Autistic Children Blog

Dare I say it, things are going pretty well at the moment. We’re back at school after the July school holidays which were lovely. We didn’t do a great deal, I had lots of study and assignments to do so the kids kept themselves busy. Paul took Bill and Bridie to Phillip Island for a night which was a godsend, Beth didn’t want to go but she’s the easy one when we’re at home so we had a lovely quiet couple of days. We went to the movies to see Rio 2 and visited friends. Beth wanted to know why we were going to visit her ex boyfriend Jose, not that he ever knew that he was her boyfriend in the first place!

School started back last week and surprisingly Beth didn’t try and make out like she was getting sick in the last few days of the holidays. I’ve been giving her probiotics lately and hadn’t seen much difference in her except for that I could give her the melatonin without her getting the runs. On Monday this week I was going to IKEA with some of the school mums and Beth got up and told me that she wasn’t well. She cried and moaned and said she had sore bits and it annoyed me so much that I just said to her I was sick of her lying about being sick and she was going. She pleaded with me, asking when she could stay home and that she wasn’t lying. I dropped her off and spoke to the lady in the office, telling her she could call me if she absolutely had to and Beth was just fine. If I hadn’t had been going out I probably would have been more sympathetic and believed her so it was good to see that if I persevered then all was ok. Since then she’s been quite amazing. That night and then the last three nights she’s come out of school all chatty and smiles, telling me all about her day and asking about mine. She’s been wonderful. Last night we were watching the tely and an ad came on for a movie that was MA15+. Beth said ‘oh so Lochlan was right, it is MA15+’ I asked who Lochlan is and she said ‘my friend from school.’ WHAT?? I double checked if he was a real boy (not like the boyfriend who ended up being a mammoth from a movie) and yes, she told me his last name and said they were friends. I even checked with other parents from school and I actually know the mum who is lovely so I know he’ll be a nice boy. I’m amazed! Small thing to some but Beth really hasn’t considered anybody a friend in the two and a half years we’ve been there. I’m so pleased!

I’m going to pop a little film on here, of Beth doing a performance at assembly. I didn’t know about it because she hadn’t brought the notice home (again) so she was rather put out that I wasn’t there. Her middle school coordinator kindly filmed it for me, I think she’s rather good. drums

I’ll leave you with a couple of Beth funnies. A little one is that when I picked her up yesterday she was walking backwards down the corridor with a huge grin on her face, trying to trick me! Love that girl!  Another was that the coordinator told me that when on an excursion Beth told the staff that the last time she went on an excursion she ran off into the night naked. She forgot to tell them that it was a dream much to their worry. And the last which is a goodie. She went to grandma and grandpas and had an apple. Bev asked her where her apple core was because she’d found one under a pillow a few weeks before. Beth said there’s an apple fairy who exchanges cores for money if you put them under the pillow. Nice try!

I’ve had Beth home again this week. She nearly passed out on Tuesday over her breakfast, she fell down on her knees and then vomitted which was quite scary but it only happened once. She’s also had a cold. It’s a hard one because she’s very good at faking an illness but because I know she is sick but not really to what degree I’m not sure what to do. I didn’t send her yesterday (Wednesday) because she was still really blocked up and they had a sports day which I knew she wouldn’t participate in. Then this morning she had a touch of the runs, and the cold and her head was really clammy so I believed her but she’s been fine ever since. I called the middle school coordinator to apologize for having her home so much this year, she was fine about it. I spoke to her about how much Beth hates school. I even asked if she could go part time, do distance education at home and go there for the things that I can’t give her like the work experience and training. Socially she’s not interested in making friends much as I’d love it if she did. But I can’t do the job pathways and all the other stuff that a special school is experienced in doing. Much as I’d love not having to drive, she wouldn’t be self motivated enough to do the distance education, every time I’d turn my back she’d be playing a game!

The latest thing which doesn’t seem to be working is Beth trying to act like a big girl. Every day she tells me she’s been a big girl and every day she does several things that show she’s not acting like a big girl. And she knows, that’s the frustrating thing. If I catch her out she straight away says ‘I’m a big girl mum!’ She’s saying this because I’ve told her that from now on 8.30pm is her bedtime, time to pack up the ipad and roll over and go to sleep, not the 10.30 that she was staying up until. She’s objected profusely to this, telling me that the others go to bed at that time and they’re much younger than her. This is true but they behave better than her! Some of the things that she has done this week to prove that she’s not a big girl are : Giving herself a love bite on her upper arm, getting her thighs stuck in coat hangers, sucking on the plastic from her magazine packet, rolling up little bits of tissues and either getting them stuck up her nose or shredding them all over the bed, partially eating her wet weet bix with her fingers, sharing her plate of food with the cat and wiping her runny nose on my pillow when she thought I wasn’t looking! And she’s being really bossy and annoying, telling me off for swearing, telling Bridie she’s done the wrong thing, basically saying the opposite of whatever we say. Driving me bloody crazy!

I’m finding Beth especially challenging at the moment. She is 15 now and almost demands to be able to do things that other girls her age do but she just isn’t mature enough. She doesn’t agree with me though and keeps insisting that she can babysit the other kids for me and other big girl stuff. I’d love to give her a bit more independance but she never seems to grow out of being a naughty little girl when left alone. I’ll give you some examples. Some a little hilarious, some real Beth funnies, others not so funny if she had the opportunity to follow through.

We got Foxtel a few weeks ago. Beth still has in her head that she can’t be out in the loungeroom with Paul home but one night she had been watching a movie when he came home so she stayed out here. Paul went and watched tely in bed so she was happy enough. I was lying in another room and I heard Paul come out telling her to leave the cat be. Dwight, who is her cat, was cleaning Harmony who is Bridie’s cat. And Beth was licking Dwight clean. “Stop licking the cat” isn’t a phrase you would expect to hear when talking to a 15 year old! Beth’s response “Dwight dared me to do it.” She told me the same thing later that night. The not so funny thing was after Beth was told off and we thought she’d be ok, Paul caught her with the windex bottle. When he asked what she was doing with it she said she was going to clean Dwight’s eyes. Luckily she hadn’t done so. Now she knows not to do things like that. We haven’t had to put things away from her in years. When she was younger she was a bloody nightmare, tipping things down the sink, dropping eggs and glasses when she saw us coming (she’d stand still for ages, waiting until we came before she’d  drop them), drawing beautful pictures all over the walls. She was a shit of a kid. It was like as soon as she had the opportunity she had to look for mischief.  That night she reminded me of Minka the Wonderdog when I get up in the night. I hear Minka trying to silently get off the couch. When Beth hears us coming she starts to say things like “I didn’t mean it” or “Whoops, it was an accident” so I know she knows it’s wrong. When the hell is she going to grow out of it though?! You can’t pre-empt every single thing so a social story wouldn’t work, she’d just do something not on the list.

She’s also being slack with her shower. She’s pretending to have the runs so she doesn’t have to go to school. I thought she was out of the shower the other morning and went to check on her, we had to leave in a couple of minutes. She was sitting on the toilet, waiting for me to tell her to hurry up and get in the shower. She had been there for about 10 minutes. I knew she didn’t have the runs because when she got off the toilet and in the shower, there was nothing there. She lost ipad privelledges for that one! The next day, when she knew I meant business, I went in to check on her and there she was scrubbing the shower screen with her toothbrush. Lucky I find her bloody hilarious!

The kids went back to school this week after two weeks off. They’re lucky, it’s only a three day week, with Easter Monday at the beginning and Anzac Day on the Friday. I found these holidays quite challenging. My regular readers may remember that I’m studying counselling and I still had to do that over the school break. Not that it’s a particularly time consuming course, it’s just hard to do with kids at home. And I never realised how much my youngest Bridie likes to share every little thought! Anyway they’re all back to school. I did panic for a little while, Beth came down with a cold. She kindly waited until Sunday rather than spoil her holidays with being ill. Just long enough to make me worry that I would have her home. And boy howdy did she play on it. She should have been born in the olden days with smelling salts and fainting with hand on forehead. Last night she even said to me ‘you need to let me stay home tomorrow’. I of course said that no, she only had one day left this week, she was bloody well going. This morning I caught her out. She’d had the runs a bit when on her melatonin and for a few days there I kept her home as she’d need to go straight after her shower. I went to check on her getting dressed this morning and she was still in the bathroom. I yelled at her to hurry up and she was sitting there on the loo with her puppy dog eyes telling me she has the runs, that she’ll have to stay home after all. In my sympathetic mummy voice I told her to hurry up and go and get dressed. So up she got and there was nothing there! So she’s figured that one out.

I took Beth to a podiatrist in the holidays as she has been walking pidgeon toed for a while. In my last post I was toying up taking her to a physiotherapist but ended up trying a podiatrist first and he was excellent. Firstly he ordered her some terrific New Balance runners at a discount, velcro ladies size 10s are hard to come by so it was a welcome surprise that he could get them. He then gave us an exercise to do. We put two strips of masking tape in a line to teach her to walk straight. He said if she can do it with ease then to bring her back and he’d fit her for particular orthotics. If not then he’d refer us to a physio who specialises in these issues, meaning it’s coming from the hips. Luckily she did it easily, meaning it’s habit and can be rectified. I was impressed, he didn’t try to sell us the orthotics first up, he didn’t charge any extra over the enhanced primary care plan that we had through the doctor, and he wasn’t fazed by Beth being a totally bored teenager having to do stupid things. And when she got off the chair and did her jump up and down and flinging her head back he simply said”It’s so exciting getting new shoes isn’t it?!” I can highly recommend him.

Beth has been rather communicative lately. In fact she’s been in ‘our world’ a lot which has been wonderful to see. One of the lovely times was when she walked past me a couple of weeks ago. I smiled and she looked at me and gave me a really nice smile back. I know that doesn’t sound like much but it really is. She may smile when she thinks it’s required, she’s often smiling while looking off into the distance but she rarely spontaneously smiles and looks right at you. Other things have happened too. I might be in traffic and muttering something under my breath and she (seeming deep in ipad games and loud music) comments on what I’ve said. One the way to and from Beth’s school we often see a flock of birds, flying in the same air space all the time. I saw them yesterday and said more to myself ‘there’s our birds’ and Beth asked where I meant. And then, even better, she followed my finger with her eyes and saw them. Another amazing thing for her. Unfortunately much of her joining in with family things is her being a bitch to others. Telling Bridie off if she farts (Beth is the biggest trumpet bum in the family!) Telling Bill he needs to get a hair cut. Correcting the kids if they say something wrong. And being a shitstirrer. Bridie asked me to stop singing in the car, Beth either sings louder or asks me to put a) One Direction on (because Bridie has decided she hates them) or b) Mary Poppins on (because Bill hates it). So much as I’m loving Beth joining in I’m having to say things like “If you haven’t got anything nice to say, don’t say anything” or just a good old “Butt out!” I can’t win!

I can’t believe it’s nearly Easter, the year is flying by so quickly. I was so looking forward to school holidays but I must admit I’m finding it challenging. I’m not sure why. I am loving being able to sleep in, if you can call 7am a sleep in. I’ve been doing my counselling course which I love, last week I had a two day workshop in the city so I was awake at 4.30am both mornings as I was so nervous and excited and worried that I’d forget something, I couldn’t sleep. That seemed to roll over to the rest of the week. We’re on a fairly tight budget so we’re at home a lot these holidays, the kids are on to their second lot of friends for a sleepover!

Last weekend was Beth’s birthday. Once again I wasn’t sure what to get her. I ended up suggesting that people gave her money as all she really wanted were dvds and Disney albums for her ipad. I ended up getting her a few things, a unicorn onesie, some bulldog slippers, a Fozzy Bear toy to add to her Muppets collection. And a book which is well worth it, More Show Me How, the sequel to her second favourite book (you guessed it) – Show Me How! She had seen it in a doctors waiting room at one stage last year and spent the whole time absorbing the information, so we bought it with her pocket money. It’s her go to book when she’s banned from the ipad. Her first favourite book is of course her Pixarpaedia.

As usual we went to the movies with Beth’s friends Erin and Jessica. These girls were her favourites from primary school and we only really see them on Beth’s birthday. She’s not interested in going out with the girls from her high school so it’s lovely that these girls want to still see Beth. We went to see Mr Peabody and Sherman, followed by the obligatory Hogs Breath. Bethie seemed to enjoy her birthday, she did the treasure hunt in the morning with the kids and she enjoyed all the attention of course!

I’ve been trying to get Beth in to see somebody for her feet, or more specifically, her walk. She is very pidgeon toed which has become really pronounced since her last and hopefully final growth spurt. She walks with one foot right in front of the other, pointing inwards. Her shoes are almost wrecked only weeks after Grandma and Grandpa took her shoe shopping, and they’re good ones too. I took her to the doctors and we got referrals to an osteopath and a podiatrist. We went to the osteopath first who spoke about growth spurts, he is excellent with the kids but didn’t really help. I’m not sure a podiatrist would help as it seems to stem from the knees or even from the hips. We also went to see our paediatrician to get his take on it and to see if we could get something else to help Beth sleep. We had been trying Melatonin which worked a treat, but it ended up giving her the runs, so we had to stop that. As he said that is what he would recommend we were in a bit of a bind. He has now put her on to Cataprese which is a medicine to lower blood pressure. I am on it to help me with my menopause flushes. It’s certainly not as effective as the Melatonin was for her but I guess it’s stopping her being awake after midnight, it’s still not great though. Anyway, he suggested we take her to a physiotherapist for her feet. Both he and the doctor referred us to the local hospital who called and said there is an eight month waiting list! Poop! So now we’re trying a physio at the local doctors who is apparently a Feldenkrais? Physio. I googled it and apparently it is a type of movement therapy which is good for the brain so I’ll see how we go there. I just want her feet better so that she’s not so clumsy all the time, it must be awful for her! If there’s no luck there we’ll try the podiatrist.

We’ve had a bit of a yucky time in the last month or so. A little history lesson on who I am going to talk about first. When my mum died when I was 13 her best friend Pat stepped in and basically took over like a mum to myself and my sister Deb. My brother Rick was at Uni but Deb and I were teenagers and at that critical time we needed Pat and she filled the role of aunty admirably. I had known Pat since I was about five, I became good friends with her daughters and I grew up with them all as my family as we had moved from the UK when I was two so didn’t have biological family here. Pat and her husband David (dad’s best friend) moved here with Pat’s brothers and sisters and their families and they became our extended Scottish family. Pat was the one I called when I became engaged to Paul (I met him through their family), the one I thought of when I became pregnant. She came wedding dress shopping with me and was at the birth of my sisters kids. She was everything and more that I could want to fill the void mums death left. The kids loved going to their house on Boxing Day every year, her and David were like a third set of grandparents to them. The year before last Pat got cancer. Beth was very concerned, she was at the age I was when mum died, she was paranoid about me dying and couldn’t articulate well what she was feeling so I didn’t know (and still don’t really) how to help her, what she truly believed. We had had a child at school die from cancer, she knew that cancer was very serious. She gave me an apple to give to Pat when I went to visit her, she said that it would help her cure her cancer. Pat was so touched by this, that and Beth telling me that she would say a prayer for her. Pat was a faithful Catholic girl and she thought this was beautiful.

Late last year my dad called me to say that Pat’s cancer had returned. It was very aggressive. I had done a painting for Pat at my art class and I took it down to Pat after the New Year. I didn’t then know how bad it had gotten. The next thing dad was calling me to let me know that she was in paliative care. I was so scared to go down to visit knowing what I knew. I went to visit and it was so lovely I went back the following week. Pat was at her finest, looking resplendant and making everybody else feel at ease about everything. Beth asked me where I was going when I dropped her at school and I told her. She asked if Pat was going to die and I told her yes she was. She was devastated, as were my other kids. They made Pat a card, all saying a similar thing, they hoped that she would feel better in heaven and be with Nanny. It broke my heart. Each day I came back Beth asked me about Pat. She died after just a couple of weeks and I told the kids. I told them dad and I were going to the funeral so Grandma and Grandpa would pick them up. She asked why I would be gone for so long and I told her that we would be going back to Pat and David’s afterwards. She corrected me – “you mean David’s don’t you?” “Yes, but for me it will always be Pat and David’s” I told her.

Last night Beth asked me about Pat. It’s been two weeks since the funeral. She told me that she missed Pat and asked me if I missed her. I said that of course I did and I always will. Some people say that kids with autism don’t feel things the same as we ‘neuro typical’ people do. Maybe not but they still feel  intensely at times. I wish I could explain things to Beth the way I can to my other kids. Who knows what she thinks about death, who knows if she just assumes that I will die young like my mum did. She can’t explain things to me and unless I guess I don’t know what she’s thinking. I wish I could ease the stresses in her mind, it must be horrible to be thinking things and not being reassured. I have spoken to her about if mum had been sick now, how she probably would have lived because of advances in medicine. But then people really do die in her life and there’s nothing I can do about it. Last time I saw Pat I took her another apple from Beth. When I told Beth how much Pat loved it again Beth asked if Pat had read about apples in Total Girl magazine too. She did what she could for her Granny Pat and I reckon she’ll miss her more than we can even imagine. I know I do.

Well it’s week two of the new school year and so far so good. Beth seems to love being at school this year, not that she would come out and admit it to anybody. I think part of the happiness is her getting some good nights sleeps. One of my lovely mummies from Beth’s school got me on to a type of melatonin. I had used the one from the chemist in the past which had worked a day or two then nothing. She brought me in half a dozen tablets of the one she used for her son and it worked a treat. It’s all natural so she wasn’t peddling drugs! I looked them up on Ebay and they were really cheap too so I can highly recommend them. The brand is Puritans Pride, they’re in a blue container and we use the 3mg strength ones. I got two containers, each with 120 tablets in, for something like $13 plus delivery. I have to give one to Beth fairly early, about 8pm, and she’s usually asleep by 10pm which is great for her. It doesn’t knock her out, it just makes her sleepy. So if I continue to watch something on tely she may wake up again but only for a minute. She’s waking earlier, I heard her put the tv on about 6.30am yesterday and she was chatting away, I went in to see who to and she was explaining the plotline to her new kitten Dwight. I went in and asked her about what she had on at school, she said ‘we have Subway on Wednesdays and houses’ instead of sighing and saying she doesn’t want to talk about it. And she’s shutting her ipad as we get to the street the school is on in the mornings instead of having to be prodded to pack it up and hurry up. I’m lovin’ it!

Speaking of Dwight, I realised that I haven’t told you about our Henry saga. Henry was actually a girl (that’s a story in itself!) cat and she was very old and crotchety at 18. She was the last of the animals that I had in my previous life before children. When we bought Bridie’s kitten Harmony last year Harmony tormented poor old Henry, but Henry had a good life, usually sleeping between the pillows on the bed that Beth and I share. I had told Beth that when Henry eventually went she could get a kitten. On Christmas morning of all times I went looking for Henry as Santa had been very generous and brought presents for all the pets too. I found her near the front door, not able to get up as her back legs were paralysed. I found a wonderful vet who told me that she had a blood clot on her heart which had basically deadened her back legs and it was time to put her down. I was glad the decision had been taken out of my hands as she had started to piddle everywhere but I hadn’t wanted to put her down for this reason. Anyway, Beth was devastated but of course realised that that meant that she could finally have her kitten. In her own dramatic way she said ‘the only thing that will mend my broken heart is to get a new kitten mum.’ Don’t get me wrong, she really did miss Henry and still does at times (as do I) but her practical mind said that I did promise.

We set off to check out the cats within the week really. My thoughts were that we would choose a kitten and pay then it’d be speyed/neutered and we’d pick it up a week later, giving us some breathing space. But no, the shelter we went to had already done these things as they are a no kill shelter. We had set out to pick a ginger boy, we ended up with a black boy with a white spot and his name is Dwight. (From The Office). He’s a little bugger as all kittens are but he’s very loved by kids, ladies and animals alike (not so much by grumpy old fathers) and that’s all that matters!

I got a notice home from Beth’s school for a travel education program. After the initial ‘scare the shit out of me’ reaction I read it all carefully and thought what a fantastic idea it was. It did make me realise what a shame it was that we didn’t have a more local school. For the next four years the kids at the school do travel education which involves catching local buses to familiarize themselves with the area the school is in, trains to excursions and shopping centres where they buy their lunch. I went to see Mr Spunky Trunks (I’ll call Beth’s teacher this for privacy purposes) and spoke with him about my concerns about Beth having absolutely no idea about traffic dangers. He reassured me that there would be seven in each group, that there would be a teacher and aide with each group and that they would be well supervised. I guess that as they go to the senior school there would be more and more independance until perhaps in year 12 they could do it independantly. This scares me to death but really, at this stage, my supervision of Beth is like that of a toddler when it comes to cars and traffic. How wonderful to think that over four years this may change, even a little bit. Because, even though I know/believe that Beth will always be totally dependant, I also know that she needs to learn some coping skills with the big bag world out there.

I’ll finish by sharing some photos  of young Mr Dwight Schrute O’Connor!

 

Oh my goodness, it’s been ages since I’ve done a post! Sorry about that. I guess it means it’s been good, nothing major has been happening. We’ve gotten through the whole of Christmas and the school holidays and I still love my children! Wow, that’s a feat in itself.

We enjoyed Christmas this year. It makes such a difference to be in a house that we love. Or maybe that’s just me, I just find it so much more relaxing. The kids getting older helps too. Everybody finished off the year well, really close to Christmas. We had Paul’s family here for Christmas Day which was nice as the kids could get up, open and play with their presents and not have to go anywhere. I just had to try and keep Beth out of her pyjamas. She’s got into the habit of getting straight into her pyjamas as soon as we get home. I don’t really mind this, if we’re not going anywhere it’s no big deal. I compromised, she had a shower every morning of the holidays, if we weren’t having visitors or going out I would let her put clean pyjamas on instead of normal clothes. She would still smell nice and have clean clothes on after all.

We had fairly cruisy holidays. Having one really stinking hot week didn’t help and I sort of felt like we lost a week of the holidays because we did nothing but hybernate. I’m so glad that I didn’t budge on our house budget when it came to the air conditioning. We let a few things go when building when money became tight but I insisted that we kept the air con. We have the evaporative type where you need windows open to make it work properly and it’s lovely. It’s through the bedrooms too. The other fabulous discovery was a 10 foot blow up pool for $48. It’s amazing, I bought some blow up chairs and Bridie and I have spent many an afternoon bouncing each other around on our chairs. What a bargain, it even has a pump. Beth has ventured out in it a couple of times, she asked for a bikini for Christmas so she has to be slathered with sunscreen as they’re not terrible sunsmart. And the pants are almost non existant. But hey, who cares, she’s wearing a bikini like they wear on Total Drama  and that’s all that matters to her.

Talking of Total Drama, Beth was talking last night about the boys that she’s decided she wants to date. She seems to have a thing for the Seths. She doesn’t even seem to know what they look like, there were about three that she mentioned last night, Seth Green (who I approve of) and a couple of others who are much older. We were having a giggle at the fact that they’d be a cute couple, Beth and Seth! She then said ‘what about Justin?’ I asked who Justin was and she said he was from Total Drama. I said ‘but that’s a cartoon so he’s a cartoon character.’ She said ‘but that doesn’t mean that they’re not real just because they’re on a cartoon.’ Um, it actually does!

Beth went back to school today. She has a male teacher this time, a rather handsome young man he is too. She actually seemed happy to go back to school this year, though she did try to bung on an ailment as usual. Nothing as simple as her drawing on herself and saying she had chicken pox, or saying her tummy was sore, or choking herself so that she’s cough really hard. That’s all in the past. No this time she had a fatal wound. She had spilled pie filling onto her leg on Friday and it had burnt her a little bit. It looked fine but she picked at it and scratched it so it had become a bit of a sore. This apparently was fatal. And she told everybody who she saw that she was dying. Luckily a bandaid seemed to fix it so off to school she went this morning, fairly happy. Her teacher told me she had a fantastic day.

Beth has been doing a little program at school. It’s for teenage girls only and I think it focusses on communication and socialisation a fair bit as well as teenage awareness and sexuality. I have noticed such an improvement in Beth socially that I am going to speak with our Middle School Coordinator and ask her about the program and see if it is that that has made a difference.

Three things have happened that has made me believe this. Firstly, when I drove her into the school grounds a week or so ago we turned around where all the kids line up, on the other side of a big chain fence. Beth waved hello to a boy on the other side and mouthed hello. Now usually Beth seems to be totally unaware of anybody else around her and often I have to poke her to acknowledge a person when they say hello. I just thought it was a one off but was very pleased.

Then on Monday Beth saw a boy called Farnham riding his scooter on the pathway when we left school. Beth called out “Hello Farnham” and waved then said “I saw you.” Farnham turned and said “Oh did you Beth, where was I” and she replied that he had been riding his scooter on the path. So really she was talking about that exact time but still, she had reached out and made the effort to speak and seem interested in something that somebody else was doing.

Then last night my friends son Brayden said hello to her as we were walking to the car. Brayden is a particularly friendly boy and every time I see him he says that he saw Beth that day. Beth barely even acknowledges him usually but before I could even say anything she waved to him and said goodbye! Maybe something has finally clicked in. I’m not sure what’s involved in the course but perhaps it talks about it being bad manners to ignore people? Either way I’m so pleased with Beth’s progress.

Sorry again, it’s been a while since I wrote. I’ve been doing short courses to qualify for my counselling course next year. I found them challenging to say the least but enjoyable and I’ve finished them now. I haven’t got my marks for one of them but the other I got a 78% pass rate which apparently is good, I only needed 60 for each of them to qualify for my new course. I’ll let you know how I go.

Beth has been a good girl, quite enjoying school and not bitching and moaning as much as she used to. She still tried to bung on the not wanting to go to school when she can though. It was halloween a few weeks ago and it’s gotten quite big in Australia the last few years. I was feeling bad as she still just wants her friends from primary school and no new ones and really wanted to do trick or treating with them. They’ve grown up much more than her, it was a Thursday night and nobody around here really does it much. I said that we’d have a party next year with it being on a weekend. I told her she was too old for it as I didn’t think they would really like to come. Then on the actual halloween morning she woke up, crying because I was getting her up. She said it was a public holiday because it was halloween. I don’t think they even do that in America! Luckily I had an ace up my sleeve. The following Tuesday was Melbourne Cup Day which in Victoria is a public holiday. Not many kids go to school on the Monday and I had decided that they could all have a slack day off. I hadn’t told her yet though. So I pretended to think about it and said that if she was a good girl she could have the Monday off instead. She was happy with that!

On Friday Beth came out of school and one of the aides came with her. I thought she was in trouble for being rude again as the aide didn’t look very pleased. Then I saw that the aide had a puppy in her hand. Beth’s teacher had gotten a new puppy and Beth had asked if she could bring it out to show me. How cute! On the way home she kept asking me about my friend Becs dog Tyson. Bec was told that Tyson has cancer a few months ago, he’s very old but he’s not in any pain so they’ve still got him at home for the moment. Whenever I see Bec and I tell Beth she asks me how Tyson is, how much longer has he got to live, has he been put down yet? It’s really lovely to see how much she cares.

I was happy to see something else this week too. Beth’s teacher from last year – Miss L – comes out with the kids who get on the buses in the afternoon. We often walk past her on the way to the car. All this year Beth has stuck her fingers in her ears as soon as she’s seen Miss L. She did this in grade 6 too with her grade 5 teacher. It was like when they were her teacher they were ok but once they weren’t that was it. It has happened all this year until this week. When we walked past Miss L. Beth said hello to her and no fingers in ears. Wow, first time she’s gone back on something for ages!

We’ve bought a sailboat for Paul for his birthday. I’ll post a picture of Beth’s version of sailing. We were so lucky that when we took it out for a trial a large pod of dolphins swam alongside us for about 20 minutes. Beth kept asking if she could keep one as a pet, I said yes, but we’d have to keep it in the bay! After a while she got over it so went down to the cabin to do what she likes doing best.