Birds
Nest Catching
So there it is. Another year in a nutshell.
I’m not sure if it’s pathetic or impressive that I could sum up 365 days in 15 short posts, but either way it’s done. These short peeks are, of course, just that – both the highs and lows are much more lasting than I could easily relate in a couple of paragraphs. I think the most important fact is that it’s been an incredible year for us, and we look forward to the learning, trials and tribulations that are certain to come. We’ve only just begun.
Coleman has indeed made some great improvements this year, but we still have more left to do. Many of our old habits remain, and we’ll need focused, hard work to overcome them. For example, mornings remain an overall tough time. The inherent quick pace of the morning, and accompanying chaos, is simply too stressful for Coleman. In general, he struggles with multiple activities and conversations occurring around him at one time, but is better able to handle this later in the day, when everyone is finished coming and going. But in the morning, the buzz of activity is worsened by the impending departure of the girls for school, overwhelming him and setting of daily hysteria. He starts as soon as he sees the girls on the stairs, and he begins to yell in commander style for them to SIT DOWN! Literally, he follows them as the come into the kitchen, into the pantry, at the fridge, behind them all the while yelling for them to sit down. And when they finally sit to eat, he is calm and sits as well. But the respite is short as morning meals are quick and before he has even calmed down, they are up again, at the sink putting dishes away, grabbing backpacks and heading out the door. His yelling escalates the entire time. “Please sit down! Have More! Sit down again!” He keeps yelling, and soon we are practically yelling at him to stop. He grabs at the girls, trying to push them into their seats, yelling and nearly crying. Every morning. We’ve tried to make the girls sit for a minute before they leave to help him relax. We count out loud so he understands the timing, but in the end, the minute isn’t enough. Ten minutes isn’t enough. He doesn’t want them to leave period. So we have not been able to successfully stop this chaos and, as a result, our mornings are what you would call slightly stressful.
We’ve also made no progress on our Supermarket trips
which many of you are quite familiar with as you’ve seen him in action. In all fairness, we haven’t yet even begun to
work on this. Some things you just
accept until you have time to address them.
Coleman does not want me to stop and talk to anyone at all at the
supermarket. I have no idea why, but it
sends him into a screaming, crying mess.
Someone will see me, give a friendly wave hello, and walk up and ask how
things are going. And Coleman starts his
angry yelling “No Goodbye!!!” He’s such
a people person. J So for
those of you that have seen me at the supermarket, to whom I quickly put my
index finger to my mouth, signing “Shhh”, until I was up close beside you and
whispered to you as quickly and quietly as I could “I can’t talk right now…”
and kept moving…. For all of you that have
been wondering what the hell that was all about, now you know. We
have more work to do here.
Much the same holds true when we are out on the
bike. With the warmer weather arriving,
we will see more and more folks out and about, much to Coleman’s dismay. I’ll use this time to say it was good seeing
you, and talk to you later. Because he
will be a yelling, crazy, hot mess if you stop us on the street.
The rain also remains an issue. When I watch the forecast and it says rain
all week, I want to shoot someone. No, really,
I do. Coleman wakes up and goes straight
to the window. If it’s raining he turns
to me and asks “Where is the rain?” knowing full well it’s pouring
outside. I respond “It’s raining a
little but it will stop soon.” I am a liar. And he doesn’t buy it. “No!!
Make the rain stop please?!” he pleads. He continues to ask about 900 times before he
leaves for school, only to open the door to see the rain, and sob “No rain
please!!!”. I look up and think Really, Mom, I could use a little help here.
But I get nothing. She must be sleeping J. So we
are still trying to figure out how to better deal with this. School has gotten involved as well, because
there too he is obsessed with the rain.
One Tuesday as I dropped him off, his teacher greeted me, standing under
an umbrella. “Have you seen the forecast? It’s going to be a long week”
she said, defeated. I nodded I know as I opened Coleman’s door to his
voice yelling “Make the rain stop!”
Coleman’s scripting and his need to repeat words also remains,
but I do feel that when things were strong medically after our first round with
the antibiotics (the recent ‘glory’ months I like to call them) he did not
require nearly as much of this. Oddly,
since the flare up, he repeats
everything we say, rather than asking us
to repeat it. Literally every single
word. It’s like living with an
echo. It’s like living with an
echo. It’s funny at first. It’s funny at first. But then not so much. But then not so much. J
But at least our goodbye phrase is down to a single set
of words. You may recall from the first
year of this blog that Coleman requires us to yell some words or phrase as we
leave each other – those words used to change each time. They made no sense – “Ruby’s Picnic” or “Robot
Repairman” or whatever nonsense words he came up with. As you leave say the words to him, or else
whoever is left with him will kill you when you come back. So one tiny improvement is that we are down
to a single phrase at the door. Ah, not
nearly as good as NO single phrase at the door, but I’ll grab onto any small
increments of change that I can get. The
single phrase we have to say now is “Bird’s Nest Catching”. Don’t ask because I
have no idea what the hell that means. Absolutely no idea. But that is the phrase. My morning routine now includes falling out
the front door and yelling back “Birds Nest Catching!” I simply don’t drink enough for this. So when you leave the house, kindly turn back
and yell “Bird’s Nest Catching!!” It’s
like Coleman’s version of “Au Revoir!”
There are a great many more things we need to work on,
far too many to list here and frankly too depressing. I’d much prefer to focus on a couple of
things at a time. That way neither of us
feels overwhelmed. And then, in the
longer run, we will have made some pretty amazing changes. Like going to a new school. Learning to ride a bike. Eating Gluten Free foods. Reading words independently. Playing Ball socially. Those are some pretty fantastic changes in
just one year. Can you imagine what we
can get done in the future?
Up next is another dietary change – casein free. This will be tough, but I think it has the
potential to be really meaningful for Coleman given the many signs he has of a
dairy intolerance. We’re not really
looking forward to it, to be honest, but we know we are going to do it. And if you know of a good-tasting Alfredo
sauce that is casein free, hit me up.
We also have dental work on the horizon. You can imagine
the fun that will be. We had been going
monthly to a dentist in Cohasset (Kristine Grazioso at Children’s Dentistry who
is honestly nothing short of absolutely wonderful and whom I highly recommend)
to try and get Coleman desensitized to just sitting in the dental chair. We had
limited success at best. Coleman was always super happy walking into
the office, talking away happily to himself as we sat in the waiting room.
(Although last visit, as we walked in, he stated loudly “Remember this is a
dentist office, not a barnyard, so don’t act like an animal.” Honest to God. I have no idea where that came from. Other
parents looked up at me and gave me the stink eye.) Then even walking down the hall to Dr.
Grazioso’s office, he was all charming to everyone, smiling and working his
magic. But that was where it ended. As soon as he stepped in her office, gloves
dropped and all bets were off. Dr.
Grazioso was amazing with Coleman, despite that he yelled pretty much the
entire time, every time. He always ended
his yelling with “No thank you!” and then a sweet "See you soon!" which always made her laugh. But it seems my little man is more like a
little shark, and despite that all of his baby teeth have not yet fallen out, his
second set of teeth have already come in, leaving him with two rows of teeth in
a few spots. Never have I seen such a
crazy thing. So we have to consider a
sedated appointment to pull some teeth, get a good cleaning done, and put on
sealants. I can hardly wait.
And finally, most importantly, we have so much more to do
in our biomed treatment. We are only at
the very beginning of the healing process and we have many, many more things to
do. I will let you all know that, three
days into the first antibiotic, and Coleman is like a new person. You simply would have to see him to believe
the change. It’s just that big of a
change. He is even back to reading all his words everywhere, which he had stopped over the past few weeks. This morning at the library, I went through a "First Words" baby book with him, and he read every page. Unbelievable. On the down side, from the flare up
we have regressed a bit and now have two new habits to break: This new talking to the wall thing, for
one. And then the echo. And then the echo. I’m not sure how we’ll address either one, but
we’ll figure it out. At least he is far
more agreeable now. We also have to finish getting Coleman’s gut
in shape, build him up nutritionally, continue to understand and treat the
chronic illnesses, and eventually detoxification of heavy metals. It’s a long road. It is true that this is a marathon and not a
sprint, and we will take it that way. Slow,
steady, meaningful changes. That's what
we are all about now. I have never felt
more sure when I say The Best is Yet To Come.
Thank you for listening and sharing our
journey with us again, and we’ll see you all again next year.
Until then, Birds Nest Catching.
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