Posts in month: March, 2010

I call her Little Girl Lost.  She was born to a nice young couple in their early twenties that seemed to have it made.  They were planning on settling down, getting married, and having the storybook life.  But something happened on the way: the little girl.  After she was born the man (boy) became verbally abusive to his fiancée:

• He didn’t like how she looked anymore; she’s fat and slobby!

• He also didn’t like how she would put in a hard day’s work but wouldn’t do all of the housework when she got home; she’s lazy and good for nothing!

• He especially didn’t like how he would have to take care of his new daughter if his fiancée had to work late; she’s a terrible mother!

When things got too much the mom took a small trip to visit her family several states away.  While gone the man (boy) went to court and started proceedings to get sole custody of the child.  Upon hearing this the mom raced home and attempted, with her lawyer, to stop the action.  But dad won, even though it was proven in court he had been steadily lying to the judge about his finances, his family life, and his residence.

The child is now 7 years old and she sees her mom one week per month.  Mom moved back with her family soon after the judge’s ruling 8 hours from her.  As part of the court order she must drive 4 hours to meet the child’s father half way to swap…that is, if the man (boy) bothers to even show up.  Many times mom makes the trip only to have to either go the whole distance to fight to see her daughter, or turn back home.

For a time Little Girl Lost slept on the couch in Dad’s apartment; he shared a bedroom with his girlfriend.  When he lost his job he moved back home with his mother.  This time he had the couch and the child slept on the floor.  She would hear him constantly on the phone to her mother either berating her or begging her to get back together with him.  And all her meals came from fast food restaurants.

Recently the man’s (boy’s) mother threw him out of the house.  He and Little Girl Lost have ended up in a homeless shelter.  As I write this she has been there for 5 months now.  When her mother first heard about it she hired a lawyer and made plans to go and get her.  But the days turned into weeks; weeks turned into months.

Her mom is not guiltless through all of this:

• Initially the judge told her she could get custody of her daughter if she stayed in the state.  She chose to move back with her family 3 states away, without her child.

• The judge then told her that if she went back to school and got a decent job that in a year he would review the case and if all was well grant her custody.  That was 6 years ago; she has done nothing.

• Recently the lawyer helping her get her child out of the homeless shelter fired her.  Why?  Because she wasn’t doing anything to try to get her daughter back.  He believes her daughter should have only spent 1 week in the shelter…it has been 5 months.

• At Christmas Little Girl Lost was in a corner with her friends at a party with her mom.  She told her friends she wanted to commit suicide.  Some of the children ran to her mother to tell her what her daughter said.  Rather than sit down with her and help her through it mom berated her for saying things like that.

• Mom has been heard to say that she really doesn’t want her daughter back; she’s too much work!  And oh, the homeless shelter is a nice place.

In the United States it is estimated that there are 1,256,600 children that are abused and/or neglected (this government report is in pdf format).  The number is broken down even further:

1. Approximately 553,000 are abused:

• 58% are physically abused or an estimated 323,000.

• 24%, approximately 135,300 are sexually abused.

• 27%, about 148,500, are emotionally abused.

2. It is estimated that there are 771,700 children that are neglected:

• 47% are educationally neglected or about 360,500 children.

• 38%, approximately 295,300, are physically neglected.

• 25%, an estimated 193,400 children are emotionally neglected.

These numbers come from the government report on abuse and neglect.

Where does Little Girl Lost come into this?  We can probably make a case for any number of these categories.  My guess would be that she is emotionally abused at the very least because she hears the interaction between her parents.  She is emotionally neglected because no one seems to have an interest in who she is or how she is feeling.  I’m also thinking that physical neglect may enter into it as well.

How is this happening?  You may have noticed that in the beginning of this post I keep referring to her dad as “man (boy)”.  By living in a homeless shelter and not working he is not meeting her physical needs. By belittling and arguing with her mother she is suffering emotional abuse. He is not doing the job of a father.  Mom abandoned her.  Mom doesn’t want her.  Neither parent wants to work out their differences.  And both are ignoring her emotional needs as well.

Though we cannot do a lot about her we can look at our own children.  Is there any abuse in our families?  I don’t necessarily mean physical or sexual abuse.  Are we screaming at our kids?  This does have an emotional effect on them.  Do we say nasty things to them or even threaten them?  This is also abusive.  Do we talk to them about their problems, their hopes, their dreams?  Do we play with them?  Do we teach them about life?  If we don’t do these things it can be neglect, both emotional and educational.

If we are doing any of these it has an effect on our children.  Improving our relationship with them is of paramount importance.

But what about Little Girl Lost?  She, like hundreds of thousands like her, struggle every day.  All is not lost for her, she has friends trying to help her.  The danger is for other children who will grow up angry.  Who may run away from home.  Who may get into alcohol, drugs, and even child prostitution.  Or worse, commit suicide.  Do you know parents like hers?  What can you do to change the direction these kids’ lives are taking?

Do you and your family move around a lot because of your job or because you are in the service?  Do your kids have issues such as Aspergers Syndrome or Bipolar Disorder?  In either case you have most likely found yourself pulling your kids out of one school and into another more often than you’d like to think about.  You have found not all schools and teachers are created equal.  Some are good and some are not so good.  You have to keep very close eye to make sure your children are keeping up to their grade level so they’ll be able to move on to college and into adult life.  This is the School Rollercoaster.

Most children have a set path.  They start in preschool or kindergarten, move through grade school, on into middle school, and finish with high school before going on to college.  They and their parents get to know the other families as they spend up to 14 years with them.  They know what is being taught at the school and where their kids are going.

But unlike them the children on the school rollercoaster can slip back sometimes unnoticed into lower grade levels based on what they are being taught in the different schools they attend.

My son Max is 8 years old.  Like other children his age he is in grade 3 this year.  Unlike the other kids his education has not only moved progressively but also regressively.  This has been a source of frustration for us because he is very smart.  And it is even more frustrating for him when he finds he is being taught things he learned years before.

Preschool was the second school he was in; he started in a special needs school to help him with his motor skills.  But preschool he loved; they played a lot and learned much more than how to count and say the alphabet.  They covered most of the things that other children learn in kindergarten.

Kindergarten was more progressive as well.  The teacher had been responsible for setting up programs for special needs kids in the district.  This was a good thing because when Max was 5 his disabilities became more pronounced.  She knew exactly what to do.  She brought my wife and I in to create an IEP (Individualized Education Program).  In those days we really knew nothing about them and she helped us through it.

She also believed in stretching the kids mentally.  Max was learning first grade work that year.  He knew how to add and subtract even before going into the next grade.  She was the first to point out to us how intelligent he is (as if we didn’t know).

We will always be grateful Max started his schooling with her.  Just the education alone would help him through the first grade; that year he was in 5 different schools, all with different ways of teaching:

• When he was promoted to the first grade we found that Max’s teacher had never taught before.  Not only that she had not received any special needs training.  The instruction he got was the exact same as in kindergarten.  He was 6 and that year he was diagnosed with adhd, bipolar disorder, pdd or aspergers (the diagnosis changes depending on the psychiatrist), odd, ocd, and whatever else they could think of.

• He became completely uncontrollable and by Christmas was in a hospital.  For the 8 days he was there they provided some form of education.  Considering what he experienced I’m surprised he got any teaching at all.

• When he came out his former school did not want to deal with him so they sent him to a special needs school about an hour away for evaluation.  During the testing they tried to determine how he would blend in with the other students.  His course of study was on a first and second grade level.

• During the evaluation phase he again entered a hospital.  For the next two weeks he became part of a one room school house type of environment.  The program covered classes on the first through fifth grade levels so Max learned whatever they gave him.

• When he left the hospital he found himself back in the special school.  They had determined that he should be moved up a grade level. So from April of that year through the following year when he was 7 he would be in grade 2.  The school followed the second grade curriculum.

Third grade was another step back for Max.  The teacher was yet another brand new one.  Like his first grade teacher this one had just graduated from school and she didn’t have any special needs experience.  We discovered that he was being taught all of the same things he learned back in second grade.  Not only was he repeating the grade but he wasn’t learning anything new.  The only good side was that the teacher realized that his reading abilities were beyond what she was teaching so he was placed in the fifth grade reading class.

We didn’t take this year lightly.  We knew that he would be far behind other kids his age if things didn’t change.  We discussed our concerns with the school principal and the guidance counselor.  The week before February school vacation they informed us that when he came back to school he would be starting fifth grade.  Why the big jump?  Because this teacher has a lot of years teaching experience and she has her masters degree in special education.  She teaches both the fourth and fifth grade levels so Max really wouldn’t be jumping two grades, only 1; and most important she has already knows Max from his fifth grade reading class.

This doesn’t mean he’ll be going into sixth grade next year.  He will continue with this teacher at least one more year.  But we will be able to breathe a little easier knowing that he is getting the education he needs.

The point of this story is that if we hadn’t kept track of what was happening Max would still be behind.  It is not enough to assume that the schools are going to provide the right education you have to make sure.  And lately if you’ve been watching the news you know that people that move around a lot or have special needs children are not the only ones that must stay alert; everyone has to.  Schools are now firing their teaching staffs for poor quality performance.  It started in Rhode Island and will be moving across the country.  Just yesterday the government announced that it will be establishing countrywide educational standards.

Not just teachers but we, as parents, all need to make sure our kids are learning what they need to.

I haven’t even mentioned what the school rollercoaster does to our kids.  The constant moves have been tough enough on Max as it is; but he also keeps losing the teachers he really likes.  This has been very upsetting for him.  On the positive side this most recent move will not only bring his grade level back up but he loves his new teacher.

For kids like Max this might not be their last move but if we keep track of what is going on we can attempt to make the moves less traumatic for them and be sure they are progressing as they should.

“Little boy, 6 years old

A little too used to bein’ alone

Another new mom and dad, another school

Another house that’ll never be home

When people ask him how he likes this place

He looks up and says with a smile upon his face

This is my temporary home”

These words are from a song by Carrie Underwood.  They describe not just one boy but over 3,310,000 children in the United States alone that do not have a permanent home.  These are the foster kids; these are the homeless kids; these are the orphans in our midst.

Foster kids move around alot, they go from homes to programs to group homes and sometimes back to homes again.  Some of them can live in upwards of 21 different places by the time they are 15.  They get used to being in “temporary homes”. Why do they end up in so many different places?  There are a lot of reasons but in the end the foster parents, and the program and group home directors decide they cannot take care of these kids anymore.  Then off they go again to yet another place to live.  Some, like the little boy, just smile; others are angry, they either don’t understand what is happening to them or they resent it.

Homeless children live where they can.  It may be in cars or shelters or even on the streets.  Many of them are still with their parents who are homeless as well.  Some of them are alone.

Some orphans are foster kids, others live in institutions.  And whether they are orphans or foster kids when they reach adulthood they are moved out of the system to fend for themselves.

People are choosy when it comes to taking in children whether fostering or adopting.  I work part time for an organization called suitcases4kids.   This gives me an opportunity to meet foster parents. They love the work they do.  They are here for the kids.  Most of them feel blessed to have the opportunity to help them.

But I was talking to one woman the other day who wants to be a foster parent and she has conditions; she won’t take a child over 3.  Her reasoning is that before this age the kid isn’t “damaged”.  But you know what?  A child needs love no matter what age or condition.  I have also spoken to foster parents who specifically look for “damaged” ones because they know these kids need the most help.

The system works the best it can; its social workers are trying to help but it breaks their hearts to see what these kids go through.

Our kids need help!  As we move through this “Great Recession” these numbers are expected to rise and it is for many reasons such as parents finding they cannot support their own children anymore.

Okay, so you are being affected by the economy too so you cannot afford to take in a child or you are worried about their possible mental issues.  But there are other ways to help.  You can volunteer at a shelter.  You can donate money, clothes, or other items.  Give them love and give them support in any way you can so that our kids don’t feel abandoned!

And maybe they will be able to find something more than just “temporary homes”.

Have you seen the new show “Parenthood” yet?  Well, technically it is not a new show.  It was originally a movie by Ron Howard that came out in the 1980s.  It was later turned into a series starring Robert Townsend.  Now Ron Howard has brought it back again, this time starting Peter Krause (from Dirty Sexy Money and Six Feet Under) and Lauren Graham (from The Gilmore Girls).  It is about a family whose siblings bond over the trials and tribulations of raising their respective children.

My wife and I saw the pilot the other night and discovered yet another show to add to our limited television watching.  The part that grabbed our attention the most and a lot of discussion was the discovery that the older sibling’s (Peter Krause) son has Asperger’s Syndrome.  It started with the child, who appears about 9 or 10, having trouble in school and subsequently being diagnosed by a psychiatrist.

The steps they go through mirror those that a lot of families experience, including us.  The mom meets up with her husband and tearfully gives him the news.  He immediately denies that there is a problem; but she obviously has accepted the situation and begs him not to let her go through this journey alone.  He finally gets it when he sees how his son interacts with his classmates.  Though the boy knows that they are trying to communicate with him he shrugs it off as meaningless focused only on his immediate concerns.

Later when the grandfather (Craig T. Nelson) tries to get the boy involved in activities the father responds by saying sadly “Dad, there is something wrong with my son;  I’m going to need your help.”  I sat there thinking “Dad where are you?  I need your help”.  My son Max has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, aspergers, and adhd..  My dad passed away in 1985.

My wife commented that the family should have known there was something wrong at least with the boy several years before the situation at school.  Certainly we knew there were issues when Max was 2 though we didn’t know what; he is 8 now.  This family seemed very surprised and yet my wife and I both knew there was something wrong with that boy at the beginning of the show.  Coincidentally his name is Max too.

Perhaps they should have known earlier but my thought is that they were both in denial.  I certainly was; but my wife has this sense about things related to health.  I have learned to trust her judgment.  Frankly, however, I think I still have some denial.  I was reading an article yesterday that was called “Misdiagnosis of Bipolar disorder” and my first thought was that maybe Max has not been diagnosed correctly.  Perhaps not but this story was more about how a lot people who actually have the disorder can be diagnosed incorrectly with other conditions.  It seems like Bipolar scares me more than aspergers and adhd so I would rather my son didn’t have it.  Actually, I’d rather he was so-called “normal”; I know other parents want the same for their kids too.

I hope the show, with all the different storylines, will not forget about their Aspie child and continue to bring us updates on his condition.

Do you ever find, like me, that there are things that you want to get done but other things just show up to push them off?  I find this happens a lot when I am writing my posts.  Today is one such example.  I have several posts in mind but this idea showed up this morning.

Among all of the odd jobs I do such as PCA work, website development, leg work for a charity, writing; I also have several clients that I do handyman work for.  Working like this allows me to be home on a regular basis for two very important reasons.  Reason 1 is my son Max.  I have talked about him a lot in my posts.  He is 8 years old and has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, adhd, odd, and aspergers/pdd.  With all of these issues he can be very difficult to manage.

Reason 2 is my wife who is disabled.  Because of this she cannot care for Max all by herself.

In previous posts and those I write in the future I address all of this but today I got to paint.  One of my clients bought a fixer upper with her husband a year ago.  He is gone now but the work still needs to be done.  Her problem is that she has to pay the mortgage and the bills so she works 50-60 hours a week.  Then she has to come home to housework and food shopping.

This doesn’t leave much time to make the repairs.  This is where I come in; I spend one day a week working for several hours while Max is in school.  Today, I’ve started the painting in the kitchen;  I had time to prime and paint several of the cabinet doors.  Eventually when all of this is done I will be tiling the floor.

Today also happened to be her day off.  When I was finished my work she we started to talk.  Even though her husband is gone she doesn’t live alone.  Her daughter and 3 grandkids live there as well.  And for a short period of time the daughter’s 28 year old boyfriend was there to.  My client threw him out when he started swearing at her and being very rude and disrespectful.  It makes me wonder if this is how he treats his own mother.

I focused in on this because I can see Max being like this when he gets older.  Right now even at 8 he knows the words.  He is very rude and disrespectful to his mother and swears at her constantly.  Something has to be done before he gets older.

First, I don’t believe in beatings; all this kind of violence teaches is more violence.  The child may not disrespect mom anymore but he learns that violence is okay.  I view spanking the same way.  This is an “in the moment” response which doesn’t have a long term effect.

Timeouts could work; Max gets timeouts for a lot of other things that he does.  He also gets them for the disrespect and swearing as well but it isn’t having any effect.  Taking away privileges and toys don’t work; he tends to move on.  In a few hours for privileges, days or weeks for toys, he may remember that he has lost something and ask for it back but in the mean time nothing changes.

His psychiatrist insists this is part of the bipolar disorder.  Bipolar kids can swear constantly, be abusive, and disrespect people.  According to him the medication should help this to a degree.  His counselor also insists that even if this is a result of his diagnosis that we shouldn’t be relying on the medication to resolve the issue.  We still have to find the tools that will teach Max respect.  My wife and I are constantly on the look out for the things that will work for him.

This all brings us back to the boyfriend.  He treats my client disrespectfully and swears at her.  I assume he probably does this to her daughter as well.  And I wouldn’t be surprise if this is how he treats his own mother.  He is 28 years old!  I don’t want to see Max end up like this.  My dad taught me to protect those that are weaker that I am.  Now I’m not saying women are weak; most can be pretty powerful.  But physically and mentally we hear of so many being subjected to abuse by their fathers, husband, boyfriends, and sons.

This is one of the symptoms of bipolar disorder that I want him to overcome not only for him but also his mother, his girlfriends, and their mothers too.  Do you have a child that has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder?  Do they swear and are they disrespectful?  What tools have you been implementing to address these issues?

You are in the store working through your weekly grocery list when what happens?  Your kid goes ballistic.  It can be for any number of reasons: you won’t buy her that candy bar; you won’t let him run around and play catch with the apples; or they don’t want to stay close to you.  And then they let loose because they don’t get their way. What do you do?

I know exactly what it feels like trying to discipline children.  We have all watched kids losing control in stores and restaurant.  And when we look at the parents we see two very harried, stressed out people.  I sympathize with them because I’ve been there.  I bet a lot of you know how they are feeling too.  It’s the “here we go again, oh my head” feeling.  You try to stay in control as your temper begins to rise.  It doesn’t help that you can feel everyone’s eyes on you and, perhaps, judging you.

So what can you do?  Losing your temper doesn’t feel good.  Getting stressed out can leave you shaking.  And please, let’s not talk about screaming back at our kid.

Why is it that some parents don’t seem to have this reaction?  Watch how they handle their children.  First off in most cases their child behaves, but if they do lose it how do their parents respond to correct the problem?

This is it in a nutshell:

First, mentally step back and take a deep breath.  When we lose our tempers, get stressed out, or worry about the other people around us we are making this whole issue about us.  Remember, it is our child that is having the problem; it is only about them.  It is not about you or even the people around you.  If you remember this it will be much easier to keep your cool and think about your next move.  Have you noticed that when you are terribly stressed or angry you cannot think clearly?

Okay, now that you haven’t lost your temper, speak to your child calmly.  If you are stressed it will make them more agitated.  Tell them what you want to happen and expect them to comply with your wishes.

If they don’t respond calmly leave the store or restaurant.  If they are very young, lead them by the hand.  If they are older, just leave and expect them to follow you.  Tell them you will wait by the car.

This method of acting is called “Calm/Assertive”.  You remain calm throughout the situation but when you speak to them it is with an assertive tone.  Do not confuse this with an aggressive tone; this is how you speak if you have lost your temper.

It is not easy.  It is a skill that has to be practiced over and over again.  Some days I have no problem acting this way.  Other times no matter how hard I try I still get as escalated as my kid.  But the goal is to keep practicing because the more we do the easier it becomes.  And it won’t be long before we see much better behavior in our kids when we are out in public.

I used to boil over all the time.  When my child would not stop acting out in public I could feel that hot temper rising in me.  I would sweat as I would tell him severely to stop.  When he wouldn’t I would begin to perspire as I knew people were talking about what a “bad parent” I was.  I kept reading as much as I could to try to cure my son’s attitude but nothing was working.

But then I realized…

My temper was about me; not about him.  And yes, when I thought about it I could actually see him get escalated the more I got angry.  But then I found the book “Misbehavior To Great Behavior”.  Practicing the suggestions it made turned me around.  As my son learned that “acting out” was not going to get him what he wanted anymore his attitude improved tremendously.

We were deluged with rain last Thursday.  It filled our basement; it killed our water heater; and we lost power for a short time.  I had to find a pump to get rid of the water; most stores were out of them.  I have finally gotten the water out, now I have to plan for actual cleanup, we lost quite a few possessions.

In the grand scheme of things it isn’t much.  Between New Hampshire and Massachusetts 300,000 homes lost power.  This winter the mid-Atlantic states were dumped on with snow.  Haiti and Chile were destroyed by earthquakes.  I will survive what problems I have right now.

With all of this however, I still have work to do.  I have several jobs one of which is as an on-call Personal Care Assistant (PCA).  I work for several people who have regular PCAs; I fill in if an assistant can’t make it on a given day or there is an emergency.  This weekend was one such situation.  One client has two regular PCAs that come to his apartment to clean his house, give him baths, and to dress him, among other things.  His legs are paralyzed so he is wheelchair bound.  My job is to be his chauffeur; I take him to doctors’ offices, hospitals, and to visit family members.

On Thursday night his apartment complex lost power in the storm.  It is a government-sponsored low income building that doesn’t have a generator.  Since the temperature started dropping in the evening they were in danger of freezing if he and his wife stayed there overnight.  When I spoke to them they were content to stay.  They found that if they boiled pots of water on the stove they got some heat.  They were prepared to do this until the power came back on.

As I mentioned he is in a wheelchair and has PCAs come in to dress and bathe him.  His wife, though mobile, has difficulty lifting much more than Styrofoam cups of liquid.  Between the two of them they were going to have trouble just keeping the pots full of water.

I informed them that they would be staying in a hotel for the evening.  I called around to discover that all the hotels and motels in the area were full; everyone needed to get out of their homes.  I finally found an open room; luckily it was what they call handicap-accessible.  I called my client; he was shocked but grateful.  At 8 pm I headed out to take care of them.

When I arrived at their apartment the first thing I had to do was help him get dressed before moving him into his wheelchair.  While I did this his wife packed a few belongings.  I pushed him down the long ramp to the car and loaded him up.  After helping his wife in as well I packed the chair in the trunk.

Now comes the fun part.  When we got to the motel we found a shabby ramshackle place.  The room was in the back side of it.  I had to roll him up a broken cement ramp into the building then down a hallway that sloped up and down like a rollercoaster.  The room was located at the far end of the corridor.  Inside this “handicap” room was a double bed that took up most of it.  There was barely enough space to squeeze the chair between the bed and the walls.  It was a tight turn into the bathroom and for a moment we thought we wouldn’t be able to make it.

But the door was wide enough to get in and we found a very large room with railings.  My client was able to maneuver around very easily.  And as it turns out he had no problem rolling himself around the bedroom.  He is very adept at getting around corners.

I got him to bed and then left for the evening.  In the morning I picked them up and took them to breakfast at a small diner down the road.  Afterwards I called the apartment complex and discovered that they now had power.  Even though it was only for one night you’ve never seen two more excited people when they finally got home.  I left them profusely thanking me for taking care of them during the storm.

So according to the title this post is about “PCA Storm Therapy”.  In this case it is about therapy for the PCA.  It took me away from all the stress at home.  The pump took care of the water in the basement without me. I didn’t worry about scheduling the installation of a new water heater or getting ready to clean up our ruined possessions.  Not only did it feel good helping my client and his wife but I was able to stay relaxed while doing it.

We woke up this morning to a lot of noise outside.  A moving van was parked in the driveway next door and the men were moving out all of the furniture.  Our neighbors were moving.  It’s kind of sad; they only moved in a couple of months ago.  We knew from the beginning they weren’t here long.  They had sold their old house and had rented this one temporarily until the papers were passed on the new one.  They had been promised 2 to 3 months before it happened.

They were a nice couple with 3 kids all in their early teens…and a large friendly golden retriever.  I say it is kind of sad because we really didn’t get to know them.  I never actually met the parents though I saw them around occasionally.  We talked to the older 2 kids whenever we saw them around.  They are very polite and very nice; their parents have done a great job.

But there were several reasons that we didn’t get to know them better.  The first one is the time of year.  As I write this my wife commented that she is sad that we weren’t involved with them more.  She highlighted this reason: It is the middle of winter so people don’t get outside very often except those that like to play in the snow…but they go elsewhere to do that.

The second reason is our street has become distantly friendly.  When we first moved in 9 years ago the neighbors told me how they used to block of the street every summer for parties.  Everyone got involved; everyone was friendly; everyone helped to raise each other’s kids.  By the time we moved in that wasn’t happening anymore.

In our first few years here there were occasional parties that we would go to mostly a Christmas party here or there.  But now we just wave and yell “Hi” across the road.  So it was with this family; we would wave whenever we saw them but…

The third reason is their dog.  While I loved playing with him when he was out my 8 year old is very afraid of dogs.  Whenever he was around my boy would barricade himself within the house and would refuse to step outside.

And the fourth is really the number one reason.  Last week I wrote about how we are in the middle of making changes to our son’s medications.  It hasn’t been an easy task as we wean him off the stimulants.  We have realized that his bipolar mania has been masked for a long time.  In the passed few weeks he has become more and more manic laughing very loudly; screaming happily; and being more oppositional.

For a long time we had been circling the wagons as it were; closing ourselves off from the neighbors as we concentrate on Max’s issues.  This has also gotten in the way of work, groups that I belong to such as Toastmasters, and spending time with siblings and cousins.  Max has been our number one priority.  At the same time it has been very tough on all of us, most especially for him.  He doesn’t know why he is acting so differently lately and it has been difficult for him to understand the reasons.

But as we work that out we still have lost our neighbors.  The van is gone now and the kids have just stopped back this afternoon for a moment perhaps to pick up some forgotten items.  And I continue to push forward getting as much work done as I can before Max gets home from school and we have to deal with his mania again.