Waiting for the carpenter to arrive so I can go outside and feed the horses and Barry and Chris won't wake up...
Hot cuppa Good Earth Original tea here -- sweet and spicy. Anyone else know about that? I discovered it when it was served on a plane flight and love it!
At any rate, Ann, no I did not have formal PT. I did do the exercises I was told to do at home and just regular work did the rest. I still find that the strength is increasing bit by bit, so I'm really pleased about that.
FoG, although I understand what you are saying about Chris being like any other kid, yes and no. Yes, he is a full human with a personality and sin nature and likes and dislikes (which he can express VERY strongly sometimes!). But no, he is not like other kids at all. We could not even train him ('we' meaning years of teachers in different schools as well as at home) to sort two things. If he could have even done that he could have 'worked' in a handicapped workshop. Every pediatrician and now doctor we have been to has never seen anything like it -- a person that retarded in a perfectly healthy body. He's NOT 'developmentally delayed', he's developmentally stopped and even regressing! He used to know and 'ya ya' about three or four hundred songs. Now that has decreased quite a bit. He's over the top on autism -- if it is not good for sounds or food it is to be discarded, ignored, pushed away, whatever. Yesterday at the medical office he began to get violent with Barry and me when he had to sit and wait so long -- and he's very strong. On the way home in the car he was sick of the whole day so he MADE himself sick by putting his hand down his throat. His protest...
Then, of course, he was hungry again.
I was told when he was younger that I would have to accept that there would be a time when I had to place him in an institution. About the time he was seven, he started having grand mal seizures. Despite going on Tegretol, he would still seize and stop breathing. We figured one of those times he would simply never breathe again. We would be kneeling down beside him, "BREATHE, Chris! Breathe!" When he was fourteen he had the most massive seizure he had ever had, and at that point I capitulated and decided all those who had advised me were right -- Chris had to go to an institution. A social worker helped me find one, but it was in Madera, a three hour -- one way -- drive from where we lived at the time. At the same time, one of my adopted sons was in a youth facility for smashing a probation he had been on. So every Friday I would drive down to see first the son in the facility and then keep going south to Madera to spend an hour or so with Chris.
Chris would look at me and take my hand and pull me out to the van. He would look at the van and then look at me and then look at the van again. It was as good as talking: "Mom, I don't know what's going on, but isn't it time we went home?"
And I would cry for three hours driving home. In the meantime, he got eczema on his arms and legs, his ears were filthy, his hair remained uncut, and one time when I changed him there was some dried feces on his bottom.
So I figured God knew this was going to happen to him. God knew that my husband was going to walk out on us. And God still allowed Chris to be my son when we adopted him (the encephalitis occurred after the adoption; he was not this way at the beginning). I was Mom. That was that. I brought Chris home.
And home he will stay. Barry has been unbelievable, willing to take him for walks, feed him, change his diapers, clean up after all sorts of messes... I don't know if I could have continued alone.
Because Chris is different. Incredibly different. Even the doctors don't know what to tell me and will almost literally go with whatever I request.
When I was teaching, one of my students, knowing I was a Christian, said to me one day, "You know the second thing you will see in heaven?" (The first would be the Lord...), and I replied "No, Aaron, what?"
"Chris! He will come up to you and say 'YO! MOM!'"
And the Lord won't have to dry those tears then, because they will be happy tears.
Hot cuppa Good Earth Original tea here -- sweet and spicy. Anyone else know about that? I discovered it when it was served on a plane flight and love it!
At any rate, Ann, no I did not have formal PT. I did do the exercises I was told to do at home and just regular work did the rest. I still find that the strength is increasing bit by bit, so I'm really pleased about that.
FoG, although I understand what you are saying about Chris being like any other kid, yes and no. Yes, he is a full human with a personality and sin nature and likes and dislikes (which he can express VERY strongly sometimes!). But no, he is not like other kids at all. We could not even train him ('we' meaning years of teachers in different schools as well as at home) to sort two things. If he could have even done that he could have 'worked' in a handicapped workshop. Every pediatrician and now doctor we have been to has never seen anything like it -- a person that retarded in a perfectly healthy body. He's NOT 'developmentally delayed', he's developmentally stopped and even regressing! He used to know and 'ya ya' about three or four hundred songs. Now that has decreased quite a bit. He's over the top on autism -- if it is not good for sounds or food it is to be discarded, ignored, pushed away, whatever. Yesterday at the medical office he began to get violent with Barry and me when he had to sit and wait so long -- and he's very strong. On the way home in the car he was sick of the whole day so he MADE himself sick by putting his hand down his throat. His protest...
Then, of course, he was hungry again.
I was told when he was younger that I would have to accept that there would be a time when I had to place him in an institution. About the time he was seven, he started having grand mal seizures. Despite going on Tegretol, he would still seize and stop breathing. We figured one of those times he would simply never breathe again. We would be kneeling down beside him, "BREATHE, Chris! Breathe!" When he was fourteen he had the most massive seizure he had ever had, and at that point I capitulated and decided all those who had advised me were right -- Chris had to go to an institution. A social worker helped me find one, but it was in Madera, a three hour -- one way -- drive from where we lived at the time. At the same time, one of my adopted sons was in a youth facility for smashing a probation he had been on. So every Friday I would drive down to see first the son in the facility and then keep going south to Madera to spend an hour or so with Chris.
Chris would look at me and take my hand and pull me out to the van. He would look at the van and then look at me and then look at the van again. It was as good as talking: "Mom, I don't know what's going on, but isn't it time we went home?"
And I would cry for three hours driving home. In the meantime, he got eczema on his arms and legs, his ears were filthy, his hair remained uncut, and one time when I changed him there was some dried feces on his bottom.
So I figured God knew this was going to happen to him. God knew that my husband was going to walk out on us. And God still allowed Chris to be my son when we adopted him (the encephalitis occurred after the adoption; he was not this way at the beginning). I was Mom. That was that. I brought Chris home.
And home he will stay. Barry has been unbelievable, willing to take him for walks, feed him, change his diapers, clean up after all sorts of messes... I don't know if I could have continued alone.
Because Chris is different. Incredibly different. Even the doctors don't know what to tell me and will almost literally go with whatever I request.
When I was teaching, one of my students, knowing I was a Christian, said to me one day, "You know the second thing you will see in heaven?" (The first would be the Lord...), and I replied "No, Aaron, what?"
"Chris! He will come up to you and say 'YO! MOM!'"
And the Lord won't have to dry those tears then, because they will be happy tears.
