Wondering what other shoes can drop now

[Babbs]

My difficult child has been coping fairly well with school not starting yet due to a teacher's strike. However he is showing signs of stress - we had an hour meltdown on Friday morning but he was able to turn it around when the neighbors came over for the day (I agreed to watch them for the day due to the strike). difficult child did a good job dealing with his frustration when the neighbors wanted to play something different than what he wanted.

But there's other cracks showing up now that difficult child's been home from summer visitation with his father for three weeks - the honeymoon's definitely over! Had a three hour meltdown on Saturday evening over being told to pick up the toys on his bedroom floor, which escalated into him throwing objects at me and SO while we ate dinner (he was in timeout on the other side of the room) and resulted in breakage of glassware and candles. We had to restrain him for over 45 minutes to calm him down after that point. SO and I talked about doing a stop the world on him, but opted to confiscate difficult child's 5 most favorite toy collections (one for each time he threw items at us, e.g. Bakugon, Pokemon, Thomas the Tank engine). difficult child is going to have to pay to replace what was broken, so he won't have allowance for quite some time now. And SO and I had to pick up items in difficult child's room in order to find the 5 categories of toys to confiscate, after I cleaned up all the broken glass.

One issue that arouse while difficult child was being restrained was he started screaming that his father had taught him karate moves and he knew where to hit us to hurt us. And he tried to kick me in the belly (last thing I need being over 7 months pregnant) to prove his point. Today, after we've had some time to calm down and process from a distance difficult child did acknowledge that his father started teaching him some moves but didn't go into why and when you use karate. <sigh> Just freakin' great. Not only does ex fill difficult child's head that difficult child doesn't have AD/HD and doesn't need medications, now he's teaching an anxious and at times physically aggressive kid how to hurt someone without teaching the more important parts of the philosophy.

And today, finally got a chance to go through Saturday's mail and state academic test scores are in. difficult child, who has a non verbal IQ of 127 and a verbal IQ of 117 managed to fail his state reading exams. And passed math with only 7 points to spare. But his school insists that he doesn't require any specially designed instruction to provide FAPE. <sigh> In what universe is it okay for a kid with an above average to superior IQ to fail state standards? Wasn't planning on taking on the fight with difficult child's school regarding Special Education services this year (too much stress with the pregnancy and then newborn) but with these results I may have to do that battle this fall instead of next school year.

Anyone have super Calgon that can take me away for a while? Dang all I want tonight to chill out is chocolate and red wine, two things I can't have right now...

 

[Wiped Out]

Babbs,
Sorry things are so hard with difficult child right now. I sure understand your need for chocolate and wine. A hot bath might be a good substitute. Is there any way for you to get some time away? I do worry about difficult child trying to kick you. I sure hope that teacher strike is over soon. Gentle hugs.

 

[LittleDudesMom]

Babbs,

we certainly understand your frustration!

Hopefully the school will get the point that intelligence has nothing to do with learning disabilities and will offer your son the supports he needs to be successful.

Sharon

 

[susiestar]

I would also be beyond frustrated. I remember being 7 months preg and having 4yo Wiz try to do a power ranger kick to my belly. He was little enough that I grabbed his leg and dumped him on his tushie. I just reacted, it was not planned out. But he did not try to kick me again during a pregnancy.

Your difficult child is 12, not 4. If he is not in martial arts lessons now, get him into them if possible. Go and talk to some of the schools around town. Find one where the sensei insists on fighting being the LAST resort. It can be very helpful, esp as he has already shown he knows enough to hurt you or the baby.

Try to find some respite now. And if you msut take on the schools, call the state board of ed and get an advocate. They are free and they make sd's take notice.

 

[Babbs]

Susiestar-

My difficult child is 9 years old. I've approached him in the past about martial arts and he hasn't expressed an interest before now. I actually met my ex in a karate class and have taken both Shotokon Karate as well as American Freestyle Karate for years. Yesterday we discussed how it should be used for self defense only and what the consequences would be if he tried using the few things he knows at school. difficult child expressed interest in learning how to use the martial arts techniques for controlling himself and helping manage his temper - I really do think that when he has these explosive episodes it scares him as much as it scares us. Right now it's more of a money issue - on strike means no paycheck coming in I'll try to get difficult child connected to one of the classes through parks and rec before I enroll him at a dojo - most of the dojos around here require a year's commitment!

Unfortunately in my state the dept of ed doesn't provide advocates for parents. There's a free parents group who helps advocate but the waiting list is long and unfortunately I knew significantly more about the law and his rights than the last two people I spoke with through them. Part of my dilema (sp?) with the school district is that I'm an employee - and I work in special education. I managed to push an evaluation past the Special Education team at his school last year and got difficult child qualified for Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) for artic and pragmatic language. But his IQ on the WISQ had a 26 point spread (which invalidates it according to his psychologist) and the school psychologist used the invalid IQ for the discrepancy measure compared with his academics (which also had huge spreads) which ended up disqualifying him for special education services. Grr... I had asked for a non-verbal IQ and was denied by the school psychologist and had gone all the way up to the Special Education director and got bounced back to the school building and told to request a re-evaluation which the school psychologist denied to do. The school psychologist I think has felt that I was challenging her professionally and even stated to difficult child's outside psychologist that she felt he was being "over pathologized". It's frustrating to work in special education and understand how the tests work and what the numbers mean and know that there's three other pscyhologists in the same district that would have qualified him for services with the exact same test scores. I was in the process of asking for an IEE when I discovered I was pregnant. Because of how heavyhanded this district is towards its employees, my SO and I were prepared to be taken to due process after requesting the IEE, but with the family changes we had to step back and not push it at that time. So now I'm kind of stuck trying to figure out do I add on more stress once school starts or do I make it take a back seat? difficult child seems to be dealing with the idea of a new baby in the household, but actually living with the changes may certainly well be a different ball of wax.

My SO keeps suggesting that we just take difficult child off his medications and let him crash and burn at school but I have a really hard time with that - we've come so far and I just feel that pushing failure like that would just set difficult child back with his self esteem and his social skills.


On an upbeat funny thing happened note, today I took him to the picket line ( I have done so for the past week) and one of the other teachers brought her 9 month old daughter with her. difficult child was entranced, trying to get the baby to talk and interact with him. difficult child took one of his toys and was telling the baby "see how his tail wiggles back and forth, just like a sperm or a tadpole." He had all of us laughing and I had to explain to him why although what he said was factual, he may not want to use sperm as an example in future!

 

[susiestar]

Can you change the school he attends? Is there some reason you can use to finagle a transfer to a school the other tdocs work in and then get a re evaluation?

I am sorry your district is not good. It must be tough for you. Have you considered moving?

 

[Babbs]

Susiestar-

part of our problem is that difficult child went to 5 schools in 5 years from starting preschool at age 2 until 2nd grade - between moving from VA to Alaska, between the Alaska school district changing placement due to boundary changes over the summer, and due to moves post separation and divorce and trying to find a permanent job for me. difficult child's therapist has basically begged SO and myself to please please please not move difficult child again until a natural transition (like to a middle school at 5th grade or junior high at 6th grade). Moving because of the baby arriving has been big on difficult child's mind and we agreed to stay in the same apartment complex (moving from a 2 bedroom to a 3 bedroom) - difficult child often brings this agreement up when he's talking to people about the baby (e.g. "my mommy's having a baby but we're going to stay in the same place!") so I know that moving to an unfamiliar school will be additional trauma ontop of the changes in the family.

I'd love to change schools but I'm afraid of what that would do at this point.

 

[Babbs]

Another two shoes just dropped-

Our hamster just died



And I got a call from difficult child's only friend's mother that his friend just told him that she will be going to a different school starting tomorrow so difficult child will be back to having no friends at school at all.


How much more does this kid have to handle?