Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas! Here are a handful of pictures that were taken within the last couple weeks.

First is my cute little snowmen cookies. I was rather proud of them :) I made gift boxes of cookies and goodies for all Owen's teachers and therapists.

This is just talent, I tell ya ;)

Christmas morning... thrilled to have gotten a book (one of many he got for Christmas).

And a new Thomas movie! "I've always wanted this mama!"

And more new Thomas movies. We aren't spoiled at all, are we?

And more books to even out those movies. He had to read every book before he moved on to the next gift. At Jason's parents house on Christmas Eve they were unwrapping gifts. But once he got to a big Curious George book (400 pages long) he went to a quiet corner and refused to come out to unwrap the rest of his gifts until he read the ENTIRE book. All 400 pages. How great is that!?!

And more books!

And a big dinosaur volcano.... that explodes!

"What? Is there something wrong with eating a giant hershey's bar before breakfast? I think not."

Slowing down....

Not too messy!

But he ate a LOT of it. He ate the rest later in the day. If you ask him what the best part of Christmas was he'll tell you "the big hershey's bar!". LOL!

But he does love his Big Wheel he got too! It's so much easier to ride than his bike is. He really has a blast with this. For those who have been here... he's even riden it to the Kroger and back! Thank you Grandpa for the new helmet!!

Though, in typical boy fashion, his favorite part is crashing.... which he does on purpose :) Again, thank you for the helmet Grandpa!!

He got a package from Aunt Sam! You can't tell, but he got 2 compression shirts- one black and one white, which he's got wrapped around him. But the shirt he's wearing is a black/white compression shirt so it all blends together.

And what's this?

Dinosaurs! Thanks again Aunt Sam! "These won't bite me!" says Owen ;)

That's it for now!

Oh, a real quick update on Owens medical stuff.... about a weekish before Christmas (right before we left to go to Michigan) we noticed a bump on Owen's finger. We aren't sure what it is right now. It's possible it's a wart. It's possible it's a fibroma. Since he's at risk for being diagnosed with Neurofibromatosis (because of his spots) we just don't know. He goes to the ped tomorrow morning at 8. If the ped doesn't know (or can't tell us with 100% certainty) then we'll go to a dermatologist to get it looked at. Please keep fingers crossed that it's just a wart!

Another update on compression shirts....

they have them at walmart now! And the best part.... they're only $8.88!!!! My life just got so much easier! LOL! Sad what a shirt can do, huh? He wears the black, white and the black/white shirts fine. We got him a gray one tonight so we'll try it tomorrow and see if he'll wear it. They also have a red and a dark blue but we haven't tried those colors yet. Woo!!!! I can buy 2 at walmart for just slightly more than the $13 ones at Target. Yippee!!!!

We're Jewish!

Or so Owen thinks! He was at daycare today and sat in his favorite teachers lap. He then proceeded to tell her "Tomorrow we're celebrating Hanukka. We'll have a menorah and light the candles and have lots of yummy food...." and went on and on. Ummm.... so that teacher came down the hall and said she didn't know we're Jewish. I told her we're not and she told me what he said. Gotta love echolalia! I'm pretty sure he heard it on a Blues Clues holiday movie they let him watch earlier this week ;) But now he's going around and telling everyone that tomorrow he's celebrating Hanukka....

Compression shirts...

Just a small update since I mentioned them a couple days ago. We were at Target again tonight and found these. It's the same tight material Owen loves, but advertised as a "swim shirt". And it's a couple dollars cheaper than the other ones. We got one since he said he would wear it (after inspecting it... lol!) so we'll try it tomorrow and see if he likes it as much as the others. If he does, it might make for a slightly cheaper alternative. YAY! Only negative is that it only came in the black/white combo- no solid black or white. But since black and white are his much preferred colors, at least he gets them in one shirt now ;)

We've been waiting 5 years for this day....

With all Owen's communication issues that he's had his whole life, I have never once wanted the kid to be quiet. Even when he's screaming "NOOOO" at the top of his lungs, at least he's talking and it's music to my ears.

But lately he's been making HUGE strides towards the typical kid area of "talking back". And boy is it hard not to laugh when it happens! Here's one example....

It's bedtime right now. I put Owen to bed and, within minutes, he was turning his light on and playing (grrr.... this is a recent thing too). I turned it off, put him back in bed and explained that his body needed time to rest. He disagreed. A few minutes after I left the room he was back down playing with his trains (light off this time). I gently guided him back to his bed and explained that he needed to stay in bed. Here's our conversation...

Me- "Owen- it's time for bed. Please do not get out of bed to play with your toys. If you want a book to read in bed I'll get you one"

Owen- "NO! I want to play with my trains"

Me- "You can play with your trains in the morning. Right now is bedtime. Do you want a book or no book tonight?"

Owen- "Trains! I want TRAINS"

Me- "I'm sorry but if you get out of your bed to play with your trains I'm going to have to take them all into my bedroom so you can get some sleep"

Owen- "No you will not"

Me- "Owen- trust me when I say I will. I cannot let you stay up all night playing with trains. Please go to sleep."

Owen- "FINE. I'll just read a book then"

and throws himself dramatically onto his bed. LOL!

Ahhh..... bliss..... I've been waiting for this day for a loooong time :) Remind me of this when he's a teenager ;)

A few pictures...

Here's some pictures for the day :) We put up our Christmas tree today! Owen loves it! He got to decorate it and, well, he did it the only way a special little boy would :) He would ONLY put the circle ornaments on it. He refused to put any other ornament on the tree at first. It was cute. Here he is with his decorated tree... he's very proud!

Here's the pile of rejected ornaments...

As he was rejecting them he would say "not today snowman/santa/horse/whatever" and put it on the table ;)

Then he decided that he wanted candy canes on the tree. So Jason, Owen and I went out and bought candy canes. 2 boxes so he would have plenty to put on the tree. He put 3 up and declared "that's enough!" and refused anymore. Gotta love it. He did decide the star had to go on the top too. So here he is with his finished tree. He's making a sad face because I told him he couldn't eat his cheez-it crackers until he got his picture taken. I know, mean mommy.

Happy boy!

He thought he was being sneaky with the pringles ;)

Our computer room is right next to Owen's bedroom (doors are literally 2 inches away). I put Owen to bed and then Jason and I went to the computer room to do some work. I heard O moving a bit in his bedroom but thought nothing of it (he usually goes right to sleep with just a little moving around). A little bit later I turned around to go to another room and saw this....

What a stinker! How he managed to get all 4 of his stuffed animals and his favorite pillow into the hallway and fall asleep without us knowing... I'm not sure! (He sleeps with all those things -Bob, Snoopy, Rex and Greg- every night)

What a night!

First I have to say.... looks can be deceiving. Owen looks so cute and adorable in those pictures I posted last night. Little did I know what was lurking beneath that ;)

He refused to go to sleep last night. He listened to his music for a little bit and then was done so we put that up. We thought he was going to sleep so Jason and I went downstairs to work on some other stuff. We *never* have any troubles from Owen with going to sleep. We heard his door shut a little bit later, but we figured he just shut it to go to sleep (he's been experimenting with shutting his door and wanting some privacy so we're trying to respect that). At about 12:30 (yes, after MIDNIGHT) I went upstairs to grab something.... and saw light coming from under his door. So I peeked it open to turn off the light... but Owen wasn't in his bed. I open the door all the way and do a quick search- and find him wide awake on the other side of his bed reading books. Uhhh.... no. Go. To. Bed. Child. Turned off the light, put him in bed and go back to my bedroom to grab something. Turn around and he's turned back on the light and is playing. NO! Rinse and repeat a few times. Finally I get tired of this game (though Owen certaintly wasn't!) and get ready for bed and get into his bed, with my arm over him to keep him from escaping ;) He fell asleep around 1:00. Jason and I decided to sleep on the couch and loveseat while his dad slept in our bed (he stayed the night to keep an ear on Owen while we went out shopping). I fell asleep around 2:00. Our alarm went off at 4:30 and we were off :)

We hit Meijer and Walmart before Jason was too ill and had to go home. With his allergies, if he's in tight spaces with people wearing a lot of smelly purfume or people who smoke his allergies go off big time. And that's what happened. Poor guy felt like his head was going to explode. So I took him home and he took a shower, took some meds and drank some tea. Once I knew he was feeling a bit better he went to bed and I went back out. I hit Lowe's, Bed Bath and Beyond (where I got this for Owen... he'll love it!!), Target, Staples and Home Depot. I didn't get a lot of stuff, but I had fun :) I ran by McDonalds on my way home for a quick breakfast for the drive home. I made it back home around 9:00, in bed by 9:10. Owen was up by 9:30. What a stinker. Since Jason isn't feeling well I let him sleep and got up with Owen. I didn't even get 20 minutes of sleep. It's a good thing I'm still young ;) It's now almost noon and Jason is still sleeping, Owen's playing with his Leapster and I'm cleaning and getting ready to put out Christmas decorations. Jason's parents stopped by a few minutes ago to drop off this cute shirt Sue bought for me. It's got a bunch of cute snowmen on it. She had to fight the old ladies at Macy's to get it though. I think she and I are going out to Target later today once the crowds die down. There were a couple things I wanted to get but none were doorbusters or things that would be gone by this afternoon so I waited on them.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Apparently pictures are going backwards today.... and I don't feel like fixing them ;)

We got Owen an MP3 player and a set of headphones. We got it for "therapy purposes" because he's not been handling crowds and public places as well lately. Lots of meltdowns. Lots of overstimulation. Just not a good combination with the holidays coming up. So, we got him an MP3 player and Jason just got done loading some VeggieTales songs, Thomas songs and some classical music songs onto it. Hopefully this will help him when out in public (along with his jogging stroller, which he still loves to crawl into and pull the shade down over him so he doesn't have to see the motion outside it).

As you can see... he loves it! He asked to sleep with it tonight, which we'll let him (and then take it away once he's asleep.)

Jason and I.

Mama and Owen. Check out what he's wearing!!!!! It's a miracle! LOL! Well, actually, it's sorta a miracle and sorta a lot of therapy stuff going into it. Underneath the shirt he's wearing a white undershirt and one of his absolute favorite shirts- they're like Under Armor shirts..... very very tight. He loves them and begs to wear one everyday (btw- if anyone needs any ideas for Christmas for him he would LOVE a new one.... they sell them at Target for $13 (hoping they go on sale soon!!!). He likes black or white, long sleeves. He would gladly do without a toy and get these instead!). The dress pants made it about 1 1/2ish hours before we shed them in the car and changed into his preferred pants (sweat pants) right before dinner. But he actually wore them! And he says he wants a Christmas tie so he can wear it on Christmas. So the hunt is on for a cute one...

Owen and Jason.... Jason had to dress up too as inspiration for Owen to do it... and it worked. Owen loves dressing like Jason. He loves everything Jason does.

And Owen being a little ham :)

We hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and enjoy this weekend. We will be putting up Christmas decorations this weekend so hopefully I'll have pictures to post soon!

It's been a fun week... and it's only wednesday!

We had our ARC/IEP meeting for Owen on Monday afternoon. All things considered, it went pretty well. We "got" everything we wanted for Owen (aide in room, lock on door, various things in the classroom to help him, ST every week, social skills help, etc). Except OT. The OT (who wasn't there but we did get on the phone for a little bit) didn't want Owen to have any OT, other than her talking to the teacher about ways to help Owen. I don't agree. And, the more I think about it, the more ticked off I got. He's been having a REALLY rough couple weeks (really bad sensory wise, to the point where he won't wear ANY shirts except those really tight, smooth feeling exercise type shirts). It's sucked. Right now he gets OT 2 hours a week at a private place (one hour is sensory/fine motor, the other hour is feeding). Once he starts Kindergarten I'm more than likely going to have to cut private OT to 1 hour per week (just the feeding) because of school/work schedules. So we want him to pick up the 1 hour/week at school. The OT was soooo against it and said it would be a waste of time Basically, what it boiled down to, is she's only at his school 2 days a week. If she's seeing Owen for 1 hour/week she won't have time. Someone that she's seeing is going to get bumped or something. TOUGH LUCK. Whether my child needs OT or not should NOT be determined by how many days she's working. Hire another OT if you have to! The OT was basically saying that the teacher was fine to work with Owen this year and we would see how he was doing in Kindergarten to determine whether he needs OT there. Even Owen's teacher was very much against this. She said that K here is more like 1st grade. They are expected to be able to sit still and do their paperwork. Right now ds won't even make a mark on a paper without freaking out. Why would I want to just wait it out until next year, guaranteeing he's going to be so far behind in K that he's going to have a hard time catching up?!? Why not help him now and hope he gets started in K on the right foot???

So, anyway, we ended up compromising and doing 60 minutes a week for 3 weeks (which will get us to Christmas break). After Christmas break we'll meet and see how much progress Owen has made.

Of course, then there's Owen's advocate... who was livid that this was the situation with the OT. He's headed up to central office to talk to the higher ups and see what he can do. We our advocate!!!

So anyway.... yesterday after work we went to the gym. Owen was pissed off because he wanted to go home and eat a donut (he has a little bag of those tiny powdered sugar donuts) and not go to the gym. No dice. I told him he could have the donut after the gym. Not good enough. Freak out occurs. I carry him into the gym (to get out of the cold) while he's freaking out. Who should we see right inside the doors? Yup.... the OT who says he doesn't need any OT. Yippee. She motioned for us to come over, so we did. She and I talk briefly, Owen freaks out when she talks to him. Eventually she's holding him somewhat. He's pissed off. Starts clawing at her face. I try to stop him, she stops me and says "I need to see this". Okaaaaay lady. Have fun! He freaks out for a little while longer before I take him away and bring him to the kids room. I sat with him for a little bit and then he eventually calmed down and ran off to play. When we were done working out we went back and got him and were on our way out.... when we ran into the OT again. He was much nicer to her this time but I still felt a little bad because he got her good on her neck. She's got some nice little scratch marks for Thanksgiving

Dentist

Owen went to the dentist this morning and did GREAT! We've been going every 3 months instead of every 6 months, just because it's easier on him that way. We do a little more every visit. Maybe in another 5 years we'll get to do an entire cleaning and exam in one visit. LOL!

But, seriously, this time he did awesome! He let her brush his teeth with a plain toothbrush, use the scrapper a little (this is new for him but he had a tiny bit of tartar build up between two of his teeth so we needed to get rid of it) and then brush his teeth with cotton candy toothpaste! This was GREAT progress for him! Then the dentist came by and looked at his teeth and counted them. This was a HUGE amount of progress for him. Now, don't get me wrong... he didn't enjoy this one bit. He screamed and tried to get off the table about half the time we were there. BUT there are 2 different screams- there's the "ouch you're hurting or scaring me and I need to get out of here right now" and there's the "I'm pissed off that you people are holding me down so I'm going to kick and scream in protest". He was doing the second one, which is reasonable for him. He does it every time. If he were ever scared or in pain I would stop them. But if he's just being stubborn... sometimes you just need to get over it ;) The dentist said his teeth look perfect, no worries at all. Next time we want to try to get x-rays. So after his appointment today we took him back to the x-ray area and showed him the chair he'll sit in and the camera so hopefully he'll be okay with it next time. Between now and then (March) I'll run by the office again and take some pictures to make him a social story, since those help him so much.

Wow.

There's snow on the ground. In November. In Kentucky. This is kinda unheard of. Jason is blaming me for bringing my "Michigan weather" with us :) Owen is LOVING it! Now he wants me to buy him a pair of snow boots and, if he'll actually wear them, I'll happily give in to that request!

This is how Owen fell asleep tonight, which is pretty much how he falls asleep almost every night. The boy loves his books. He's not met a book yet that he didn't like.

And once I took the book off to put it away, I figured out his little secret.... he didn't want to wear those pj's but it's COLD tonight (see above pictures!). But he agreed to wear them, because he knows he wakes up cold and then can't fall asleep and then mom gets a little cranky. LOL. So after I gave him his goodnight kiss and left the room he unzipped them. What a stinker! The other night he completely took off his pj's and covered up with the blanket so I wouldn't see it. LOL! (And yes, he has a Christmas blanket on his bed already. Because he's spoiled by Jason's mom who wants to buy him everything under the sun. Ha. Great. She also bought him a Christmas towel set for his bathroom because "he needed them because they have Christmas trains on them". Sure. Uh-huh)

And on to some not quite as fun stuff (actually, kinda boring I'm sure if you're not Owen's mommy! LOL!). Anyway, we got 11 pages of Owen's evaluation results back this week (from the school). There's still more, but it's a start. I won't write all the results since that would take a long time but basically he doesn't qualify for a "classic autism" diagnosis. Duh. We knew that. He does qualify for an "autism spectrum disorder" diagnosis. Again, we knew that. We've known this for years. But we had to go through this whole evaluation anyway just because that's how the school does it. So, surprise surprise.... Owen's on the autism spectrum. Bet you all are shocked ;)

There was obviously a whole lot more to the evaluation than that and maybe I'll go into more detail later. But it's late and Owen has a dentist appointment first thing in the morning. Yippee.

I will say though that the evaluation said that he's reading at a 2nd grade level right now (in preschool!). Yay for Owen! And everyone who asks is shocked to learn that he taught himself. I swear I'm not sitting here giving him reading lessons (like he would actually sit for them if I tried!!). He totally taught himself. The only thing I do/did is tell him what a word is when he asks. Usually after he asks once he knows it for good and won't ask for that word again.

We also started a new food thing this week. Owen got into a really long rut where he started dropping foods again and refusing to try new foods. Not cool. It's been going on for a little while now so it was time to crack down. Jason, Owen's OT/feeding therapist and I talked about it and decided to try a weekly menu for him. He's obsessed with lists and anything written down so we thought this would work well. For every meal he had at least 2 foods that he likes and eats well. Then some meals he had a food that he's previously eaten but doesn't anymore. And some meals there was a brand new food. The new foods were usually at dinner. He got all foods presented to him at the same time. He chose to eat the "favorite" foods first and then asked for more of them. In order to get more of his favorite foods he had to at least interact with the new foods. This could be smelling, touching, snake testing, biting and spitting out or chewing. It all depended on what his previous experience with that food was and how he was handling it. Nothing was ever forced (we don't believe in force feeding. Food should be fun, not stressful) and he never went to bed hungry. But at times I think it was a battle of the wills between he and I! But, over the course of this week he tried (and liked!!) celery (he ate about a 2 1/2 inch piece!). He also tried a bite of cucumber, but didn't care for that. He touched a hard boiled egg. He also bit a piece of chicken and spit it out (was pretty indifferent on the taste, it didn't seem to bother him too bad, but he definately didn't want it in his mouth!). He also put a piece of spaghetti in his mouth but couldn't handle it and gagged until he almost vomitted. That one obviously got spit out immediately. We were at the gym on Monday and they were giving out free hot chocolate. To my surprise, Owen wanted some (it's not something he's ever drank before). He asked for some with mini marshmallows, whipped cream and hershey's syrup on top. And then he DRANK IT! And THEN he asked for some more the next day and drank it. And then again tonight for dinner!!! We've been making it with water (which is how the gym made it) but we may play around with milk and see if he'll drink it that way.

Yay for me!

I found out today that I got a raise at work. Woo-hoo! It's another $.50/hour. I also found out that I got a weeks paid vacation that I can use anytime between now and next November. Yippee!!!

Why, oh why, does he always make me eat my words?

Yesterday I talked to Owen's pediatrician about various things with him. I mentioned that the inhaler seemed to work the last time we used it and the coughing/wheezing stopped. But we left it in Michigan (good job on my part, I also left his winter coat there). Owen's insurance will cover another inhaler, but won't cover another spacer (he needs this to use the inhaler). Great. So I talked to the ped and told him that. Owen hasn't been coughing or wheezing so we decided to just let it be for now and hope we can make it another 5 weeks until we get back to Michigan to get it. The ped obviously said if we need one to call him and he'll write a script (and I'll just pay for the spacer out of pocket).

But Owen had been doing well so I told the ped we didn't need the script right now and I would call him back if anything changed.

And then last night hit. 102-103 fever all night, coughing and wheezing pretty bad, can't sleep well at all, etc. It wasn't bad enough to take him to the ER, but bad enough to keep us all awake. I actually slept in his bed for part of the night just so I could keep a close ear on his breathing (and had a monitor on in his bedroom the other part of the night so I could hear him from our bedroom). He definately needed his inhaler. Just hours after I told the dr we were fine without it. Yup, that's my boy. LOL!

Today he's been fine. 99-100 fever but up and playing. He did stay home from school and I took the day off work just so I could keep a close eye on him. Of course, Owen's dr doesn't work in this office on Friday's though. He works in a different office (at the hospital). So I called the nurse at the dr's office and she's out of town too. WTH? So I left a message with the other lady who works there, but never heard back from her. I can imagine she's busy being the only one in the office (there is 1 other dr who works there but I've only met her once).

So now I'm deciding between crossing my fingers that tonight goes well or calling his dr's home phone number (which he gave me and told me to never hesitate to call) and seeing if he can call a script into the pharmacy. Hmmmm....

Heard back from the school....

And my child is not typical One of the people on his eval team called me yesterday to say that part of the evals were done (the autism eval was done) and the results show he's not a typical child. Well...... duh. Again, he's not severe enough to be diagnosed with "classic autism", which we all agree with. They did give him the diagnosis "autism spectrum disorder", which we expected. So.... woo! At least we all agree on *that*. She did say also that it doesn't matter if they diagnose him with classic autism, ASD or PDD-NOS- the same services will be available to him since in this school district it all falls under the "autism" category.

Poor kid can't catch a break.

Owen's had a cough for months. It gets better and worse but it's always there. His dr and I have been keeping an eye on it for quite awhile. He had an ear infection a little while ago (at the same time as the cough) so he was on antibiotics. The ear infection went away, the cough stayed. We chalked it up to a bug/virus. Except it still hasn't gone away. Thursday night it got really bad (he also had a mild fever). Since we had a big weekend and beginning of this week I took him to the dr on Friday morning, just to rule out any throat or ear infections before the weekend. All was clear, just the cough and mild wheezing. We went home and kept an eye on it. A week later, it's still not better. So, back to the dr this morning (I also wanted to talk to him about the evaluation Owen had done).

First the dr wants him to have a chest x-ray done just to rule out anything odd going on. He said he's seen kids who had a cough for months and when they finally get a chest x-ray done they find out they asperated a piece of a toy or something. It would be rare, but possible. So he's going to get that done probably tomorrow morning.

The dr fully expects the x-ray to be normal. If that is the case, his next guess is asthma. Right now he's calling it "reactive airway disease"... basically Owen is coughing and wheezing and we don't know why. We are going to try albuterol and see if it helps. If it does, we lean more towards asthma. If it doesn't... we'll brainstorm more and try to figure out how to help this cough/wheezing.

As far as the evaluation he just had goes... the dr and I pretty much agree on it. PDD-NOS seems to fit. Owen has some quirks. He has some signs of autism. He doesn't have enough to meet the criteria for autism. But yet, he's not quite typical either. For now, pdd-nos fits. With the adhd- as the dr said.... he could walk down the street and point out a dozen people within 5 minutes that he can diagnose with adhd. It means nothing. Yes, we'll keep it in mind. No, we are not going to medicate him. It may be a way to explain some of his quirks, sure. But maybe it's not. Who knows. Same with OCD. Just another "roll your eyes and keep it in mind" type of thing. Am I going to jump up and medicate him? Not a chance. Will I keep that possibility in mind? Sure.

For now we are going to try to find some sort of behaviour therapist he can start seeing to work on some of his major issues.

Soooo... that's the update for now.

If you hand out diagnosises (diagnosies?) like candy, eventually the child will take one. Right?

Today we had the long awaited evaluation in Louisville. This is said to be one of the best places for an evaluation around (Cincinnati children's is the other) so I was very very hopeful when we went in. I got up at 5:45 this morning just to get him there on time. And what do I learn?

-pdd-nos provisional diagnosis
-adhd provisional diagnosis
-"possibly ocd too, but I think we'll wait another year to give him that one"

Uhhhhh.... yeah. Whatever. Basically they said that Owen wasn't showing enough signs of autism for that diagnosis (YAY!) but he had enough to get a pdd-nos diagnosis (which is what we assumed was going to happen before we even went today). But they also said that alot of what I've been saying is autism/pdd-nos symptoms are actually adhd symptoms. Hmmm... not sure what to think about that one. The OCD one I kinda laugh at. Only because the kid is 5!! Seriously! OCD??? His OT and I have joked about OCD before, but neither of us were serious. The provisional part of those basically means that he meets the criteria for them right NOW, but that could change in the future so they could take that diagnosis away.

Some of what they said made sense. Some of it just blew me away. They were not even willing to talk about therapy options for the "adhd", they just insisted he needed to be on meds. At just barely 5 years old. Hah. Not going to happen. Just for laughs I did read the papers they sent home with me about ADHD. One of the biggest side effects of these meds is lose of appetite and decreased weight. Yeah.... that's just what he needs. Right.

Updates, good and bad

First the bad. Jason went back to the surgeon this morning for a re-check. They took off the cast and did a new x-ray. Based on that and how his thumb looks, the dr said that it's not healing properly so he's going to have surgery on Monday morning. He'll put 2 pins in. So, that sucks big time. Any positive thoughts for a speedy recovery would be much appreciated!

The good news... we've been trying to get Owen an evaluation at the Weisskopf center for a long time. Last month they told me another 6-8 months. I told his pediatrician that and he gave them a nice little call ;) (Owen's ped rocks by the way!). I got a call yesterday asking if we could be there Tuesday morning!!! So, his eval is Tuesday morning. Woo!!!! Bad news on that one is it's about 1 1/2 hours away and we have to be there at 8am. Yikes! But, we'll do it :)

The hopeful news.... Owen's school is, well, not doing as well as I originally thought they would. I am not too happy with their progress on the evals so we hired an advocate for him. I just signed the paperwork this morning and right now that advocate is sitting down having a meeting with the head of the special education department for our county. After that he's going to see the principal at Owen's school and demand an alarm is put on that door (the one that I put the alarm on but was promised a permanent alarm would be put up "soon".... 7 weeks ago). So.... we'll see how it goes! I'm very hopeful that he'll be able to help us.

The other bad news... the advocate isn't cheap. I did get him to lower his cost and spread out the cost over the next 3 months. Add onto that though the cost of Jason's thumb. Thumbs apparently aren't cheap ;) I don't know what the ER visit is going to cost us yet, we're guessing a couple hundred. Each surgeon appointment costs $20 (he's had 2 so far, will be having many more in the following weeks). The surgery, not including the cost of the anesthesia person, will be about $850. He's also going to need some physical therapy after all is said and done to regain the use of his thumb. I believe that's a $20 co-pay each time too. So, after all is said and done, we're looking at probably $2000-2500ish out of pocket. Yikes! To compound that fun little fact- Jason can't work his weekend job until he's completely healed. Now, the weekend job we don't NEED to survive. We use that for play money, mostly. But losing that job for a couple months and having about $3000 in unexpected bills (Jason's thumb and Owen's advocate) isn't cool. But, we'll survive. I talked to Jason a little about me getting a second job but he doesn't think it's possible because he's not going to be able to do anything with that hand for weeks so he wants me home to help him.

But, we have a roof over our heads, food in our fridge... we'll be fine. And THIS is a huge reason why I've been playing my little couponing game. We can survive for at least a month without buying anything other than fresh fruits, milk, eggs and some meat. We have plenty of frozen veggies, some frozen and canned fruit, pastas, tons of cereal and breakfast bars, nuts, peanut butter, crackers, etc etc. We have plenty of TP and PT for awhile. And I've been working on Christmas gifts for Owen (working sales and coupons) so even if we don't have the money to buy anything else for him, he'll have a good Christmas.

Breathe in.... breathe out..... we'll be fine :)

Weekend pictures

Here's a handful of pictures from the weekend. Saturday afternoon Jason and I actually got to go out.... without Owen.... which happens like twice a year. LOL. Jason's parents watched him at our house. We went to a horse racing place with a friend. It was fun. I bet on 3 races. My first one I picked Owen's lucky number (10). I had a $2 bet and won $9.60 on it. Woo! Then I bet 2 more $2 bets on 2 more races and lost both times. But it was fun. Afterwards we went out to dinner.

Sunday we went to the Louisville Zoo for their Halloween party/trick or treat. Owen LOVED it. Had a blast and wants to go back every day. LOL! Here he is sitting at Shrek's castle.

On an elephant.

On the carousel, which was haunted so it went backwards.

"Where's the train? We need to ride the train". LOL. That was the focus of the whole thing. The train is at the end and is, of course, his favorite part!

Playing checkers at Cracker Barrel after dinner. Yes, he insisted on wearing his costume to dinner ;)