The prices have been pretty good on all the fitbits from what I have seen. I bought a HR for my Mom for Christmas before Thanksgiving at Target for $113.00 maybe the price will drop again before Christmas. I also got each of my girls a regular fit bit on Black Friday for $59. I thought it would be great to track their sleep cycles. I would definitely return it and buy the HR. I looked at the charge and now I am glad that i went with the HR.

Okay, well now I am pretty overwhelmed. A lot of this info I can't even process right now. I am so exhausted I really can't make sense of this right now. I will come back tomorrow and try again. Thanks for the advice though. What was the point of doing a folate / folic acid blood test? They also checked her Vit B12.

Thanks. They did blood work to check her folic acid levels and yes from they said you can have too much. If the number comes back high she will have to go into the ER to have an IV and it flushed. She stopped taking the meds Thursday night and she was worse today. Yes, it might be something else but when I called the advice nurse they were concerned enough to have me talk to the on call doctor who then wanted to her to go in. Perhaps just because she has had ongoing medical problems this year and to be on the safe side. Thanks for the info.

So I posted a few days ago about an appointment that we had this week where the doctor prescribed Deplin 15 for my 13 yo which as I understand it is folic acid. She is being treated for ongoing symptoms from TBI and depression from the TBI. She started taking this on Tuesday. Yesterday she laid in bed all day and said she didn't feel good. Today she woke up late and within a few minutes I could tell she felt worse then she had the day before. She is very irritable, whiny, she said her legs are numb and her head is numb. She said inside her head it feels numb and she keeps hitting her forehead. Not a great way to help a headache though. She has an upset stomach and doesn't want to eat. I was looking online and it said that a typical teen needed about 400 mcg of folic acid. The pill she is taking is 15 mg which is about 15,000 mcg. That's a big difference. I called the advice nurse and finally talked to the on call doctor. She said she should probably be on about 1mg not 15. So we headed to urgent care to get her folic acid levels checked. Just wondering if anyone has any experience with this. TIA

No worries. Now I know what to look for. Thanks for all the suggestions.

Are their flash sales only a few hours. I just went to order and now it's not on sale. :confused1:

Thank you for clearing that up. Great idea!

This is a cool idea. Would these work internationally. I am assuming he has an iphone but I don't know for sure.

Those are awesome ideas! I like the ornament idea too! I hadn't even thought about the blanket and shower shoes for the station. That's a great idea. I have no idea what he brings or needs. He does live with a room mate so cooking at home is an option but he's at work at lot since it's his first year. When I asked him what he needed, he said a "day off". lol :D So my guess is that most of his cooking is done at the station at this point. I love the idea of using things besides baskets...great suggestion. ;)

I have four nephews who are all in their early to mid-twenties and I want to give them all themed gift baskets this year for Christmas. This is the first Christmas in several years that I have been able to buy for my family. I don't want to go over board and spend a lot but I want to make them fun and useful. Here are the themes I have picked out, although I am open to other ideas. #1 is a firefighter in his first year and I guess he's really learning how to cook at the station. So I want to do a cooking/firefighter basket for him. I was thinking the center piece would be a cookbook? #2 lives in an apartment with his girlfriend and they don't have a lot of money. I was thinking of some kind of home basket with maybe a gift card to a grocery store as the main gift. What else could I include? #3 in going to Vietnam in January so I leaning towards a travel basket. No ideas there. #4 lives at home and is working and going to school. He wants to be a doctor but sometimes that changes. I was thinking of maybe just a movie type basket with a gift card to the movies so he can have a fun night out of the house. Any ideas on things I can include to make these baskets fun and practical but not expensive! Thanks :D

Thank you. Her bloodwork has been fine. I do think she needs some Vit d though. I guess this is some headache regiment that a headache specialist recommended but I think I would want to see him before I started the same regiment.

So we saw another doctor today for follow up on my dds TBI. This time we saw a psychiatrist. I have been really reluctant to go this route but the medication just hasn't consistently worked to treat the depression/anxiety that has come on since the accident. Her doctor has been urging me to do this as he wanted someone who knew more about these types of meds overseeing her. I should have listened. She actually had some good advice. When I was going over the list of medications she had been on, I mentioned Wellbutrin and she immediately said that was not the right med for her. I thought that was interesting since the month she was on it, she had the worst month ever! That helped build my trust a bit. Anyways, she wants her to start taking deplin with her current medication. From what i can tell this is a prescription for folic acid. She also suggested Zomig for migraines and a list of daily supplements that she called brain vitamins. I wanted to get some advice before I put in an order. She is recommending a daily regiment of Feverfew Herb Butterbur CoQ10 (200-300 mg) Vit B2 (200-250 mg) and Omega 3 Gems by Carlton (she was specific about that brand) She also recommended Vitacost.com Overall the appointment was good. She is not pushing to get me out of the room to talk to her and as of right now we will meet together and we don't go back for a month. She also recommended a headache specialist who happens to be at the same Neurology clinic that we are headed to in January to go over the changes in the MRI. As always, TIA! :)

Up until a few years ago we waited until after the 17th of December because or dds birthday. I always thought it was better to wait so that she felt like she had a birthday before we started Christmas. She told me a few years ago that she likes the tree up on her birthday and that she shes her birthday as part of Christmas so we started putting it up on Black Friday. I was always bummed that I couldn't go shopping so we started the tradition of decorating that day which helped me focus on what really mattered and not that I didn't have money. This year we put it up on Thanksgiving day. That was a first and earlier then we have ever done. We happened to be home this year and it was a quiet day and the girls asked while dinner was cooking if they could put it up. So we did. But, i will say that we had been out shopping on that Tuesday where we bought a new tree and some new ornaments so the box was in the living room waiting as opposed to me having to bring it out from the closet as we normally would. I do think that made a difference in how early we did it but we will see. I kind of like the idea that maybe after they leave home and are home for Thanksgiving that they help decorate the tree before they leave. So maybe that will be our new tradition. :D I am one of those that wants it gone after Christmas though. I think a few times it has made it until New Years Eve but not many.

We have a snowflake which tilts to the right. Before this year we had always had a star. That tilted too which also is why we upgraded to the snowflake. I swear one of these days it's going to fall on top of cat since they insist on being part of the tree too. :laugh: Maybe I need to find myself a mike to put on top. I bet he would sit up straight. :laugh:

No she doesn't. History of ulcers, asthma and some sprained ankles have been it. This was out of blue in October. But now it has happened twice so I am guessing this is going to be a weak spot now. Not good for a singer and stage performer. :scared: Or maybe that's why she has this. idk Your journey sounds similar to the one I am having with my TBI kid though. It's exhausting. I am glad you are getting some answers.

We like to shred our chicken and use it for tacos, burritos or enchiladas. I usually just put a few chicken breast in with a can of chicken broth, a package of taco seasoning and a package of ranch dressing and let it cook for about 6-8 hours. Shred it just before it's done so the juice can soak into all the pieces and then put it into whatever you want to make. We usually do this and keep it in the frig and use it for lunches too for quick tacos. Sometimes we will do the bbq too but shred it and eat it on buns with some fries and a salad.

So hubby took her in and she just called. They are sending her to a TMJ specialist. He (the doc) said he could hear the bone scraping when she opened her mouth. More rest, a soft food diet and Motrin. He said it was definitely inflamed. And of course tonight is Choir. This is my kid that is not suppose to have things like Motrin due to a history of ulcers. :confused1:

I have looked everywhere for a hot water bottle. When I ask at the store, they don't even know what I am talking about. Where do you get one?

So around the end of October my dd went to a Halloween party and her job was basically to scream for a haunted house thing that her teen group organized. Later that night she complained that her jaw hurt. I figured she just over did it and it would feel better within a day or two. Later the next week she was still complaining of pain so I chopped it up to wisdom teeth coming in. I knew she hadn't been hit or anything so I wasn't thinking serious jaw injury. i finally was able to get her into the dentist and they said that it was not her wisdom teeth but that she had dislocated her jaw. She could barely even open her mouth. :huh: She is also involved in a choir and maybe the repeated singing and screaming she did in October contributed to this? Since it was a new dentist I decided to take her in to our medical doctor and he said the same thing. Dislocated jaw and she needed to rest from all activities that week (singing and improv). She did that and slowly throughout the week it started to feel better. This weekend she was trying to stretch her bottom lip above the top lip :laugh: Not even sure why but apparently her sister was doing it too. Lol. Now, the other side of her jaw feels the same way as it did on the opposite side and you can actually feel the ball joint moving and it sort of sticks out, or at least it seems like it. She has an appointment today again to get it checked. I had no idea this was going to be something that could keep happening. She had a choir performance last night and could barely sing and it hurt during dinner as well. Is she dislocating her jaw or is this TMJ or are they the same thing? With choir and improv she is constantly talking, laughing, singing and this is really interfering with her activities. What can we do to prevent this, besides not doing silly lip maneuvers with her sister. :laugh:

She just finished all the school testing. I have posting in the learning challenges board mostly regarding that. She had neuropsych testing, academic testing and OT and PT evaluations. It took over a month to complete it all and it had to be really spaced out but she did complete it all. I posted the results on that board if you were curious at all. Your right about the reading, it will get worked on slowly through out so no need to focus on that. She is overall very nervous about school but overall her testing was pretty good, except for the areas mentioned above.

Thank you. That was very helpful. Reading is also hard because she has visual tracking issues. I do like the idea of reading old books though because your right, it's the short term memory that is lost with TBI. She is doing cognitive behavioral therapy (since June) and is starting PT next week. I am working on OT. It is needed with all the visual red flags that came back on her OT assessment. I hadn't thought about speech therapy for helping with memory. During the IEP they asked me if I wanted speech therapy. I will have to go back and ask about that.

The school is giving her a chrome book, we pick up tomorrow. It is suppose to have text to speech and speech to text software on it and in her IEP is states the use of audio books so I thought there was going to be program on there to use as well. I was hoping it was audible. I should find out tomorrow. I am thinking a kindle would be a good investment.

Thank you. I forgot to say we did MUS before Saxon and we stopped about half way through Fractions. I have found she needs more of a spiral math program versus just the one topic although I did like MUS. I am not sure she needs a whole book of division but that is kind of the program she needs. I really wish they offered a book that offered more topics. She also used Learn Math Fast for a time period but wasn't really making a lot of progress there either. Ugh...thank you for mentioning it though. I appreciate it. Also, I don't think BF history of the horse will work as LA. :huh:

I really have to finalize my list today so I can get things ordered. Does anyone have any recommendations?

My 13 yo dd who is in 8th grade and suffered a TBI last December has been off of school for 7 months now. We just got an IEP written for her and we are starting school slowly. At this point she has been released to do 7.5 hours of work a week. Even though she did school from December through May when she was taken completely off, she wasn't making much progress. Although it's a shortened week we still need to touch on all the subjects. History and Science are going to project based with probably movies as the core ingredient. Testing showed significant weakness in most visual categories, sensory motor integration and also executive functioning. She will have a text to speech and speech to text program as well as can utilize audio books. I really need help figuring out math and some LA. Except for Math and maybe reading, everything needs to be at grade level or within 2 years. Math - prior to the injury we were using Saxon 7/6 which was going very slowly. We then switched over to the Key to series and she was working through the fractions books. That was going well with the help of a tutor. She really needs to go back to around long division and do a lot of review before I think she will be ready to jump back into the Key series. I really like the Key to series in that they were not visually overwhelming and the books were broken down into small books. I don't know how long she will need before we can jump back into fractions but she really has lost of lot of confidence too, especially with math. I was leaning towards Miquon first since I thought it might help to be able to use the c-rods with her but I don't want to "baby" her either and there isn't much review in those books from what I understand. I also considered RS, probably around level D or E, thinking more E if I went with the program but then it's expensive and I am not sure the use of manipulatives would serve her long-term. I want to challenge her but not overwhelm her. Special ed suggested if there were 20 problems on a page, just have her do about 5 at a time. LA - I am pretty sure I have a plan for grammar, vocab and spelling but writing and reading I'm just not sure yet. Someone suggested Write source as an option. She needs more frequent small pieces at this point. Reading comp she tested very low, in the 2nd grade. Reading was something she loved to do before the accident. Now it gives her a headache and visual tracking is very difficult so I want something that maybe could help her improve but I'm having a hard time finding things that are age appropriate but still meet her needs. I am not sure I need a separate curriculum for this or if I can just incorporate from other subjects. I had looked at Beautiful Feet, History of the Horse as an LA curriculum but I am not sure it counts as LA. Since it says 3-6th grade, I think I could use it for her. It has literature books with it but I would have to either read them to her or get them as audio books. I really like the idea of the immersion reading that the kindle has too. But, currently we don't own a kindle. It requires writing in small chunks and I could always add more writing as she needs more. Anyone have an experience with Winston Grammar? Thanks in advance! :)