Life

Life the last month or so has been really overwhelming. I feel as if I don't have a minute to step back and breath. Even when I actually do. I don't know how to utilize my time or how to keep it together. This quarter has been way too much for me to handle. And the husband wants to do this again next quarter.

What is going on that is causing us to be so busy? Well the hubs and I are both in school. He is/was working full time. The son is in school and has multiple appointments. I just got a job. Writing it down it doesn't sound like that much, but it really is. The hubs is home for an hour on Mondays and Wednesdays. He works 10 hours on those days, comes home and showers and then goes to school for 5 hours. Tuesday and Thursday I have 5 hours of class. I start my job tomorrow and I will be going in after work. Z has appointments and school throughout the week. Then Saturday and Sunday the hubs works another 10 hours each. All this time one of us is withe kids. It's a lot of back and forth. And then trying to find time to do school work? I just can't do it. I'm tired.

A lot of it is that I'm still depressed. I don't know if I ever have not been depressed. At least it certainly feels that way.

There are so many other things going on that I'm stressed about. Little Lady is going in for another speech therapy appointment in the beginning of March. One more thing to deal with.

Is it us as parents that suck? Are we failing our kids? Why is it that they have both had speech delays? Why is one of my kids autistic? I really have tried my absolute hardest. I have done everything I can for my kids. I have been here. D has worked two jobs for most of the kids life trying to support us. We don't get to go out and do most things people our age do, and we hardly complain about it. We work hard. D with an actual paying job and me with the kids. I just get so angry some times.

I really feel like we try hard and definitely harder than some parents and yet they have kids that are developmentally fine. It doesn't seem quite fair. We have really tried to be here and raise our kids ourselves.

What a downer I am tonight. I have a paper to work on, so I better hope to.

Where did I go wrong?

I'm feeling pretty stressed about little Z today. Yesterday he had speech therapy and it went great until the end. When it was time to clean up and say goodbye to H he had a melt down. We got in the car and he kicked Little Lady. We spent about 10 or so minutes in the parking garage trying to calm him down!

I feel like I just don't know what to do anymore. I am trying to get him the help he needs. He has play therapy and speech therapy. I've been calling ever so often trying to get him an assessment so I can get him in a preschool. I just don't know what more to do!

And to top that off I feel guilty. I don't know where everything went wrong. I don't know what I did wrong. I tried to do everything I could.

I didn't smoke, drink or have caffeine while pregnant.

When he was born I breastfed until he was about 5 months.

I only gave him organic food until very recently. Even now he mostly eats organic.

I kept him away from BPA, phthalates and PVC as much as possible.

I stayed home with him so that we wouldn't have to send him to daycare.

I just tried to protect him from what I thought could be hazardous to him and his development mentally and physically.

I'm so frustrated. Z doesn't deserve this. He is a sweet boy despite it all. A happy kid and he just seems to really love life. But he has problems and I want to fix him and I can't do it. I can't make him all better.

Because of that every day is a challenge for everyone in this family. We have to worry about simple things like taking him to the grocery store or on walks. Or worry about what is going to happen if we tell him no.

I'm emotionally drained from this. I am so thankful that he only has a developmental delay instead of something like autism. I know it could be worse. But it could also be so much better. It doesn't matter that he isn't autistic, because people are constantly assuming he is anyways.

I hope that one day we will be able to look back on this and be proud that we were able to overcome this struggle. In the meantime I just need to keep taking it minute by minute, hour by hour and day by day.

Little Z

We signed the papers in March to move in to our new place at the end of April. Since then things have been pretty crazy around here.

Z's behavior got better for awhile. Then it got worse. We took him to the doctor on April 7 and discussed behavior. No diagnosis, but a referral to a child psychologist. We got him in 2 weeks later and met with Dr J.

Dr. J was a nice guy and Z seemed to really like him. Or his toys at least. Dr. J noticed Z seems to have a hard time comprehending speech as well as speaking. e were then recommended to call a speech therapist and told to come back in about a month.

On to the speech therapist. We got into the speech therapist 6 days later. That appointment went really well. The speech therapist, H, thinks that Z should only need about 2 months of once a week therapy. So we start therapy Tuesday and have an appointment every Tuesday for the next couple of months.

It's all been an adventure. I'm glad we are getting him help. I've also been trying to find Z a pre-school. I want him to go to one with kids with special needs and typically developing kids. There are a few here, but I know the one I really want is full. So my next step is trying to find someone to assess him and place him in a school. Last 2 weeks I've been taking a few days a week and a few hours a day and calling anyone I can to help. I keep getting passed on to the next person and back and forth. I know I will find someone eventually and I will get him in and he will get the help he needs.

In the meantime we just need to keep loving him and trying to keep our patience. But most days the patience thing is very hard.