wipe off whatever comes out onto his face, or any furniture nearby. ugh. His hangar obsession continues with full force. On top of all that, I am not sure if I mentioned the fact that my husband injured his back at work way back in June, but we are still dealing with it! He was released from therapy because they could not do anything more for him. He can only work 15 hours per week, cannot lift anything over 15lbs, and has had quite a few set backs in his recovery. Just when he starts to feel better, he starts having severe muscle spasms that have sent him to his knees. He has had several shots in his back, and they work for a few days it seems, but then stop. He is hoping that his back will eventually recover fully, but I am starting to have doubts that it ever will. Of course this has placed much of the child care/and house chores onto me. He helps when he can, but often it falls to me. Michael is a big help and pitches in quite a bit sometimes with caring for Nick while I run an errand or am busy with homework. Homework of course I try to do as much as possible when the kids are at school or in bed. But it does not always work that way when I have had to study for finals over the weekend. Stress has gotten the better of me at some points, and I am not too happy about that. I can control it most of the time, but on days like when Nick decides to rip up our carpet on the stairs (staples and all!), gets poop everywhere, pees through several outfits a day, and has numerous metldowns all in one day (sometimes even all in one hour!) things start to just unravel and my sanity starts going out the window. Some days I wonder why I decided to go back to school as it seems that has done nothing but ADD to my stress level, but then I have to think of the big picture and just press on. This IS what I want to do!

And after months of putting it off due to tight finances, hubby and I finally sprung for an elliptical machine!! I am so excited! I have worked out on these things for YEARS in a gym, and now I will have one of my very own! And since it is hard for me to actually GET to a gym with everything going on, I can take an hour out of my own time and workout at home. I am able to think clearer when I exercise, and literally just slow my mind down and think about things more in depth instead of just frantically racing around. I need to lose some weight so I can keep up with Nick if nothing else. Who has time for a gym when you are going to school, caring for your family, and chasing an autistic 8yr old?? By the time I am done with everything I just want to fall in bed and go to sleep!

That is pretty much all that has gone on in the last month. Just trying to keep my sanity intact daily. I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

First signs of winter!

Nick loves his new Angry Birds winter jammies :)