It's the little things in life!

I'm relaxing this evening with a fabulous glass of wine, even though there are a ton of dishes in the sink and James isn't in bed yet. And there are a stack of bills on either side of the computer taunting me. And I miss my sister terribly ( www.thelongwayaway.blogspot.com ). We were supposed to have a dinner party tonight, but we actually got snowed out, or in--depending on how you look at it. I actually made a very simple dinner, but when you have a kid who doesn't sleep without you (and without sleeping, doesn't eat), these things take all day. So I, literally, spent all day barefoot in the kitchen. The great thing about today was that Tom was home all day because of the raging snowstorm, so I never had that 'I'm not paying attention to my kid' guilt. I fed James and took care of naptime, and Tom played with him/therapied him in between. But I was still in the kitchen all day instead of hanging at the spa so.......still not really a day off. HOWEVER, dinner was fantastic. I even made dessert. Granted, I made 8 of them, but that just means breakfast, lunch, and dinner are done for tomorrow. And everything turned out AMAZING!! AND Tom is now giving James a bath and will clean up the kitchen while I put him to bed. It does help that I married an amazing man (clearly, we're having a good day).

Hopefully tomorrow I'm feeling just as positive and oblivious to our plight. I think I'm enjoying my wine a little too much...

So what do you DO all day?

A very common question for the stay at home mom. My old response (other than a raised eyebrow and a "what do YOU do all day") was, "I don't know, but it took all day." Some days this is still my answer. Trying to entertain the kid, make things interesting (for both of us), hopefully teach him something, enforce the rules even when you just want to let it go (you'd pay a high price for that later!), keep him safe (easier said than done), love him (easier done than said), and keeping the house in order (nearly impossible) while making dinner, bookwork, and if I'm really lucky---maybe speak to an adult for a few minutes. Somehow this takes all day. I mean, I suppose you could let your kid entertain himself all day, but that sort of defeats the purpose of being a stay at home mom, doesn't it? (sometimes I turn on a cartoon so I can go to the bathroom by myself...but he always finds me)

Anyway, many days, I have a totally different answer, but no one really wants to hear my list, so I usually just use the former response. This is all to say that the therapy with James is very involved and since the more you do, the better, we do a lot of it. Not only do we do all the sensory therapy, but James has a severe oral defensiveness, meaning he does not eat...anything. My child lives off of Pediasure, which isn't even remotely made to live off of. In between two naps per day (about 3 hrs between each nap and bedtime), we try to do a session of each therapy. The sensory therapy can really take as long as I want, depending on what we are doing. Some examples are: touching icky toys, tunnel crawling, giant foam room, playing with shaving cream, swinging, bouncing, jumping on the bed, squishing between pillows, spinning, etc. Most people will read this and think, 'well, this is just playing.' And it is, but there is a purpose to each 'game' and many of them are things that are very difficult or uncomfortable for James, so that is what we are working through. In some ways, it's nice to have such a structure for the day's play. Then comes oral therapy. We have some mouth exercises and tooth brushing (which is very new that he'll allow me to do).

Then there is food play. You got it---I am supposed to show my kid how to play with his food. Anything to make it fun! When he blows bubbles in his drink, or spits something out, or...guess what's really fun? Oh yeah, throwing it. lol But seeing as James has only just started to even touch things like yogurt, applesauce, meat strips, and lettuce, we gotta make it fun! And we are seeing real progress. He has started to lick a spoon, sometimes even with something on it. Every now and again he will put his hand in his mouth. He'll drink juice sometimes, even some soup. He chews things up, but spits it out because he doesn't know how to swallow it, and doesn't really want to. And in the process makes a monumental mess! It's funny, til I find...something...on the wall weeks later. Seriously, we're going to have to paint our house after this!

Starting over...

I haven't blogged in so long, I can't even catch up, so I'm just sort of starting over. I originally started a blog about diabetes and pregnancy, but that is the least of my worries now. So now I feel like writing about our lives with sensory integration disorder. After all my posts about miserable nights, worry, stress, disliking daily life, etc. on www.pregnancyanddiabetes.blogspot.com we did finally figure out what was wrong with James. It actually didn't change much of our daily life, but it does feel better to just know what was wrong and that is is fixable. It has been 19 months since I have 'slept through the night' --- whatever that is. But at least I now feel like my son is going to survive and I might just survive as well. Good news, also, is that he's the cutest, funniest little dude you've ever met, so I've decided to keep him!
Posted by Clare at 9:19 AM