Wednesday Morning - off to school!

Ben has started potty training at school and at home yesterday with his therapists. He's had some success, but also some accidents. He doesn't seem to get the fact that he is supposed to put himself on the potty and not wait for someone to tell him to do it. His therapist told me to keep a pull up on him when he's not at school and/or in therapy, but keep taking him to the bathroom every half hour or so. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't. Right now, he doesn't seem to care whether he's wet or not, even when wearing underwear. I had kind of a rough morning with him and I'm still recovering. I woke up myself around 3 am and couldn't get back to sleep, though I desparately wanted to. At 5, I heard Ben wake up and try to come downstairs. I brought him back to his bed and told him it was still nighttime and he couldn't get up yet. He accepted this the first two times I did it, and I was able to lounge in bed until about 5:30 before he tried again. This time, he threw a major tantrum when I tried to put him back to bed. He was so loud and angry I'm very surprised the girls were able to sleep through it all. He broke one of my coffee cups by throwing it on the kitchen floor and dumped the water bowl. I felt pretty patient with him as I tried to calm him, but maybe I was just tired. He finally calmed down with the help of some of his favorite music, and sat on my lap for a while, cuddling. While he sat with me, I thought about what's going to happen if he does this when he's 10, or 15. He'll be a lot stronger then. Hopefully, we'll be able to improve his coping skills. If not, I'm afraid we're in for it.

What to do with the little guy

Poor Ben, though I suppose he thinks he's getting away with something. He's only had one day of therapy this week because his therapists have both been sick. Coupled with him being sick last week, and the snow, he hasn't had to intensely work at anything in quite a while. Other than school, that is. Next Tuesday begins his big potty training week. I'm going to bring him into the lab at the army hospital for some blood work first thing on Monday morning, and let Rob put the girls on the bus. He's got a whole slew of tests that Dr. Compart ordered and she's waiting on the results. The next day, it's in for the long haul! His school and therapists are going to try to teach him to go to the potty when he needs to, so that he isn't prompt dependent, i.e., only goes when we tell him to. If that doesn't work, we'll put him on a timed potty schedule. Either way, it's goodbye diapers and hello big boy underwear. And hello mess.

It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

It's kind of hard to believe less than a week ago we were about to have a snowstorm. Well, all that snow's gone now, thank goodness, and it's an absolutely gorgeous day outside. All my kids are better, more or less, and I will be happy to send them all back to school come Monday. It was a little rough there for a little while, but it passed, as all things do. Ben has been a little charmer for the past few days. He's smiling, cuddling with me, and generally being a good boy. Still spitting, occasional gasping noises, but for the most part no screaming or crying. He is still getting completely wiped out at around 7:30 pm, and I'm not sure why. His schedule hasn't gotten any harder, but every night, right before bed he winds down and sometimes falls asleep right where he's sitting. I'm not complaining but it's unusual behavior for him.