The issue is that due to budgets, they’re limiting actual activities in the community and prefer to do life skills in the home. They want a parent present whenever a worker is in the home, which makes total sense to me that they don’t want a service provider in a residence alone with a child. But I can’t always be here the whole time.

My oldest, DS12, was recently approved for services after years of waiting. It’s great, but the truth is I needed these services desperately when he was ages 6-8 and not so much now, but I won’t give them up either in case we do need them at some point. I’m not great at logistics, and the agency that is providing respite/skillbuilding/community hab is newer to my area. I actually worked as a service provider in the same capacity years ago, and maybe that’s where my frustration is coming from. Their policy is that an parent must be home during services, except respite, and they limit community outings due to budgetary constraints. So okay, except he was approved for 12 hours a week of community hab and 6 hours of respite. They’re very much all or nothing, or I’d have refused respite. Here’s the issue: services are provided after school between the hours of 3:30(when he gets home from school) to 6:30 and Saturdays. Saturdays I said no because those are family days here and I am protective of family time. But I have two other children who are in gymnastics and dance, and my other son has private therapies after school. Essentially: one of my younger children have something every day during the week between 4-6pm. My husband and I work opposite 24 hour shifts during the week, so there isn’t always a parent to stay with him DS12 and his workers and a parent to take the other children to their activities. I don’t have a grandparent available to stay or help commute during those specific times. There is no one for the younger two kids to carpool with. DS12 is fine home alone for two or three hours at a time and usually he’d stay home while whichever sibling has gymnastics or dance and then we come home and make dinner and then have family time/game night/movie night. My plan was that he’d get his community hab hours during the afternoons post school but before our dinner and family routine, but that isn’t looking like it will work out if a parent has to be here. When I did this job, it was 2005ish and we probably had a lot better funding. I always had the kids out in the community. They want to do three hours a day, four days a week. And are being very pushy. Is this normal? Am I just way off base with my expectations? I don’t know enough about how things are run now.

Our first house closing was terrible. The house was held in an estate but there were 22 owners that had to sign—the elderly previous owner had left it to ALL of her nieces and nephews and not just an executor or something. All 22 of them were on the Legal documents as co-owners of the house. One lived in the boonies of Canada and had trouble finding a notary, one nephew they had to hire a private investigator to find. The one cousin that was handling the whole thing was so annoyed. The house sold for $75,000 so each cousin only got a few hundred after everything. Our realtor had never seen anything like it. Fortunately we were able to continually extend our apartment lease because it was three months after our initial closing that we were actually able to close and take possession. I’m glad everything worked out!

IIRC, that particular county in NY has a large population of Hasidic Jews who do not vaccinate, and that is what drives up their unvaccinated numbers. In NY, any child who attends public school has to be fully vaccinated, with only very rare medical exemptions possible. So vaccination rates in our state are pretty high except for specific religious enclaves such as the Amish in the Fingerlakes region or Hasidic Jews down in Rockwell county and surrounding areas. I am not very concerned about the spread of polio outside of there because vax rates everywhere else are pretty high. And they have all the information and there has been public information campaigns to those specific religious groups on the importance of childhood vaccines but I do not think it will change.

I know it’s blasphemy but I gave up on my instant pot. I have four crockpots though. I need to throw food in something in the morning and have it ready in the afternoon. The IP just didn’t really work for anything but quick mashed potatoes for me.

DH was born with a very large VSD too. They wound up correcting it earlier than expected when he developed congestive heart failure and cardiomyopathy. Other than a funky looking EKG, he’s had no complications. Except for the zipper scar and other scars, you wouldn’t either know. I hope she gets better quickly with no complications!!

https://www.abeka.com/AbekaDifference.aspx I always thought her name was short for Rebekah, but maybe it was just Beka.

No. I bathed my babies when they needed it. Some days that was none, some days it was five times. my now 12 year old hated the bath and water and the whole thing literally from birth, so that probably set the precedent. At three days old we bathed him and he screamed for an hour even after the bath. I was so worried somehow the water was too hot despite feeling lukewarm to me. Turns out the child has significant sensory issues. He likes the swimming pool now but we have to demand baths or showers and it’s still a struggle sensory wise for him. My 10 year old only bathes when necessary but she doesn’t fight about it. My 7 year old would live in the bathtub if we’d let him. If he’s particularly difficult or upset, I usually give him a bubble bath. It seems to regulate his sensory system and give him a mental reset.

TGATB is a world away from Beautiful Feef lol. I know people who use it and love it. We still haven’t decided on schooling for my rising second grader so I’ve been doing some more research. I know people love it, but I have some qualms. I’m glad you had a good day!

Autism is so often genetic. The neuropsych who diagnosed my son, in the conference with me and my husband, said that for every child he diagnosed he finds an undiagnosed adult in their family, most often a parent. Obviously this was an exaggeration, but I knew which side DS got it from and pursued my own evaluation after that. Knowing I am on the spectrum helped so much. I went decades thinking there was something wrong with me only to find out there isn’t. I just have a neurological difference. All that to say—is there a possibility your husband is on the spectrum? Sometimes it’s hard to see the same traits in our children that we remember having growing up, yet now the world is putting a label on those traits.

Thank you! I think you’re right!

We probably aren’t great at theory of mind and don’t really grasp that other people’s minds work differently. signed, someone who was diagnosed by a neuropsych in my late 30s.

They’ve already rented the condos right on N. Myrtle. DH and I don’t mind driving a bit to get away for a couple afternoons/evenings though. This sounds amazing! I’ve never heard of it. Off to google….

It’s easier to be the victim instead of owning a series of bad choices, I suspect.

Good news: My in-laws gifted us a condo for a 10 day trip to north Myrtle Beach next week. Bad news: They rented a three bedroom condo for themselves so they could bring my parents along(my parents and DH’s parents are staying in one condo together). Two of my sisters, as well as DH’s sister and her husband, are also coming. They all get along and will share another three bedroom unit. To be clear, we are close to everyone and thankful my parents and in laws are friends. Both sets of my grandparents didn’t get along and things were awkward. However, my mom talks all the time and overshares to an embarrassing point. Strangers do not need to hear about your food allergies and how you’ve given up your life to take care of your elderly parents. Nobody cares, but she doesn’t realize that. She wasn’t always like that, but I think for the last five or six years my grandparents needed so much care that she’s stopped socializing and lost social skills. Fortunately for all my FIL loves to talk and listen and they have a great time together. My MIL and dad don’t like to talk and so they also have a great time sitting in silence reading books. But I’m going to go crazy. We’re going to have to get out of the condo complex some. DH hates crowds(unless it’s a country music concert) and everything touristy. I like museums and historical sites. We’ll have at least one date night because all the grandparents have joyously claimed the kids for at least one night. Where can we go? Where can we escape to that’s quiet and peaceful? Google is only turning up super touristy things. (To be clear, we are very grateful for both the trip and that our families like each other so much. We just like very quiet and non touristy things. We usually camp at a secluded campsite or rent a house on a quiet lake.)

Yes. I was reading somewhere(or maybe it was a TikTok) where someone said that many people are jerks but true narcissism is rare. If you ask my sister, every man she has dated or married is an abusive narcissist. I dated a lot before i got married at 27, and I can truthfully say not one was abusive or narcissistic. One or two might have been jerks. I think the overuse(and I feel the same way about adults diagnosing themselves with autism based on a google search and teenagers diagnosing themselves with DID because it’s all the rage on tiktok) greatly diminishes the pain and difficulties that people who have true narcissists as parents or spouses go through.

Does the local hospital have urology and is capable of breaking it up? Our hospital doesn’t have either so anyone who needs it that urgently is transferred someplace else, but right now no place locally has beds available for transfers. If it isn’t 100% urgent things are getting scheduled for outpatient procedures.

My mom used it with my youngest siblings and loved it, but that was ten years ago lol.

I’m willing and ready to go. We ride at dawn. Yesterday I had a million things to do but offered to go in and work with my husband in the morning as long as I could leave by 2. I left at 8 pm but not until after I hit the building with an ambulance. First time in 15 years I’ve hit anything with an emergency vehicle. Then I came home(DH was working overnight) and DS12 was having a complete meltdown over something, which hasn’t happened in a year. He went to swing and I discovered DS7 had found and dropped some ancient eggs in the refrigerator while I was dealing with DS12 And now I had rotten eggs smashed on my kitchen floor. Then at 7 this morning as I was getting ready for work, DH texted me and said he was in the ER with what he assumed was a kidney stone and he’d need a ride home when he was discharged because of all the narcotics. I got all 3 kids to their summer program, called my boss who promptly gave me the day off, and went to the ER. He got discharged a few hours later, I drove him home, did some things, then went to pick up the prescription the ER called in, only to discover that it wasn’t filled despite being two hours since it was called in. They were breaking for lunch but told me it would be refilled afterward, which would mean I could not get the 45 minutes away in time to pick up younger children from day camp(I called SIL who got them). Then our renters called and something was wrong at the rental house so I went there. Then I went to the bank only to discover I had left the check I needed to deposit home. Now DH is dead asleep on narcotics and I have to go to work. My oldest promises the house will still be standing when I get home tomorrow. All of this to say: I can be packed and ready to go by 8:30 tomorrow morning.

My great great grandmother was not even 5 foot and from the pictures weighed about 100 pounds. she birthed 11 children, and two sets of twins.

I remember her post when she first found the lump. She was one of my favorite posters. I am praying for her and her family.

You’d need to check with your facility. A lot don’t allow LifeAlerts, because those are designed to contact emergency services and they don’t want it calling 911. Ask if they have a fall prevention program and the specifics. Also ask what their policy is for falls. Do they pick people up off the floor(some of my local facilities do not)? Do they automatically send anyone who is on blood thinners or may have hit their head to the hospital? Do they contact the next of kin whenever a fall happens? Do they have in house X-ray and providers or do they send people out to the ER for that? it varies so wildly from facility to facility. But falls are so frequent that they should be able to quickly spout off their policies.

I still have a few more to send; I ran out of stamps lol. Those are going out today. I’m glad everyone is enjoying them lol. Even though I wound up having to write two sets of cards last December, I’m glad it can give a little bit of joy No matter the month.

I’d also be interested in the parents of children with mental illness group.

I did have a child who insisted he wanted to be a Dinosaur Unicorn for Halloween the year he was 3. It took me forever to figure out he was thinking of a triceratops.