A fairly good Thursday

Yesterday was one of our busy Beth days. We dropped Bill and Bridie off to school then headed off to see Richard Malter in Frankston. Or as I like to call him ‘flaxseed guy.’ We’ve been going for over 6 months now so I was more than pleased when he told me that he had done all he could and to come back and see him in 6 months for a checkup. All her levels were where they should be with no metals in her system that shouldn’t be there and no viruses either. I think it was certainly worthwhile to go there as apart from the initial consultation which was over $200 each visit has cost us around about $100. We’ve gone every 4 to 6 weeks so I think that’s pretty good. And I’ve definitely seen improvement in Beth. Mind you we’ve also done speech therapy and occupational therapy through this time which I’m sure has helped. The majority of improvement has been in the last 6 months however so credit where credit’s due, I think it has made a difference.

Beth was hilarious yesterday, I didn’t realise how much information she absorbs. I know she likes to read credits and tell people who voiced what characters but I didn’t know to what extent. She likes to talk to Alan who is the naturopath that works with Richard. It’s always about what movies he has seen and who his favourite characters are. Beth’s been looking a lot on you tube lately at movie clips and looks at what other movies people like who like the same clips as her. Yesterday she was rattling off all these names that I’ve barely heard of. She spoke of Willem Dafoe and how he was in Ratatouie and what other movies he’s been in. She told Alan that Bill Murray was the voice of Garfield and who also starred in Ghostbusters. She spoke of Owen Wilson as he’s the voice in the new movie Marmaduke. He was also the voice of the coach in Fantastic Mr Fox (she of course knew the full name) and how he was in Marley and Me. She then went on to discuss John Ratzenberger who played Cliff Claven in Cheers. “Did you know” she asks ” that John Ratzenberger has been in every Pixar movie since they started?” She then went on to name each movie and character that he played. It was amazing. Now how to use that memory and channel it into something that she can work towards as a job?

Occupational Therapy was cancelled due to Kate being sick which was such a shame as we started off so well. Never mind, another form of therapy took my mind off it, retail therapy,  as I bought myself some Birkenstocks at DFO on the way to Sensational Kids! Beth is giving them to me for my birthday.

Sensational Kids was pretty good. I spoke to Rod about self awareness for Beth and how she doesn’t seem to realise when she is wrecking something (like Bill’s eraser) or even if she hurts one of the animals by accident. Rod was saying that these things come with maturity and as Beth’s emotional maturity is very young it will take longer than most kids. He explained that at a younger age kids don’t see beyond what they are doing to the consequences, either with punishment or the after effects of what they’ve done. When I told him that I took the computer away for the day when she broke Bill’s eraser he pointed out that it’s hard to punish somebody who doesn’t really know that they’ve done anything wrong. Beth knew to apologize but only because she knew that an apology is what gets her what she wants. I explained that for the benefit of my other children I had to punish her, especially as she had broken something of theirs. Also, it didn’t feel right just letting it go, so maybe it was for my benefit also. Rod suggested that I do social stories and use 3 examples. It could be a boy who threw his cat that hit the wall, a girl who didn’t eat up all her dinner and a girl who said good morning to her mother. Which one of these is the wrong thing? Whilst not eating all your dinner isn’t a good thing it’s not really a wrong thing. This would give Beth the opportunity to work this out for herself. I could then write stories more fitting to her.

They played blowing bubbles a lot with Rod telling Beth that she had to blow them over the table. Once again she needed to figure out why this was preferable than the carpet. In thinking about it and being prompted Beth figured out that she could wipe the table down if it spilt, something that would be more difficult if it spilt on the carpet. It really boils down to not making it so easy for her and giving her the answers to everything. Give her prompts to work it out for herself and the lesson sinks in. It’s so easy to answer for our kids, all our kids, that we do it without even thinking.

After picking the other kids up from school I dropped Beth off at Bev and John’s and took the boys to Karate. My Bill got his yellow belt, first in the class! I’m so proud of him, he’s got so much more confidence since going to Karate and now cubs too.

After such a big day I was looking forward to going home, having our Thursday pizza and getting into my flannies. Wrong. Got home and a tree had come down on some powerlines so we had no electricity. We had our pizza by candlelight/torchlight then popped over to Bev and John’s for a couple of hours. When we got home the girls got into my freezing bed while Paul bunked in with Bill. Thank goodness the power was back on when I woke up, it would have been hell getting the kids ready in the freezing cold.

The lantern parade is on in Belgrave tomorrow so we’re going to go with Amanda, Geoff and their boys. We went a couple of years ago when the HAGS did a lantern making workshop. Mine was like a teepee it was so big! This time I bought the kids ones from the 2 dollar shop in Belgrave. Much easier!