Way To Go difficult child 1

[Alttlgabby]

Poor thing sat at the table for 4 hours last night to do homework! Ugh. I hate making her sit, but she did get up, get something to eat at dinner, something to drink, snack after dinner, etc.. I hated making her sit for that amount of time (not good for her), but she had some stuff that she had not gotten done in the last week from being absent last week. She sat and played almost the entire time and that is what takes her so long. So, unfortunately, she didn't get any tv time last night. She started off doing math and I watched her off and on while she played with the cat, played with her ice in her drink, etc... She distracted herself so much that she went from doing the "evens" of her problems to doing the odds, which she didn't have to do, and then didn't get half of what she was supposed to do, done. She is missing 4 assignments in computer because she works very slowly and was supposed to stay after school yesterday to make up some of it. She "forgot," so needless to say, the assignments didn't get done! I think they have some makeup time on Friday, but she will definately have to stay after next Tuesday in order to keep up. She has a sheet in Science that she absolutely needed to have done or she misses out on a lot of the stuff on the next test. So, last night, we went over AGAIN, what she needed to get done. We have been over this already since Monday! This morning, I asked her if she remembered what she needed to get done. She named off what it was and got it right (and I wrote it in her agenda just in case)!!!! Way To Go!!!!!! She comes home this afternoon and I had been taking a nap. Get up and she is at the table doing her math homework from today. I looked over her Science and she had the entire thing DONE!! She didn't even have Science today, but she got it done while at school!!! Actually went to the teacher and told her she needed the makeup work! Way To Go!!!!! I told her that I was so proud of her for remembering for one, and getting it accomplished. Her little face just lit up like a Christmas tree!!! So worth it!!! That poor kid has had such a rough time of it and lacked so much in the way of praise before. Unfortunately, I told her she had to do the problems over that were the evens she missed the night before. She got right on it with no problem and tonight was done within about 20 mintues! by the way.. she is doing better in the eating department as well. She did help Uncle grill steaks tonight and she actually washed my plate and daughter's plate that were in the sink, which is NOT her responsibility to do, and put them in the dishwasher. Everyone rinses their own plates, cups, silverware, etc to put in the dishwasher.
I think I am going to start keeping a diary of whether she seems to sleep well at night, good breakfast, good day at school, getting a snack right after school, etc.. to see if any of that is affecting her as far as time goes to get her work done. Tonight, she got right on it and was done within the hour! Last night, it was about 4 hours total with small breaks for dinner, snack, drinks, etc.. and she seemed to wander a lot and be off in another world, picking at cleaning out her ear, playing with the cats, pencil, Picking her lip, etc... several times I had to remind her to get back on task.

 

[susiestar]

WOW! That was a long homework session, even with breaks! And she had no meltdowns? AWESOME!!

I think that you will find some very valuable info from the log of how she sleeps, bfast, dinner, snacks, how much homework she has and how long it took her, meltdowns, etc...

 

[timer lady]

Please consider that all of your difficult children emotional issues may be getting in the way of academics. Praise away when she is attuned to what must be done ~ dare I say it? Don't let homework issues turn into something that would interfere with your bonding; your relationship with your difficult child.

With all your difficult children issues, I presume she has an IEP & can get all the help in the world at school or at home. Both of the tweedles have qualified for a one on one tutor because their emotional/mental health have interferred with academics. I let that happen as their health, for me, was the priority. When they did have a good day or did their homework with-o complaint we celebrated.

This board auntie is proud of your difficult children homework completion. Give her a big CD board ((((hug))) from me.

 

[Alttlgabby]

WOW! That was a long homework session, even with breaks! And she had no meltdowns? AWESOME!!

I think that you will find some very valuable info from the log of how she sleeps, bfast, dinner, snacks, how much homework she has and how long it took her, meltdowns, etc...

Sometimes it takes her that long due to playing around and not doing what she is supposed to do. Sometimes it only takes her 30 mintues. One thing we never have is meltdowns. I have only seen her throw a fit one time in the entire year she is here and I was talking to her very calmly and explaining that I was not trying to be mean to her, but that she HAS to do homework. She HAS to go to school. She was sitting on the floor and threw herself back on the floor. For me.. that was GREAT because she had never showed any type of emotion like that. or too much emotion at all.

 

[Alttlgabby]

Please consider that all of your difficult children emotional issues may be getting in the way of academics. Praise away when she is attuned to what must be done ~ dare I say it? Don't let homework issues turn into something that would interfere with your bonding; your relationship with your difficult child.

With all your difficult children issues, I presume she has an IEP & can get all the help in the world at school or at home. Both of the tweedles have qualified for a one on one tutor because their emotional/mental health have interferred with academics. I let that happen as their health, for me, was the priority. When they did have a good day or did their homework with-o complaint we celebrated.

This board auntie is proud of your difficult children homework completion. Give her a big CD board ((((hug))) from me.

OH yes, I do praise her. She needs LOTS of it. God only knows that her Mom never did anything that was required to be a parent, so she definately has 100% Mom in me, and I have to say that even with all her problems, I am proud of her, and myself. Together we are working towards a much better future, and she is blossoming into a wonderful young lady.
Homework is not too much of an issue. She does it with no complaints and will come to us now for help. She wouldn't before. Would not ask any questions. And if I checked it and told her something was wrong, she would be defiant and tell us that SHE was right (math). We have pretty much passed that with me sitting down and showing her step by step where she was going wrong. Somewhere along the lines with all the moving she has done, she didn't get the concepts of "simple" math down properly. She can do algebra, but she can't do division or multiplication without a chart. Sad. So we are working on that concept and trying to show her how to do it properly. I am very proud of her though for the strides she has made since being with us.

Yes, she has an IEP. She has had one since pre kinder, I do believe.I remember signing one for her myself in either pre k, or kinder (when her father, my brother, abandoned the kids). The one thing that I WAS happy to see was that apparently SOMEONE along the line noticed that she wasn't developing properly and had her parents put her in an early intervention.

The one thing that I hate at the moment, but am also excited, is that we now have to move these girls again! We honestly thought we would be here in LV for a very long time, however, the jobs just are not opening for husband like they were supposed to. One of the guys on the AF base had put his name in specifically for a hire, but AFPC (personnel center) is just not moving. So, husband just got a job working in San Antonio that we just could not turn down. They offered him the highest salary with full benefits. The kids are all excited though to be going. We are keeping our house here in the time being due to the housing situation, so we may end up back here in the next few years.

by the way.. thanks for the hugs!

 

[TerryJ2]

That's really neat.
I have also noticed that my difficult child has "off" days. Anything the rest of us do, he has 10fold.
Definitely, keep a journal of her sleeping, eating and activities. Good idea.
So sorry about the move.

 

[Alttlgabby]

That's really neat.
I have also noticed that my difficult child has "off" days. Anything the rest of us do, he has 10fold.
Definitely, keep a journal of her sleeping, eating and activities. Good idea.
So sorry about the move.

Thanks! Yes, I do need to keep a very detailed journal to see if there is a pattern here because so far, I am not seeing it. When the psychiatric did her evaluation, the one thing that our therapist was surprised not to see on it was "depression" due to some of the signs she has. She will sleep for 15 hours if we let her. She also likes to be alone a lot and tends to be withdrawn at times, although this is getting much better!
Other than having to actually MOVE them one more time, I am not sorry about the move itself. We lived in San Antonio years ago and loved it. It is much more family geared than Las Vegas and I think the girls will love it there. Another thing is that their BM was living in NE and then had to move to AZ (only 1 hr and 20 mins from us!) to get their brother, who used to live with us (LONG story). She has not TRIED on her own to contact them since December 24th, or to come see them (thank goodness!). difficult child 2 did talk to BM about two weekends ago through her sister putting them all on speaker, and I found out, so her cell phone is gone permanently. It wasn't due to the fact that she talked to BM, but due to the fact that she lied to me about who she was talking to and it wasn't fair that she get to talk and her sister didn't! ALL calls with BM are to be on MY cell phone so that I can monitor behaviors afterwards (meltdowns, anger, etc). I hate the phone calls because BM calls and confuses them, promises them stuff she never comes through on, etc.. Before, I didn't have the right to tell her to kiss off, but now I do and I will no longer have her doing the things she was doing in the past. I haven't been too happy about the usage of the phone to begin with since it was given to her specifically to get in touch with husband and I after school since she had activities. She started giving the number out to all her friends, then to people in NE, and there were over 4100 texts on her phone this last month! Very excessive and I told her that was NOT why we gave it to her. We had texts coming in from one of BM's friends in NE who had been told by the SW already that she had no business calling without our permission! I have no idea HOW she got my phone number last year, but had called here telling the girls that they needed to call their BM and wish her a Happy Birthday. I do not want her calling my house because she is NOT a good influence at all.
Our SW is coming in the morning for us to sign our formal paperwork on the adoption since her Supervisor signed off on it this morning. So we are excited about this. I really want this to move quickly.