Thursday, March 17, 2005

Does anyone else ever have to use PARENTAL CONTROLS FOR a SPOUSE?

Brother.......

Tuesday, March 15, 2005

TO SEND OR NOT TO SEND? That is the question!

Noah stayed home from school today. He informed me yesterday he wanted to stay home....and since Keith and I were mixed about sending him back.....we let him stay home. GOOD thing as he has had an extremely difficult day even around us. I mean really difficult. Cannot listen well at all for us today. Felt the need to body slam himself into things all day...open cupboard doors in the eye doctor's office and shut and repeat over and over even though I kept telling him to NOT do it. Kept feeling the urge to KICK things....walls at the store...climb on shelves in store...almost out of control type behavior. I have noticed when he goes to school he then starts to act like this again. Whereas if he stays home he does much better and is more calm and acts better and does NOT have days like this. SO it could be because of him being in school for the past 6 days being stressed...not sure. We are still debating about what to do. Part of us wants to send him but in reality we don't. We cannot let NOAH make the decisions...we have to decide what is best for him. And to be honest I am not thrilled about having to worry if he is going to run away from the school all the time. SO.....we are probably going to yank him again...and proceed with the formal evaluation and meanwhile homeschool and work on behaviors here at home and go from there. He was doing so well when we were doing things at home 100%. It has fallen apart rapidly since he has been back in school.

BUT.....we put in an email to the behavioral consultant who went to Noah's school on Monday to see what her thoughts were about the day there and how things were going. I then put in a call to her to see if she got my email. No word back from her yet. I kind of wanted to see what she had to say before we made a final decision about Noah. BUT I think we already have.

Monday, March 14, 2005

Noah: DO you ever want to go back to your new school?

I just asked him. I asked him if he wanted to go back to Sheridan Green. He said" well...maybe a little bit". I asked him...."or would you rather do school here at home with mommy and daddy?"....he said "yeah...I would rather stay home and do school here tomorrow". I asked if he ever wanted to go back to Sheridan or just stay home....he said"MY school at home is better". I asked why and he said "cause I can do it".

Pretty much says it all.
That was a copy of the letter via email I sent to Noah's behavioral consultant.
Just wanted to know how it went on Monday with Emmy Davis. She seemed extremely defensive and stand-offish to us on Monday morning. I imagine cause I made the call to you. I am not sure. I tried explaining some other things that bothered Noah or worked for him and she basically told us she could care less because she only said "he has to learn to do things the way we want him to"...."he cannot sit with the other kids or do things with them as he disrupts them too much"...etc. She stood the entire time with her arms crossed in front of her and her legs in combat type stance. She did the same thing when we picked Noah up and Keith approached her to talk about some things. For the first time she DID NOT sit down "alongside" us to discuss Noah. She stood cross armed and combat stance the entire time...ABOVE us and kept saying "well...we will see Noah tomorrow"...shooing us out the door. I left because I was already ticked off and felt if anything else needed to be said Keith could do it. He did not like the response or lack thereof either so he came out pretty quickly after I had left.

I had explained to Emmy that morning that Noah was extremely upset and crying this morning (MONDAY) and did not want to even go to school because he said there were TOO many STOP signs and WAIT signs and schedules all around him. He also mentioned he did not like always being by himself and not being able to play with the other kids or do things with them. I mean he is being overwhelmed with VISUAL cues to the point where every inch he turns there is a sign telling him what he can or cannot do. MORE things he canNOT do than can. As I had told you last week...he is not being allowed to even sit with the other kids as Emmy says he disrupts the class too much. I spoke with someone who runs another CAC program in Denver and they said when they had that problem they have their other kids put headphones on and stay in the room and continue with their work..etc. Not sure why that was not an option for Noah. In other words by Emmy removing the other kids from the room....Noah got super attention to the fact that he was having a fit when it should have been headphones placed on...him being redirected and then ignoring the tantrum. What happened instead only made him probably feel like "wow...look what I just made happen". He got everyone's attention! For most of these kids and especially we know with Noah anyway....a lot of his behaviors you just have to ignore....and prompt him to do something positive and ignore the bad behavior and go on. Drawing attention to it only reinforces the POWER of the bad behavior so it continues.

ANYWAY..I am tired of explaining things to teachers and school staff who do not understand or seem to care to understand as Noah being present poses a huge inconvenience for them and the rest of their class. Keith and I both still feel isolating Noah within the classroom is not right. He even has partitions up all around him......dividers..etc. We are not sure that is necessary. I guess it is a close call to make as there are times he prefers being to himself to accomplish things....but the whole idea of the CAC program was so he COULD interact with other kids in a regular SMALL classroom setting. This is NOT interacting in any fashion. He ONLY interacts with his para and sometimes teacher. ONCE per day he is allowed to do CHOICE time with ONE other student. This is only for MINUTES. Otherwise it is Noah and his para. While this is okay we suppose to some degree.....it seriously lacks in ways to provide Noah with appropriate social skills classes and behavior modification, peer observation, etc., which was the ONLY reason we had even considered placing him in another public school program. It also does not even afford an opportunity for that. Noah is presently NOT receiving any academics which we also have huge problems with. To date we are also not even aware he is receiving any speech therapy or occupational therapy let alone any special education services. His para is reading TO him rather than having HIM READ TO HER...he CAN READ. While we understand just becoming aclimated to the room and environment is a process and takes time..etc...we do not feel it should be a reason to withhold his therapies and/or academics.

Fostering the isolation in the corner of the room only makes Noah feel he needs to be off to himself in order to complete any work or project. This is NOT the goal we had all set in place for him from the start....so we don't understand why it is happening now. Emmy Davis will say it is because Noah is too disruptive to the rest of the class. While we understand that to a degree...we also know he has to be allowed to mix and mingle, to observe and to be allowed to SUCCESSFULLY DO SOME SOCIAL interaction each day.

I also tried to tell Emmy Davis this morning that Noah has to have something in his hands all the time...preferably a MICRO BEAD stretchy toy to hold, squeeze and stretch WHILE he works...not placing that aside and only allowing him to have scheduled SENSORY breaks. We are right back where we started at WEBER! We have even offered to BRING IN A MICRO BEAD stretchy toy as they only seem to give him KOOSH balls which he does not like that well and they have never worked well here for us at home. We have also told her that we had to start out with very small time increments to demand sitting and working on anything. Start with a scheduled amount of time...say 5 minutes....and then let him take a break. Then keep doing that and slowly increase the time he sits and works. Emmy acted like she could not believe or allow SO MANY BREAKS for Noah.

To be honest Keith and I are to the point where we are asking WHY we keep sending Noah back into the public school setting where everyone experiments with different things to try to find something that works. We already can make things work fine here at home with academics..etc. We are even beginning our own social skills classes since he is not yet receiving those anywhere else. He is able to effectively calm himself at home if he gets upset. He has made tremendous strides. He does well socially with other kids at playgrounds and play areas. SO....except to train him to eventually become another cookie cutter molded little person who sits and does everything in school the exact same way everyone else does..WHY ARE we continuing to send him back? The ONLY reason we did this time was so Noah could SUPPOSEDLY receive social skills training and behavior modification per his IEP. He does NOT have to ever enter a real classroom setting to complete school...or even college for that matter. And to date we are not happy with anything we have seen in the public school setting and had NO PLANS for allowing Noah to go to a public school long-term. Emmy Davis wants to refer Noah to an SIED program (or is it SEID?) as she said "they have more expertise with behavior modification than I have or ever will have". By her calling and scheduling an appointment with Barb Bailey prior to Keith or I even telling her what we would consider as a possible option (the SIED/SEID program).....that ticked me off considerably. Here the day before she had told me to go home and talk to Keith about it. I told her there was really nothing to discuss as we had already talked about the SIED program before and we all agreed that was not the proper placement for Noah. She said if we wanted to go see the program she would go along..to let her know..and she would call Barb Bailey about it. She would give Noah one additional week (now this week) to see how things went. Friday we go in (the day after this conversation) and she informs me she has already called Barb and has already scheduled an appointment for next Thursday the 17th at 3:00 p.m. to discuss WHERE we were going to PLACE NOAH AFTER SPRING BREAK!! Now what??? That told us right there she had thrown in the towel with Noah. What other message should we have gotten? There is no other message. It was loud and clear.

So....again I told her that date was not good for me to meet...and besides..if Sheridan Green did not work out for Noah...then we would officially withdraw him from public school settings until we completed his formal evaluation and heard where the professionals would say he should receive his therapies. She then made a comment about Noah not receiving any social skills....and I thought to myself....AND HE IS RECEIVING THEM AT SHERIDAN? NO he is NOT. He is isolated and only being allowed to interact with his para. So basically he is only being babysat while at Sheridan as far as we know as he is NOT receiving any therapies or academics or social skills training/behavior modification.

As you can tell I am extremely upset. SO upset we are not even sure about proceeding with Sheridan Green anymore even this week. Keith and I have talked and talked about this to no end. We are both so sick and tired of explaining things to deaf ears. OR trying to place Noah with so-called EXPERIENCED personnel and then they act like Noah does things they have never seen or worked with before. Meanwhile Noah goes through Hell. If he has not gotten a paranoid complex from all this yet in time he will. He is TOTALLY aware he is being sectioned off from others. The problem is he does not totally understand WHY. In fact I could say the same about us his parents. We are also not totally sure why.

So before we make a hasty decision we would like to know what you saw or felt was happening at Sheridan Green when you observed on Monday.
I purposefully did not call as I don't have the time or energy to discuss this further via voice. I hesitate also as I may say something I will regret. You however have been the only one to date who truly seems to understand and GET IT. For that we thank you very very much.

SO...please email us and let me know your thoughts. You can forward this email to anyone you feel would benefit from it...including Barb Bailey. Thanks so much!

Sincerely,


Melinda AND Keith
SIGNS SIGNS everywhere there're signs.....

My last post reminded me of that song. I imagine that has become Noah's world....as he is using so many visual CUES for everyday living. His school is using them to the extreme I think. He cried this morning NOT wanting to even go to school as he said they have too many STOP signs..too many WAIT signs..too many SCHEDULES......I imagine in his little world he has had his limit. I mean he cannot tune out the environment like we can. The stimulus is overwhelming to him. SIgns telling him what he CAN or CANNOT do all around him.

Signs signs everwhere there're signs...do this don't do that everywhere there are signs............

yeah..........right......................sickening
SURROUNDED BY STOP SIGNS in the classroom. That is how Noah sees his world. He told me so this morning. DO they help him NOT run away and leave the room?
well..it usually does with him I guess....he sees the sign and is very visual...so I guess they think it will help to reinforce the STOP and NOT going out the door. I am glad they have them but I think after awhile Noah is feeling boxed in literally. I dont know. I expressed concerns this morning to the teacher who was extremely defensive. I called her on the fact that last week after she told me to talk to Keith about what we might consider as options for Noah IF her program did not work out before she called the director to schedule a meeting...that she went ahead and had already SCHEDULED a freaking meeting with the director before I had even told her what Keith and I had discussed. I had told her that pretty much indicated to us she had already decided in her mind that HER program was NOT going to work for Noah as she told me Friday she had scheduled a meeting with the director to discuss WHERE they were going to place Noah AFTER spring break. She stood there mouth gaped open.....eyes funny...she KNEW I had caught her in a lie and she wrote it off as "well it had to be a misunderstanding"..."I told you I was going to call Barb"...blah blah blah. SHE NEVER was to CALL Barb until AFTER we had discussed what WE MIGHT consider as options....and there are NO other options from the DISTRICT so what was there to discuss anyway? She once again was referring to the program for emotionally disabled kids. Noah has already been proven to not be emotionally disabled. SO I would NEVER place him in a program like that. She said she was sorry but it was not sincere. When I told her how Noah started off his morning NOT wanting to go to school and why.....she basically stood there with her arms crossed super defensive and said "he has to learn to sit with others and not be distracting before he can do things with the other kids". HUM....and HOW ONCE AGAIN is THAT making him more socially acceptable?

SO I told her look " I am tired of telling everyone what WE know works with Noah and no one seems to be listening. We are done with the crap. If this does not work out for Noah we will be officially withdrawing him from public schools as they obviously don't have a freaking ass clue what to do with kids like him. We would homeschool him....and keep the appointment for evaluation...and based on their recommendations decide what additional therapies he will need to LEARN social skills more than we teach him already at home...etc. She of course could secretly care less as if it had been left up to her last week would have been Noah's final week...no matter what she will tell someone to their face.

I told her isolation bothers him.....being surrounded by barriers bothers him...etc....and yet at times he seems to like that or prefer that. SO who knows. BUT he seems SAD about it all and is probably thinking "gee...what is wrong with me since I always have to sit by myself to work and go to school...etc." What kind of life is that for a 6 year old to have to try to deal with? Especially since he cannot quite grasp concepts to begin with?

My job is suffering as I cannot concentrate on anything but this. It slowly takes over everything in your life. I am so exhausted so I then cannot get up and do my work..which means I then have to try to do it during the day which is near impossible with everything else going on. I have already expressed my concerns to my boss. I told her even if I wanted a break in my position since no one can cover for me while gone I basically cannot take a break from work. BUT I may have to. I am getting a very bad attitude about everything in general and am so sick and tired of public school staff thinking they know what is best for your child when time and time again they prove to us they don't have a clue. Not when it comes to dealing with someone like Noah.

SO...........on that note I better get to the other PC and work. I have about 20 tapes sitting over there

Sunday, March 13, 2005

(This is what has been going through my head already this morning....it is only 25 degrees outside. I have fresh coffee....wonderful candles lit and smelling great and stew cooking in the crockpot. Rather than re-write all my thoughts here ....I copied and pasted from my other blog....to here. Makes it so much quicker. I now wonder why I have 2 blogs. I mean I should be able to handle everything under ONE....although my second one...Dear Noah...was made to be just for my son Noah. Not so much for me to rant and rave about things he does not need to hear. SO I guess having 2 serves a purpose. Anyway...my thoughts already by 7:30 a.m. Sunday, March 13, 2005:

Dear Noah

WHAT is the world coming to. I mean a gunman IN A GUARDED courtroom guns down and kills the jude, court stenographer, and others Friday. A man goes into a Saturday night church service and kills others and himself. I know they say the chances of those things happening in everyday lives is probably miniscule. But all those people affected in the past few days had miniscule chances too. EVER since 9/11 I have thought about things I never dreamed I would think of. I now PONDER possibilities I never could even imagine before.....just so I can be "more prepared"???? What kind of a concept is that? Can anyone ever be prepared to just LIVE in this world anymore? You never know who you will come across and what will happen. You don't know if even the policeman you seek out to help you will be straight and legit and okay. ALL these concerns and worries makes trying to teach you who to count on to be there and take care of you or HELP you when you need help so tough. Even for the average person who can understand "concepts" it is getting tough. For someone who does not it is near impossible now. Some of the people we would normally have sent our children to in the past for help are now not always the ones who will help our children but instead are the same ones who hurt. Devils in sheep's cloathing. AND IF I TOLD THAT TO YOU NOAH....YOU WOULD TAKE ME LITERALLY AND THINK "DEVIL IN SHEEP'S CLOATHING" and that is what you would be looking for. HOW IS it EVER possible to get you to understand. I DON'T EVEN understand times like this that we live in. It is so hard to not become depressed and worry all the time wondering what kind of life you might have one day. I worry about a lot but in the back of my mind I know it will all work out and I really don't have any control over much anyway so I just need to give it all up to GOD. However....as a human being that is even hard to do sometimes as we want to always keep our "hands in the pot" (again...you will take this literally...sorry). We always want to try to handle everything ourselves. I can turn it over to God but I also will still worry to some point. I WORRY about you even going out to recess as you have been trying sometimes to run away. The slightest thing that is different in your environment can set you off and make you run. NO ONE gets that.....I think YOU DO. You thought the person holding the school door open Friday was a "stranger". You remembered Mommy has told you to run, kick, scream, yell ...do ANYTHING to get AWAY from a stranger. YOU DID exactly what I told you. However...you have to make sure where you are running is safe. AND running away from your paraprofessional is not safe. We would not know where you were. You could get hurt. Mommy and Daddy would miss you and love you and would not know where you were. We might not ever get to even see you again. We could not imagine a life without you in it. THANKFULLY GOD AND HIS ANGELS were watching over you when we were not there and you stopped when your para said "STOP!!". You came back. I don't want to get a phone call one day however where they say you got away. AND....while your para may be great..she is overweight and out of shape and I HIGHLY doubt she could run and catch you. I could not run and catch you as I am out of shape. AND we all know CHASING you only makes you run more. SO that would not work anyway. SO many things in my mind constantly racing around....worries....fears...stresses....trying to think positive all the time so we don't self fulfill all the crap in our heads we do worry about. Then we wonder. WHY EXACTLY are we continuing to try to even send you back to a public school setting? MAKES NO sense to us. We don't even desire to send you to a public school. We have had great success homeschooling you here at home. Supposedly it was for therapies and to learn to handle a classroom setting. WHY SHOULD YOU EVER NEED TO LEARN THAT? YOU don't HAVE to go to a classroom setting to go to school. You can do school at home..you can even do college at home now. WHY NOT DO THAT INSTEAD? MAKES perfect sense to me. We know what is best for you. The teachers don't. I mean you are not even getting the social skills classes you need now. Once again they have isolated you into a corner of the room.....you are partitioned off from the others so as not to "disturb" them. How can you learn social skills if you are not allowed to be SOCIAL???? WOW PEOPLE....NEW concept there. I think we will just go ahead and withdraw you from school now. I know the head of all the IEP stuff is thinking you need 4-6 weeks to see if all these new things will work for you. However your teacher threw in the towel last week when she said she had already called the director and scheduled a meeting to "discuss WHERE you would go AFTER spring break". THAT tells me she has already made up her mind "you" in "her "room will NOT work. Meanwhile I wonder about that. Daddy and I both do. You are presently not getting ANY academics in school as they say they cannot get you to sit and stay on task long enough to complete anything. Funny.....at home we got you to complete and stay on task on about 5 different subjects Saturday. You completed all your work and actually learned things. You soaked things up like a sponge. Your behavior was better and we could control it. WHY should we continue to let you go to a school where they have admitted they do NOT know how to do those things but yet somehow supposedly know what is BEST for you and think anything they do will magically transform you? INTO WHAT we ask? A perfect cookie cutter molded little person who will do and learn things the way all the other little cookie cutter people do? WHAT FUN IS THAT?? AND WHY when your paint water at school became dirty and they would NOT let you get up and change it to keep you calm and on task.......WHY we would like to know did they just not let you change it? I would have done that at home. You have a full time para assigned to you. The bathroom sink is in the classroom for Pete's sake! Instead they tell you to USE DIRTY water which really set you off and you threw the chair across the room into the door. Now ALL that could have been avoided by allowing you to simply change the water.....and then sit back down and finish painting. They seemed so thrilled and proud they were finally able to get you calmed down enough that you sat and used dirty water to finish painting with. THAT would have bugged even me! That affects your painting when the water is dirty. Are we the only ones who understand that? I just sit here with my mouth hanging and shaking my head. I really believe we will be homeschooling you in some fashion......and you will be receiving additional therapies either here from home or we take you somewhere for them or both. We think that is what will work best. It is so funny when the teachers say "oh but he won't be getting any socialization" ....oh and yes I say...he is receiving SO MUCH in school where you keep him off to himself all the time. I would think if you were not paranoid before.....you would soon become paranoid. I would imagine you would start thinking something must be wrong with you. We have gone through this same thing before....over and over and over it keeps happening. WHY???? I would think that is not helping you to learn to be with others...only making you crave being alone and off to yourself even more. AND then they talk about sticking you in an SIED program...that is for emotionally disturbed children. YOU have already been deemed NOT emotionally disabled. We will never place you in a program like that. There comes a time when we have to stand up and say "hey....we do know what is BEST for our son and the district obviously has no freakin clue". I am so thankful to GOD we have been able to change our work schedules around where Mommy and Daddy can be home with you during the day and at night so someone is always with you. We love being with you 24/7. We love teaching you things. We love seeing you change and grow. We are thankful we should be able to give you what you need. So be tough my little Noah. My little angel boy. We truly believe you were sent down from God above for Mommy AND Daddy to love. And that is what we are doing!!

LOVE YOU TO THE MOON AND BACK ...again and again and again and again....FOREVER AND EVER AND EVER AND EVER!!Mommy
posted by Melinda @
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