It has been a while since I blogged but that has been down to having so little spare time.
J is still presenting me with hard behaviours and it has caused upset with his middle brother, O.
Lots of manic laughter in O's face, spitting in his hair and pushing him to the floor.
The spitting has not ceased since the last time I wrote about it and it is so bad I have stopped taking him out. I have had to have him with me when collecting O from school for several afternoons (due to the transport escort asking me to take him otherwise they would be sitting outside my house for 20 minutes - they always ask this when one of the other children is not on the bus and it means one less stop).
J spits and twirls round. He sits on some play equipment and spits out the corner of his mouth.
He comes up to me and barges me and kicks me.
You can imagine what this must look like to other people.
The other undesirable behaviour that is back is the weeing around the toilet bowl. I thought I had gotten him back to sitting down, but it appears he has seen or been taught again, how to stand up and wee. All well and good for neurotypical able bodied children of nine years old. Not so good for children like J, who know they have to stand there, but not that they have to aim it inside the bowl. Kitchen roll and spray is being used many many times a day to clear it all up.
I have an automatic response now when I hear him lift the toilet lid up and that is to shout out " J sit down". He does as he's told. But the other times when I don't hear him, I soon discover the delight of sprinkles everywhere but the bowl. I was on the phone the other day to a call centre and the man asked me the following question " what is the first line of your address?" and I replied "J sit down". The man laughed and told me that was incorrect, but he understood! It was automatic for me to say it as I heard the lid being lifted up!
The melatonin is still working it's magic as well. Magical Marvellous Melatonin. It has given me back the later part of my evening (11pm) but then I can't really achieve much at that time, apart from empty the washing machine, empty the dishwasher, clean the kitchen, iron, sort lunch boxes, catch up on the news, read a book and pass out.
Just before Christmas we had W (his baby brothers) Christening. I had no extra care for him and was worried about his behaviour. In the church he coped very well. He wandered about and we let him. The vicar already knew about him and had removed all dangerous or heavy objects and had no candles.
Towards the end of the service J walked up the pulpit and took hold of the microphone. It was switched on and he started babbling away. It was really very funny and made us all chuckle. Trust him to add his own little twist to the day, and make it even more unforgettable (in a nice way I mean).
He coped very well at home too with all the visitors and strange food.
He had two school friends there as well, one who is in his class. I tell you, seeing him and his class mate sitting together on the sofa, his mate, another J, eating his food, and my J drinking his cola, I felt a bit teary. He has never had a friend round. Why would he when it has no interest to him? But they were both really comfortable together and it just made it even more memorable for me. I, of course, took a photo for posterity. A milestone for him and for me.
J had a lovely Christmas. He enjoyed opening his presents which consisted of a metre of Jaffa Cakes, a floor drum kit (the flat version you can roll up), two new magnetic drawers (one plain and one in colour) and his very own IPod Touch 4th Gen. Youtube is still his favourite and he whizzes round it searching out Teletubbies, Bear in the Big Blue House, Story Makers, and Balamory. It does amaze me that a non verbal (only echolalic and very very basic demand words - "milk, toast, toilet" etc has such command of Youtube. I have a vision of him when he's an adult, working in a computer shop and people giving him their broken laptop and he just fixes it. No words are exchanged. He just does it. An Apple Genius perhaps?!
