This Week in Our Journey Ending: December 19, 2008

This week was awesome! DD had another great week! That makes 2 weeks in a row!!!! Yipee! She was even in one gen. ed. class this week and stayed in the class the whole week! The lowest grade she made on her behavior chart was a 97!!!!! We are so proud of her. We also started titrating down on the Depakote and she should be completely off of it by December 29. We are praying and believing that God's glory will be seen through this in a big way and that DD will not have any negative side effects or any rebound episodes. I am hoping to be able to go to DD's psychiatrist in January and be able to tell her only great things! God is awesome and I am believing Him in a big way!

In regards to the school, I received a response to my letter regarding the training/experience of DD's teachers in regards to her disorders. They could not find any such records. So I will be requesting training for DD's teachers. Also in regards to the evaluation that is missing out of her special ed folder, well I have now received two different stories from the district. One saying that they remember the evaluation being in her folder and another saying that I never gave them the document (and that was from the same person). I don't know how to fight the he said, she said that is transpiring out of this, but I distinctly remember sitting in the principal's office along with the counselor and giving them the report along with discussing a possible additional diagnosis of bi-polar. That was back before I knew to document everything. So a lesson that everyone should take from this is to document everything! If you have a meeting, send a letter confirming what was discussed in the meeting and any documents that were given at that meeting and that you expect them to be placed in your child's permanent education file.

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!

First Attempt at Making Gluten Free Bread

I went out and bought a breadmaker this past week to make gluten free bread. This is the results of my first making. The top was not completely done and there was no way to add any time to the cooking. Otherwise DD enjoyed the part of the bread that was done and had several sandwiches in her lunch this past week.

This Week in Our Journey: Ending December 12, 2008

DD had the best week so far this school year! No outbursts at school and did very well on her behavior chart!!!!!!!! Praise God!!! As of Monday, she is totally off her lithium. So that makes 3 medications she is now off. Wednesday it snowed!!!! DD loved it and made a snow angel and threw snowballs. Today we had our third ARD meeting for the year. I feel that we made the most progress as far as IEPs and BIPs in several years. The district support teacher who was assigned to come in and help did just that. We have had several in the past who have not made any new suggestions and one even said she was at a lost as to what to suggest. This one has spent several days observing, getting to know and working with DD. Tonight we went and saw Bethlehem City at our former church and then went and saw the Dearing Dazzle light show. This has been our third year for doing both and has become a Christmas Tradition of our family.

Have a great weekend!

Snow in Kingwood

We had several hours of snow yesterday in the area! It is a pretty big deal when it snows around here. The HS students after church last night had fun having snow ball fights.

Gluten Free, Casein Free Pancakes

Thanks to my mom sending DD some gluten free products, DD had pancakes this past weekend. She liked them so much she wants them for breakfast every morning. This particular brand is Bob's Red Mill and it comes in a 22 oz bag. There is a store locator on their website to find stores that carry their products.

It calls for 1 1/2 cups of the mix and 3/4 cup milk. The batter was a little thick, so next time I am going to increase the milk to 1 cup.

Burkhart Center for Autism Education and Research

In doing research for DD's upcoming ARD I found the website for the Burkhart Center. The Burkhart Center is part of Texas Tech's College of Education. I found a wealth of information on it, especially related to behavioral issues. Some of the information was new to me. I am adding this to my links section. I definitely recommend visiting the following modules:

Module Two: Communication

Module Three: Social and Behavioral Issues

This Week In Our Journey: Ending December 4, 2008

This week was relatively calm. DD really did not have a good week at school, but at home things went well. We had an appointment with her psychiatrist yesterday. We are working her off another medication starting today. By the end of December she will be off a total of two more. I am excited and nervous at the same time. I pray that she does well off her medications and that we can manage her behaviors through therapy only. I am starting prep work for next Friday's ARD. The LSSP called today and said that the behavioral services survey is complete and she wants to meet with me next week to go over it. I am going to have her send home a copy for me to review prior to the meeting. I am curious as to what it says as I did not get a good feeling/vibe from this particular LSSP when she called me a few weeks ago.

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend.

Interesting Article on Brain Waves and Language in Autistic Children

Brain Waves are Window in autistic language woes

A Chocolate Sort of Day

Yesterday was one of those days. It started when DD announced very early on that she wasn't going to church. We worked through that and off to church we went with her gift for Angel's Of Light. At church she had a melt down. She even told me that she wasn't going back to her bible study class because the kids were throwing food at her. So I called her bluff and said "Let's go over there and talk to them about this. I want you to show me the kids who did it." She replied, They will just deny it." I was so embarrassed by DD's behavior. Who knows what they think of me as a parent. After days like this I just don't want to go back. I ended up sitting in the car with her while Jimmy went to worship service. After a few minutes she calmed down and wanted to then hug and kiss on me. We told her that as a result of her behavior at church she had to spend the day in her room. She spent most of it banging on the wall. We still had to go grocery shopping so it was decided that I would go to the store. That set DD off because she wanted to go. Jimmy told me to go ahead and go and that he would handle this outburst. So I pulled out of the driveway to a child screaming at her father. What fun! After walking around Wal-Mart for a while I finally got groceries and a Hershey's bar at the check out line. Not on the diet, but I needed it.

I can't think of what would have triggered this meltdown unless it was just over stimulation from Thanksgiving, getting the tree out on Friday and shopping on Saturday.

To end this post on a positive note-DD had a great day at school today! One down and four more to go!

Upcoming ARD Meeting

We have an ARD on December 12. I sent to DD's special ed teacher a list of the changes/additions that I want to her IEP. He called me back and said that they all look very good and he would write them up in draft and send them to me. Hopefully the rest of the ARD committee will agree!