No advice but I wanted to tell you how sorry I am that you are having to deal with all the brushing. We thought once that my oldest daughter had them. The school claimed they found one on her. I had no clue what to do so I went straight to our pediatrician (my oldest is disabled so I was hoping he would have some advice). He couldn't find any on her and was baffled as to why the school thought she had them, but he suggested doing the treatment anyway. I believe they also sell a spray you can use on pillows and such. I keep a spare can in my first aid cabinet just in case. Good luck with it all. I'm sending prayers of patience for you!

Honestly, I've always wondered if genetics plays a part in whether teeth are prone to decay or not. Everyone in our family has horrible teeth (my original family, not my husband/kids,etc). My mom, dad, brother and sister fight to keep their teeth. I've elected to let some of mine go and hope to get partials this year. I remember as a kid, I would have 6+ cavities every visit. Just in case it's not genetics though, I stay on top of my kids dental care. My husband teases me about it, but I don't want my kids to go through what I've been through. I tell them that when they leave my home they will possess two valuable things - a college education with no student loans and a perfect and healthy set of teeth. (And honestly, I'm not sure which will cost more). My oldest daughter has autism, so I brush and floss her teeth 2x daily. She can't spit so I wipe on a fluoride rinse with gauze. She has had one cavity in her life, thank goodness. Other than her two dental visits a year, I usually try to squeeze in an extra one (which insurance won't cover) just to make sure things are going well. My middle daughter has had a few on her back teeth, so I double check those. However, Celiac Disease can cause dental problems so I don't stress over them, we just work hard to keep them to a minimum. My youngest has had no cavities. I know if you have reflux, it can cause damage to back teeth as well. I limit soda and forbid Mt. Dew completely. :tongue_smilie:

I feel much better. I went to the store last night for bulky non-perishable items. I filled up an entire cart with soda, bottled water, toilet paper, dog food, ziploc bags/aluminum foil and cleaning supplies (dish detergent, dishwasher detergent, laundry detergent and misc cleaners). I forgot to mention that we have a second house on our property that my husband uses for a "man cave" :lol: . So, we have to stock it with stuff as well. (And honestly, the bulk of the sodas goes to his place and I also stock it with paper plates and plastic-ware since he isn't the best at washing dishes). Plus, his friends come over every other week for a 'guys day' (which I don't mind since he's still on our property and available if I need him, plus his friends do our yard work) and I usually stock some snacks and a big lunch for them. I'm looking forward to shopping today since I think my only bulk item will be rice milk and some large cans of pre-cooked beans, corn, tomatoes for 40 quarts of soup I'm cooking tomorrow.

I'm curious if he gets lots of colds or asthma type symptoms?

My oldest had dental work under anesthesia recently (due to her autism). I wanted to mention that while she is out, they can do other things so if she needs sealants, do that. If she needs more x-rays, do that. Once she is out, they can do a lot of treatments. I know it's hard but I am sure she'll be fine. The hardest part will be the "nothing to eat or drink after midnight". Oh, and after my daughter woke up from anesthesia, she was very, very dizzy. Be prepared to carry her (so no extra stuff to carry if you can help it) unless they wheel her out in a wheelchair or wagon. And the car ride home might make her throw up.

Poison control is super nice. We have called them before when our oldest swallowed miscellaneous things (and once she put sudafed in her mouth). They can tell you whether you may need to go to the hospital or whether the amount possibly ingested wouldn't be a problem. Truly, they are really nice.

My MIL is terrified of being seen as "old". So, the girls call her by her first name.

I don't have a child who eats constantly but I wanted to mention that there is a medical condition where children do not have the brain impulses necessary to tell them they are full. If I were you, I would keep a food diary for a week and ask your pediatrician if it is normal. If it is, well, start saving for when he's a teen-ager and the appetite increases! :D

I have no advice, but you seem to be very sensitive about the subject so I wanted to send you lots of :grouphug::grouphug::grouphug: .

I agree with the above (especially bolded). I also wanted to mention that while I would want to know, if a friend of mine had provided advice to my child...I would originally be mad/hurt but would also be grateful that my daughter went to someone sensible for advice. I've never minded when my kids confided things to their teachers or guidance counselors because I'm secure enough in my position as their mother to know that nobody will ever take my place. I've always encouraged my children to come talk to me but also told them that if they feel they cannot talk to me, to please find a trusted adult (teacher/guidance counselor/family member/church adult). In my opinion, it's more important that my child receive good and sensible advice rather than my need to know.

:grouphug: I hope you post an update. All the best to you and yours.

I'm going to try doing two trips this week (we live 15 miles from the nearest store and an hour to the nearest Publix/health food store). I'm going today after a dentist appointment and pick up pet food, toilet paper, bottled water, soda (we use a 12 pk a week), and cleaning supplies. Tomorrow I'm going to "the city" and buy my meat, dairy and veggies. That should solve things. (Plus I'm going to a specialty health food store for some gluten free things). It might be that bulk items are what is causing me grief. My daughter with autism only drinks rice milk (although she is starting to drink flavored water occasionally) and we use 1/2 gallon every two days, plus regular milk for the girls (and cream for DH and cooking). Plus, I'm bulk cooking some soup (he has friends over every other Sunday) and need to buy the ingredients to make about 40 quarts of it. Really we don't eat many processed foods (other than gluten free mixes) so it amazes me at how quickly the cart fills up with dairy, meat, veggies and dried beans.

I feel so weird. I can never get all of my groceries in one trip through the store. I try stacking as carefully as I can, but I either make two trips or go to two different stores. I've noticed other families with half full carts cheerfully making their way to the front of the store although they may go more than once a week. Currently, i make one large trip on the week-end and then towards the end of the week, I usually have to run back for milk or some other odd or end. (Don't get me started on the cost). I do have a weird shopping list - we try to eat all gluten free due to dd's Celiac. My oldest has autism which means that she sometimes won't eat what the rest of us are eating and she's starting to eat a lot. (I blame being an almost teen-ager. My husband is aghast sometimes at how much she can eat - almost as much as he does). My husband takes salads to work (and he likes a varied salad so I buy lots of veggies). I would love to hear stories of others who have towering carts or someone in tow with a second cart at the store.

Thank you all SO much. I've copied down everything here and will be trying one out a week until I find some good ones. It's reassuring to know that pork has actually changed over the years. I'm going to first try switching the type of pork chops I buy and then dabble in brining for the thin ones I get from a typical store. I'm really excited now. :)

I would just drop it. If she said she wouldn't charge for it, I would take her at her word unless you are billed for it. Then I would remind her about what she had said. If she's as professional as you say, I'm sure she will honor her word. If you feel uncomfortable about it all, go by (or call) and thank her for her understanding why you were unhappy about the x-rays. You can offer to pay at that time if you want.

My biggest concern would be STD's and pregnancy. I think if the teen is taking care of prevention, then I wouldn't tell the mother. If it were me, I would want to know that my daughter was having sex. I wouldn't like it, but I would want to make sure that she was seeing a gynecologist and taking care of her body. I would never betray where I heard it from since I would want that line of communication to remain open. It's a tough situation. :grouphug:

I do an absolutely horrible job cooking pork chops. They are usually overcooked and/or tough. I'd love some recipes for cooking a great pork chop in the oven (I prefer oven over stove) and different ways to cook them. My family prefers bone-free pork chops. I typically cook gluten free, but I can alter most recipes. I just need inspiration! (And how to prevent them being touch so oven temp and time please). Thank you!

We had the roomba and loved it. My oldest (with autism) was going through a particularly difficult time where she dumped her plate on the floor when she finished eating. Even worse, she would pick through a bag of potato chips, eat the ones she wanted and throw the rest on the floor. We had carpeting at the time. We sent the roomba through once or twice a day. It would break up the chips and vacuum them up. (Disclaimer - typically, I wouldn't suggest breaking up chips over carpet, but I was exhausted at the time). Ours worked great for over a year before it began having problems (breaking brushes, etc). If you buy a roomba, buy up extra parts when you do. We ended up getting rid of ours when we moved. Of course, we then moved again to a place with carpets. I'm probably buying another roomba soon, simply for convenience. I loved ours. If you have lots of pets, you will probably have to clean the brushes weekly, but that's not hard. I sat down and took the bottom of it off, cleaned everything and put it back together. I think you'd enjoy it for carpets. I can't speak as to other floor surfaces.

I think my oldest has Hand, Foot and Mouth. :( She had oral surgery today to remove three teeth and needed anesthesia due to her autism. While they were putting in the IV, I noticed a weird hard blister on the palm of her hand. I made a mental note to check it out later. She has about four on her left hand, two on her right hand and three on each foot. She also has a rash on her elbow and knees. Additionally, she has an awful rash spreading above her lip (I had thought it was just dry and irritated earlier). Two questions: Is she at any risk for having any type of complication because of having surgery today? She is taking antibiotics (and lortab). Any idea for what to put on the rash spot above her lip. It looks painful. Because it's so close to her mouth, I want to be careful. Thanks :) (She's non-verbal so I can't ask her if it's painful, etc).

I agree with the above. :) Is there a reason why she can't do it herself? (Other than the obvious that she hasn't been doing it. ;) )

I'm thinking about changing our cover school. When we pulled dd out over Christmas break, I needed someone who could help us and fast. We used our local cover school because I knew the director of it through various organizations. Our local cover school operates as only a cover, no activities or social groups. The cover group I want to switch to is one that my friend uses. They have a number of activities for all grade levels and have a building for labs, library, etc. They do teach some classes if interested (chemistry, biology, calculus, etc) for high school kids. There are other differences, but my main one is to put the girls in a situation where they will meet other homeschool kids. Is that something that is commonly done or am I committing a violation of homeschool etiquette (for lack of a better word)?

It's not hanging at all. She apparently continued pulling it and it ripped down the side of her toe/toenail. (That's the part that is bleeding). The bed of the nail isn't bleeding, thank goodness. I went to the store and picked up epsom salts and some open toe shoes for her to wear for a bit. She is having teeth pulled on Wednesday (under anesthesia) and will have both antibiotics and pain meds starting then. So, maybe that will help. If it looks weird tomorrow morning, I may run her to our local doctor (rather than her podiatrist) to see if she needs any type of ointment other than the neosporin. Any other suggestions, I am ALL ears. :)

My oldest daughter has torn her big toe toenail. It's ripped about 1/3 into the bed of her nail and down the side of her nail. The side of her nail is slightly bleeding. It looks very painful. I managed to clean it once with peroxide although she wasn't happy about that. I put neosporin on it and then made a loose bandage with gauze and medical paper tape. After about an hour, I went to change the bandage since it was still bleeding a bit. I tried to clean it with peroxide again and it bubbled up quite a bit, but she started crying and screaming a bit, so I stopped. (This is my autistic daughter - she has a high pain tolerance but cleaning the toe is bothering her a good deal). I blotted off the peroxide and put more neosporin on and bandaged up again. Left alone, she seems fine. I am very worried about infection. She typically won't keep bandages on and we're all checking on her every five to ten minutes to make sure it's staying on. I gave her some ibuprofen to help with any pain. Any suggestions on how to keep this clean without hurting her? I have a dental appointment tomorrow to have a cracked tooth cut out. I really don't want to cancel that appointment. I might be able to shift it to Tuesday or take her to a doctor on Tuesday. I'll have to wait until tomorrow to start calling doctors. She is almost asleep so i'm hoping the rest of the night goes fine. (She goes to bed early). She has torn a toenail before but it didn't seem to bother her at all. This one seems to bother her when we mess with it. (I think she ripped this one off herself - she has done that before when she was upset).

Many years ago, my brother (who was in his 20's at the time) became ill and was diagnosed with a nasty case of flu. It lasted weeks. He never seemed to really recover as he continued to have stomach cramps/vomiting/diarrhea and significant weight loss. Honestly, he was so ill (and had dropped to 85 pounds) we thought he was going to die. It turns out that the flu triggered Crohn's Disease. Once he was seen by a gastro and diagnosed (and this did involve surgery by that point) he improved and is doing just fine. I have heard that both Celiac Disease and Crohn's Disease can be dormant (for lack of a better word) and triggered by illness or stress. Has he seen a G/I doc?

For reading, we started with Edmark and basically taught word to picture. As we went through Edmark, sometimes we had to branch off and teach a word in greater depth. I liked Edmark because it would teach that a horse was still a horse whether it was large/small, blue/yellow, one or many. Towards the end of Edmark, I had a friend of mine (who is a SLP) help me create a way of teaching her sentences. We taught that some words are just 'joining' type words (a, an, the, this, that, etc). And we implemented an arrow -> in teaching. We started out by teaching a word (such as 'bird'). Then we put sentences together such as 'The bird' 'A bird' 'That bird'. We used both pictures and words. If we used a picture, she was expected to hand us the word 'bird'. If we used the word, we expected her to hand us the picture of it. We wrote words on the back of index cards (we went through hundreds of index cards). We started adding descriptive words (This is a blue bird) or (There are two birds). When we finished with Edmark (and our own sentence type program), we moved onto Reading Milestones. We're halfway through with the first one and plan to continue onto the second set of books. She takes AR tests where we read the book to her but she answers the questions by reading them herself and touching or typing the number to the answer. Because she's non-verbal the only way we can make sure that she is reading is for her to read things on her own and answer questions. We're fairly sure she is reading higher than a 1st grade level but right now 1st grade is the only thing we can accurately test with her.