So far summer has been . . . odd. Normally we stay home, enjoy the garden and spend time with friends. We like our parks and museums quiet, which isn't an option in the school holidays!
This year the weather has been so variable that we've not done much outside at all - no blisteringly hot paddling pool days, no out door dinners, only one water fight!
We've also been busy, so time at home has been our decompression time.
We've been bowling, to a soft play centre and swimming with a support group, we've camped with the Scout group, this weekend we camp again with another group, and we've done a couple of home ed visits as well! Our quiet summer has gone up in smoke - which is both good and bad.
It's good, because these have been days well lived. Good friends and happy memories have been made. Time has been well spent, and we've all enjoyed it.
Bad because, for me, the summer is a time of recharging batteries. A few weeks with less expectations, less stress of getting places, less need to be on time. It's when I build up enthusiasm to face projects and workbooks again, when I gather resources, find inspiration. This year we have been so busy I think I'm going to hit September at the same point as I burn-out. So perhaps we will have to take the first part of September as a recovery period - lets just hope for an Indian summer, so our quiet days can be spent in the paddling pool!
In other news, we have an appointment next week with CAMHs. The follow up to both M and J's ADOS's. I *think* I know what will happen, but I am worrying about counting chickens before the eggs hatch. . . I am also worrying about what will come next. Still, worrying only borrows trouble from tomorrow as the saying goes. And bridges must be crossed when they are reached.
For the moment I think it's time to be happy with where we are, the kids have had a fun summer, probably their busiest yet, they are enjoying "Our Island story" as a bedtime book, Minecraft has turned into some kind of challenge-based project, with J and A asking me to set tasks and then comparing their builds, M is reading a roleplaying source book at night (I don't think he knows I know) and L is writing a story.
Even when planned summer relaxing goes out of the window the children are learning and growing faster than I can keep track of, and really, I guess, that's why we do things the way we do :)
Wednesday, 20 August 2014
Wednesday, 30 July 2014
Summer success and plans
Houston, we have a problem . . . Well, I do anyway!
Last time I blogged I had to change the account access, and now I can't remember the password! It's set up on Gmail, which isn't the main email I use, and I'm struggling to get a password reminder sent anywhere I can read it . . . for now I can access the blog via my tablet, but can't get into my gmail account at all. So I'm typing on a *really* small screen. The prospect of which has put me off blogging for a while. But it's about time I bit that particular bullet, so here we go . . .
Life is full of ups and downs, and one of the downs is CAMHs - so far they've been pretty decent with us, only one dodgy appointment and the record was set straight when we wrote to them. We are so close to the end of M and J's diagnosis journey, I can almost see the finishing post. So of course this has to be the time our local CAMHs have been told to find 25% budget savings! We know some of the people the boys have seen have taken redundancy or early retirement, so changes in who they are seen by is inevitable. I *think* that worked in our favour when J had his ADOS the other week, two fresh sets of eyes seem to have seen things a bit more clearly than those who thought they knew him. But the down side of this is longer waiting times.
It's been almost five months since M had his ADOS, and we haven't had a follow up appointment. So my husband called (again!) and asked how things were going . . .
Now, I do understand that losing a lot of staff creates problems, and by all accounts another member of staff is often off sick too, but my understanding has limits. So it was better that my hubby call, he's far more patient than I am ;)
He was told about budget cuts, longer waits, staff off sick, and then as a concession the lady he was talking to said she would try and send us the raw reports, although they "don't normally do that." A couple of days later we got the reports. They have more than a few grammatical errors, and it's clear they are meant for internal uses only, but now I can see what happened in the two ADOS assessments. I feel a lot happier :)
The reports are at great pains to point out that they are part of a larger process, not a diagnosis in and of themselves, and so I'm not going to share the content, suffice to say that it made me happy, then sad, then relieved.
I have no idea when we will get to the next stage, we're waiting to see the Neuro-development clinic, and hopefully when we do we will have a formal diagnosis for each of the boys.
So, that's M and J . . . The next big news is L.
Back at the beginning of May L began a paddle sports course. He was very nervous, unsure of going at all, it took a lot of talking on my part, and a lot more pressure than I was actually comfortable applying. In the end he went, with the proviso that he try for two weeks and if he hated it he could stop going.
He loved it! As far as I can tell he is actually quite good at the various paddle sports, and has passed the course with flying colours. This week he has gone to Devon with the group, for four days of paddling mayhem :) At 15 1/2 he is the youngest of the group, but he is happy with that, and has made some good friends. He's thinking of joining a local club and earning more qualifications . . .
Lastly little miss A. She is enjoying the school holidays. She is "playing out" for pretty much all the time we are at home, she has lots of local friends. For A socialising comes easy, she is a little bemused by all the "best friends" nonsense, and it has been a bit of a shock to her how unkind some of the kids are to each other, but on the whole she is happy and thriving.
Over the summer we have a lot of activities booked with our local ASD support charity, we saw "How to train your dragon 2" with them on Monday, and are going swimming on Saturday. It's shaping up to be a very fun few weeks :)maybe the start of the school term will give us a bit of a rest!
Last time I blogged I had to change the account access, and now I can't remember the password! It's set up on Gmail, which isn't the main email I use, and I'm struggling to get a password reminder sent anywhere I can read it . . . for now I can access the blog via my tablet, but can't get into my gmail account at all. So I'm typing on a *really* small screen. The prospect of which has put me off blogging for a while. But it's about time I bit that particular bullet, so here we go . . .
Life is full of ups and downs, and one of the downs is CAMHs - so far they've been pretty decent with us, only one dodgy appointment and the record was set straight when we wrote to them. We are so close to the end of M and J's diagnosis journey, I can almost see the finishing post. So of course this has to be the time our local CAMHs have been told to find 25% budget savings! We know some of the people the boys have seen have taken redundancy or early retirement, so changes in who they are seen by is inevitable. I *think* that worked in our favour when J had his ADOS the other week, two fresh sets of eyes seem to have seen things a bit more clearly than those who thought they knew him. But the down side of this is longer waiting times.
It's been almost five months since M had his ADOS, and we haven't had a follow up appointment. So my husband called (again!) and asked how things were going . . .
Now, I do understand that losing a lot of staff creates problems, and by all accounts another member of staff is often off sick too, but my understanding has limits. So it was better that my hubby call, he's far more patient than I am ;)
He was told about budget cuts, longer waits, staff off sick, and then as a concession the lady he was talking to said she would try and send us the raw reports, although they "don't normally do that." A couple of days later we got the reports. They have more than a few grammatical errors, and it's clear they are meant for internal uses only, but now I can see what happened in the two ADOS assessments. I feel a lot happier :)
The reports are at great pains to point out that they are part of a larger process, not a diagnosis in and of themselves, and so I'm not going to share the content, suffice to say that it made me happy, then sad, then relieved.
I have no idea when we will get to the next stage, we're waiting to see the Neuro-development clinic, and hopefully when we do we will have a formal diagnosis for each of the boys.
So, that's M and J . . . The next big news is L.
Back at the beginning of May L began a paddle sports course. He was very nervous, unsure of going at all, it took a lot of talking on my part, and a lot more pressure than I was actually comfortable applying. In the end he went, with the proviso that he try for two weeks and if he hated it he could stop going.
He loved it! As far as I can tell he is actually quite good at the various paddle sports, and has passed the course with flying colours. This week he has gone to Devon with the group, for four days of paddling mayhem :) At 15 1/2 he is the youngest of the group, but he is happy with that, and has made some good friends. He's thinking of joining a local club and earning more qualifications . . .
Lastly little miss A. She is enjoying the school holidays. She is "playing out" for pretty much all the time we are at home, she has lots of local friends. For A socialising comes easy, she is a little bemused by all the "best friends" nonsense, and it has been a bit of a shock to her how unkind some of the kids are to each other, but on the whole she is happy and thriving.
Over the summer we have a lot of activities booked with our local ASD support charity, we saw "How to train your dragon 2" with them on Monday, and are going swimming on Saturday. It's shaping up to be a very fun few weeks :)maybe the start of the school term will give us a bit of a rest!
Wednesday, 18 June 2014
Up, down, and often round the bend
It's been a while since I wrote anything here, life has been a curious mix of crazy and not worth blogging about.
Often I get mental blocks - if something big is happening then I can't seem to plan things the other side of the big thing, and we've had some major things to get to the other side of!
The biggest reason for my silence has been L and his exams. He took Edexcel Mathematics B IGCSE and Biology IGCSE. We hit the books for some pretty major revision, and fitting "normal" life in around the edges wore me out. L does not like exams, and despite being pretty good at both subjects his dyslexia may well get in the way of decent results, but now the exams are over all we can do is wait for mid August and results day.
Revising has been awkward. I generally prefer to follow the kids as they show me how they want and need to learn. Thus far it's been a successful strategy, but revising for exams changed that. Now we had a deadline, and a specified curriculum. No more digging as deep as L wanted, no more skimming over the boring bits. Together we had to do this in a much more structured way, and it really didn't suit either of us! L wanted to look far more deeply at the cellular biology. Ecology didn't interest him. At times I was telling him to stop being interested, and at other times trying to help him remember things he felt no connection to. Maths was a little easier - until L wanted to know WHY trigonometry works, and why Pythagoras was so fascinated by right angled triangles. Still, at the end of the day we got through the material, he retained a lot of the information, and he went into the exam halls confident and with a good shot at things.
So that was one big thing.
Another has been a weekend away. Not such a big deal? Really? We went away with the children's scout troop. I am not particularly keen on quite a few of the leaders, and there have been . . . issues in the past with how the leaders cope with the boys differences. Add to that the fact that this was our first camping adventure, and that L was going to be left at home for the weekend alone . . . so much potential for disaster!
L was fine. He had a friend come over and stay for part of the time we were away, and together they managed to cook (pizzas and curry) sleep (at least a little) and feed the animals. They didn't change the kittens litter tray, or walk the dog, or wash up (not convinced L washed himself let alone anything else!) When we got home the house was intact, and I guess since L is only 15 that's enough of a victory for me!
The camp was OK too. The first night we had a thunder storm. So now we know that the tent can cope with a lot of rain in a short space of time.
There were lots of activities on the Saturday, and from those we learnt that A is awesome at climbing - she went across the traversing wall so easily, confidently and quickly! She is also fab at monkey bars and other "dangling" sorts of things. We really need to find a way to get her climbing more.
J really enjoyed the air rifle range - and he improved his shooting over the day too. He wasn't so good at the climbing side of things, but he did persevere and improve. One thing he excelled at was random conversation. J has a small selection of topics of conversation, and if the other person is even vaguely positive about them J will natter for hours. The other person, of course, rarely has to say anything, but J barely notices that!
M didn't find an activity that he excelled at, nor did he fixate on any one thing in particular, he did, however, have fun and try pretty much everything.
All three children were awarded badges and trophies at the AGM - they have all been recognised as working hard and trying their best.
J has had awards before from both Cubs and Beavers, A has from Girls Brigade, but M never has. He was so sweet as the younger two got their awards - cheering for them and being very encouraging. He clearly didn't think he would get anything, so when his name was called his reaction was lovely. Lots of smiles all around :)
In other news, our local CAMHs are having a bit of a reshuffle, and this has dramatically increased waiting lists for things. So whilst J finally has a date for his ADOS we still haven't had a follow up for M's ADOS which was on the 4th of March! This process is taking forever!
So now that the exams, revision and camping are over and done with, I have lots of posts bubbling around in my mind. It's amazing what climbing over those mental blocks can do for the subconscious :)
Often I get mental blocks - if something big is happening then I can't seem to plan things the other side of the big thing, and we've had some major things to get to the other side of!
The biggest reason for my silence has been L and his exams. He took Edexcel Mathematics B IGCSE and Biology IGCSE. We hit the books for some pretty major revision, and fitting "normal" life in around the edges wore me out. L does not like exams, and despite being pretty good at both subjects his dyslexia may well get in the way of decent results, but now the exams are over all we can do is wait for mid August and results day.
Revising has been awkward. I generally prefer to follow the kids as they show me how they want and need to learn. Thus far it's been a successful strategy, but revising for exams changed that. Now we had a deadline, and a specified curriculum. No more digging as deep as L wanted, no more skimming over the boring bits. Together we had to do this in a much more structured way, and it really didn't suit either of us! L wanted to look far more deeply at the cellular biology. Ecology didn't interest him. At times I was telling him to stop being interested, and at other times trying to help him remember things he felt no connection to. Maths was a little easier - until L wanted to know WHY trigonometry works, and why Pythagoras was so fascinated by right angled triangles. Still, at the end of the day we got through the material, he retained a lot of the information, and he went into the exam halls confident and with a good shot at things.
So that was one big thing.
Another has been a weekend away. Not such a big deal? Really? We went away with the children's scout troop. I am not particularly keen on quite a few of the leaders, and there have been . . . issues in the past with how the leaders cope with the boys differences. Add to that the fact that this was our first camping adventure, and that L was going to be left at home for the weekend alone . . . so much potential for disaster!
L was fine. He had a friend come over and stay for part of the time we were away, and together they managed to cook (pizzas and curry) sleep (at least a little) and feed the animals. They didn't change the kittens litter tray, or walk the dog, or wash up (not convinced L washed himself let alone anything else!) When we got home the house was intact, and I guess since L is only 15 that's enough of a victory for me!
The camp was OK too. The first night we had a thunder storm. So now we know that the tent can cope with a lot of rain in a short space of time.
There were lots of activities on the Saturday, and from those we learnt that A is awesome at climbing - she went across the traversing wall so easily, confidently and quickly! She is also fab at monkey bars and other "dangling" sorts of things. We really need to find a way to get her climbing more.
J really enjoyed the air rifle range - and he improved his shooting over the day too. He wasn't so good at the climbing side of things, but he did persevere and improve. One thing he excelled at was random conversation. J has a small selection of topics of conversation, and if the other person is even vaguely positive about them J will natter for hours. The other person, of course, rarely has to say anything, but J barely notices that!
M didn't find an activity that he excelled at, nor did he fixate on any one thing in particular, he did, however, have fun and try pretty much everything.
All three children were awarded badges and trophies at the AGM - they have all been recognised as working hard and trying their best.
J has had awards before from both Cubs and Beavers, A has from Girls Brigade, but M never has. He was so sweet as the younger two got their awards - cheering for them and being very encouraging. He clearly didn't think he would get anything, so when his name was called his reaction was lovely. Lots of smiles all around :)
In other news, our local CAMHs are having a bit of a reshuffle, and this has dramatically increased waiting lists for things. So whilst J finally has a date for his ADOS we still haven't had a follow up for M's ADOS which was on the 4th of March! This process is taking forever!
So now that the exams, revision and camping are over and done with, I have lots of posts bubbling around in my mind. It's amazing what climbing over those mental blocks can do for the subconscious :)
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