Category Archives: mental illness.

Day 10 ~ the truth shall set you free

This morning started out fabulous.  David was well rested, I was fairly well rested, and we were up on time to see everyone else off to school. I first give David quiet time in the morning, gives him a chance to get himself in sync with the day.  This morning was no different, after a quick breakfast of Cinnamon Life Cereal, he got his meds and went to his quiet space.

Later in the morning, I heard some noises that told me fairly quickly he was doing something he wasn’t supposed to be doing.  So I stalked quietly into the area near his quiet space, and he quick jumped up, shoved what he was doing under a blanket and came out and asked me wahtI was doing.

I explained that I thought he was doing something that was off-limits.  He denied it, as is typical of any ten year old who gets caught doing something they shouldn’t be doing.  In his case, we need to be more vigilant so that he doesn’t hurt himself or someone else.

So I sent him to the living room with a blanket for quiet dark time.  This is where he covers his whole body with a blanket for not more than ten consecutive minutes.  While he was attempting to get himself under control, I went back into his quiet area to see what he had been doing.

I found missing keys.  David has this thing / compulsion / obsession about keys.  Real keys, fake keys it doesn’t matter.  He had key rings with keys we haven’t used in years, plus he had my extra set of keys for our world.  all of these were mixed together.  In talking with him about the keys, he blamed his older brother.  I know that his brother didn’t do it, because I had moved the keys to the top of my dresser this morning after everyone had left for school.  Which means that David went into our bedroom without permission.  (he likes to dig through other peoples stuff and take whatever interests him.  In his defense, I forgot to lock the door this morning.)  So I told him he was lying.  This evolved into a huge meltdown.  David doesn’t handle confrontations well.  So he had quiet time with his father for an hour this morning.  No toys, just a book.

In the end, he admitted to stealing the keys and lying about it.  He doesn’t understand the compulsion to take keys from other people.  He doesn’t understand why he lies all the time when confronted with behavior.  I don’t understand either, but it is part of what makes him the person that he is.   At least I didn’t find any empty cat food containers in his dresser again.

So for now, David is limited in his roaming around the house ability.  He can go in his quiet area, but for not more than 15 minutes without coming out to report what he is doing.  Why?  Because he can get in a lot of mischief if he is left unmonitored, and having him report to me allows me to do chores like laundry, dishes and baking.

So over all, while we had an incident this morning with negative behavior, we got through it, we resolved a meltdown without anyone getting hurt, and he took ownership of his behavior.  All positive things in our book.

Cheers to a good day!

Day 9 ~ more fun than you can shake a taco at.

So I had to stop at our high school to sign some papers for one of my kids special education teachers, and the Superintendent happened to hear my voice.

He came out, asked me if I had a few minutes so he could give me the paperwork for home schooling. Now, if you are following my blog, you already know this.. we are in spirited discussions with our district regarding the return of our youngest to public school. He was in a residential behavior modification program for 7 months. And once he completed their program they discharged him. Now the school doesn’t want him back, they want us to bus him 40 miles one way to another day treatment program. They will pay all expenses.

Our argument is that our son deserves a chance to at least try to be successful in the public school setting. Least Restrictive Environment it is called. Well, they aren’t wanting to do that. So my wife and I toured the facility. It is a nice enough facility, and if our son isn’t successful in public school we would put him there, but we don’t want that to be the only option available to him.

At the conclusion of the tour, we met with the administration of the facility, as well as our superintendent, the reps form the local special education district and a secretary. I asked our superintendent, “If our son completes this program successfully, will the district take him back?”

His response was, “I can’t say that we would.”

I have a huge problem with that. Alarms are going off in my head, my wife is steaming mad. So we told them that we weren’t going to put our son there. So until the school comes to an agreement with us about our son’s education we are home schooling him. My wife is a special education teacher in another district and more than qualified to be our supervising teacher.

Today when I was at the high school the superintendent wanted to talk to me about an email my wife had sent to the elementary school principal telling her how unprofessional she was for trying to schedule an IEP meeting without first contacting either parent, our advocate, or the facility that he was discharged from to determine which dates would work.

The prior written notice (pwn) was delivered via fax and email. A day later I received a copy in the mail. It was handwritten, which in itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but have your ever tried to read a handwritten fax? Next to impossible. Only half of the IEP team was included in the notice. So my wife sent a note talking about professionalism, and how we had other obligations the morning in question and wouldn’t be able to make it.

There are a number of options on the pwn that can be chosen from. The one that we received was marked for “permanent placement in a home school setting.”

The only reason we are home schooling him at all is because the district refuses to educate him.

So we are requesting a facilitated IEP.

I apologise for the length of my post tonight. I am just a little angry. This spirited discussion, this polarised communication between us the district, has been going on for over 3 years. It is beyond time for it to end.

I should post a copy of the email my wife sent. 🙂 it was well written.

Evening Day 3

Well it appears that we have two levels of behaviour.  That which he exhibits during the day when it is one on one, and that which is displayed in the evenings when everyone is home.  Tonight he was all about the word no. Everything we said, “no” was the response, didn’t matter if we were talking to him or not.  20 minutes of solitude under a blanket for that and other inappropriate behaviour and things were fine.  The most pressing behaviour is that he doesn’t want to listen.

Just a matter of changing or adapting our parenting style, if this is the only issue that we have, we are rocking.  However I feel that we are still in the honeymoon phase after his return from the residential facility. Only time will tell if that is an accurate portrayal of the situation and his behaviour.

On another front, the clozaril affected his white blood count so he had to stop taking it.  We had to do a blood draw everyday, until it was above a certain level, and now that it is above that level, we have to do a blood draw every other day for a month.  No word yet on whether or not he can get back on the clozeril.  He had developed a cold, so maybe the decrease was related to an illness and not the medication.

Questions for the doctor at any rate.

More later.