My daughter is allergic to wheat and rye, and has been gluten free for too long to be tested for celiac due to the allergies. When she's had wheat she has diarhea and purple bags under her eyes. She looks pale and sick for a week or two. The diarhea lasts a day or so, the loose stools are always with us. I'm pretty sure she has other allergies we can't find or something, b/c we can't get her stools to be normal. She also was very sickly b4 we identified the allergies. And she had sensory issues, didn't speak much, but I think that is because she felt so ill all the time. Her immune system is much better now, and she won't ever stop talking, LOL. This is two years later...

I am trying to figure this out myself. We need a whiteboard and I am trying to decide whether to alter the dining room so that it is now a school area, or use the upstairs playroom. We have an open floor plan, but only one child. The thing I worry about is that she might be distracted by the TV. Not that we have it on, but if I was teaching her would she stare at the TV and long for Dora instead? I just wonder if it would be easier to keep my daughter in a disciplined, working frame of mind if she has a specific work area. But I'm hesitant about the playroom for the same reasons as the OP. Advice from veterans welcome!:confused:

bump...

OK, so this is how it would go at our house. Grace: Mommy, what if we lose all our money? Me: Don't worry Grace, we'll be OK. Grace: Mommy, will we ever have to live in our car? Me: Don't worry Grace, we're not going to have to live in our car (to myself: they'd take it b/c it's not paid for, LOL) Grace: Mommy, is Daddy going to leave us? Me: Don't worry Grace, Daddy's not going to leave us. Grace that night: Mommy, I had a bad dream that Daddy was gone. The next day at Target in hearing shot of everyone: Mommy, you can't buy too much or we might get homeless. There's no way for me to explain that around here. I'm still too scared to tell her what divorce is... And this might just be my particular daughter. She can't even watch Disney movies!

Do you think the cursive could be used for a kindergartener? My daughter also has fine motor issues and I have read that cursive is actually easier for them to learn because of the way the letters flow, and that it can help with dyslexia. I have only found two programs that specifically address cursive for K'ers. (Cursive First and Peterson). I did not like Cursive First. Peterson looks good but I'd like to be able to pick from a couple of good programs.

It's a phonics and reading program. I think it might cover handwriting as well... Haven't used it but I did look into it.

I checked into SSL after reading some of these posts- do you need the teacher's guide? It's 23 dollars if you don't purchase the teacher's guide, but 67 with the guide. It is worth the extra money?

:iagree:

We adopted two dogs from shelters. The first dog was a lab mix and the shelter workers swore up and down that he was fine, just hyper, and that he was a young dog. Our vet told us he was much older than we were told, and put him on anti-anxiety meds for aggressive anxiety. He ended up living his last days as a basement/outdoor dog b/c he bit and we were afraid to have him around our daughter. But I think he got better treatment from us than he would have from anyone else, so we did a good deed I guess... The second dog we got from a different shelter, run by an older woman who knew the dogs personally b/c they lived on her farm, and we described our needs well. We ended up with the sweetest, most loveable hound/beagle mix that is the best dog EVER. We love this dog like she is one of our children. So, in essence, go to a reputable shelter. And be wary of people that say things like "just high energy" or any other word that might seem like a code. Overall, I vote for beagles/beagle mixes. They come in different sizes. Ours is a beagle/hound (looks like a typical hunting dog) and we hear they have been bred over the years by hunters to have very people friendly personalities. They're smart, cuddly, and can be dressed in doll clothes if your children so desire. They aren't a "security guard" but they're a very good alarm if anyone is near your home. However, they bark and then they lick the strangers hand, KWIM? So it depends on what you want...

:rofl:

I am hypoglycemic, since childhood, and I tend to gravitate toward sugary foods due to that tendency toward sugar addiction. I have always thought that beans were good for me b/c of the fiber and protein content. Are beans not good? That could explain why I like them so much, LOL.

We get a lot of our gluten free stuff there for DD (crackers, cookies, cereals). She's allergic to wheat and gluten free is much cheaper from them...

:iagree: I wish I could send you a nice, calm bath or something over the internet, because you need and deserve one! My daughter has sensory problems and she used to be the same way. Her behavior got much more violent when I tried to "lay down the law" and make her do time outs after hearing from so many family members that we were just bad parents, LOL. Once we started her in OT therapy, with an OT who also happened to know a lot about parenting a child with sensory problems, things got much better. We found that time outs just didn't work for her, and we completely stopped them for a while. Now, a year later, she can do them, but then she couldn't handle it. We did try to stay very calm, and keep our rights to respect at the same time. We might have to put her in her room if she was hitting and say "we can't let you hurt us but when you are able to be safe with us we are right here and love you, etc." One thing I wondered after reading your post is whether the worst behaviors occur during times of transition. That is when my daughter was the absolute WORST. Getting her in the car made me question whether I should put her in day care, because I started thinking anyone in the world would be able to get their kid to get in the car, right? It must just be me? But I have heard from MANY parents of kids with sensory issues that they have those same thoughts from time to time. I agree with the other poster that positive reinforcement, like sticker charts, work very well. My daughter has a sticker chart for one behavior at a time. I believe her first chart was geared toward knowing when to take a break when she was angry. Once she got stickers for speaking in sentences, then saying hello to friends, etc. We had to stop the saying "hello" chart because she was unable to achieve that goal. She has such problems with transitions that trying to get her to say hello is overwhelming to her. But now we're all the way to "please and thank you" and it really has helped a great deal. We'll go back to Hello when we think she is ready. I also agree that Raising Your Spirited Child is an excellent book and the pages are well worn at my house. Do you think your daughter might do well with a strict routine so that transitions might be easier for her? Or maybe a twenty minute count down? (warnings at 5 minute intervals) I have a chart of the week with pictures of the people she will being seeing each day, and at night before bed I review what will happen the next day. Oh, and there were many times I just put my daughter in the car and got her shoes on her when we arrived, or brushed her hair while she was strapped in and couldn't fight me, LOL. As far as parenting advice those are the only things I can come up with... It sounds like you are doing everything possible already. But kids with these sensory issues often feel overwhelmed and out of control, so they seek control over many situations. If your daughter got a sense that violence and defiance gives her some control, she will probably try to use that as much as she can- my daughter did. And I really don't know how we got her to stop, I can only remember the completely overwhelmed feeling that I had just trying to deal with it. So I definitely feel for you and wish you didn't have to go through it. :grouphug: If you do find something that works for you don't worry about what other people say about it. We got all kinds of flack from our family when we stopped doing time outs, but that is what she needed and it worked for us. You might find something that works for you and seems to help. Follow your instincts and your love for your child. Remember that you are the parent she was meant to have, and she is yours for a reason. Many parents couldn't do what you do, and do with love... She is lucky to have you.

Last year we had to have our dog's teeth cleaned and it cost over a thousand dollars. BUT- she was in surgery for 4 hours, and had to have multiple teeth removed due to infection and rot. We had adopted her and always commented on how horrible her breath smelled. We didn't realize it smelled because it was infected. We felt horrible for not getting her care earlier. They had told us that she needed her teeth cleaned, and we thought it was silly to clean a dog's teeth until they showed us where the infections were... If we had done it earlier she would not have lost so many teeth. All in all, I think the vets took great care of our dog and were reasonable with their prices. After all, there were two vets in there for four hours trying to save her teeth. I got a filling at the dentist the other day and it was 350 dollars for about 15 minutes of work with NO anesthesia AT ALL. I have a friend who is studying to be a vet- they don't make a ton of money. Basically they can pay off their loans and live an OK life without a ton of extras. I think most vets are in it because they love animals, not money.

How do you structure your homeschooling day? I am preparing to start my daughter's kindergarten year next fall (I'm trying to think ahead). Many of her friends are going to public school. Right now she is in preschool due to some developmental delays that the school system thinks will be corrected if she is in a preschool setting. I have some doubts regarding the benefit of this but she enjoys it so we'll let it be for now. So my question is this: For an only child, what does a typical homeschool day look like? Do you work in the morning and find activities in the afternoon? Are there some days your child does not play with any other children at all? Is that OK? I'm trying to think of how many activities to put on our plate. As an only child I assume she will need more since she has no siblings to interact with at home. But every day? Twice a week? Three times? I have another idea that perhaps we could watch a friend's daughter in the afternoons after school, but I am not sure I want to commit to that in our first year of home schooling. Any advice?:confused:

We have 2600 for 3 people and we are downsizing as soon as the market improves. Cleaning a house this size is a HUGE undertaking. It takes a day for each floor, and I still don't feel like things are clean enough. But we only have one child, and don't expect any more, so it seems like there are all these bedrooms just sitting there. For a family of three, who do not entertain, this is a glaringly large space.

Thanks so much! That is good advice!

what age do you start your children? this is one of the big questions i am struggling with right now... my main concern right now is as you said, pick her curriculums and study them prior to teaching them. i got WRTR but it seems overwhelming so far, and not very fun. so the search continued and i am between SWR and SSRW. then my plan was to start her when she turns five in march, or that summer when it gets too hot for fun outside.

So it sounds like I might be able to do a combination of both? I have the WRTR book, but haven't read all the way through it yet. Do you think I could use the WRTR book to add in what SSRW doesn't cover? Another question: My daughter is 4.5 and knows all the letter sounds. She asks me how to spell words all the time so that she can write letters to people, but she can't read the words she writes. Should I start her on a program now or wait until she is five? I really am thinking I should start her on math, because she's counting and adding/subtracting already, but I am not sure if I should begin reading yet and risk overwhelming her. If she senses possible failure she becomes avoidant. She's VERY hard on herself. That's why I worry that SWR might be too hard on her, whereas SSRW would be more nonthreatening... Thank you so much for your responses. I know I can always find answers here!

I am having trouble choosing between these two programs. I like SSRW because my daughter needs to have fun in order to cooperate. However, SWR seems very complete. If I chose SSRW would I lose some of the rigorousness offered in SWR? Is SWR boring? I want a very thorough phonics program- are these on the same level? Which do you like better and why? Thanks for any advice!

Your son sounds a lot like my daughter. She is 4 also and bright, but has a slower processing time, especially for auditory information. She also did not speak in public for a long time. She is in speech therapy and OT now for sensory and receptive language problems, and looking back I think she was very anxious because she couldn't process all the signals coming into her body. Most people talked TOO fast for her. Way too fast. Imagine hearing a foriegn language that you barely understand, and having people look at you as if you should understand and asking you questions. It would make you anxious too. When the speech therapist told me to slow down my speech to an almost silly low speed, my relationship with my daughter changed almost overnight. And as she relaxed, her processing speed improved as well in conjunction with therapy. It will always be slower, and she would be very troubled in a classroom environment with all the noise, but her social skills have improved a great deal since she started being able to understand the world around her better. It seems very simple, but a slow auditory processing time combined with sensory issues can mimic autism, and we have very often heard people wonder if she has autism, as well as people who said there is no way she has autism. We're still unclear on that, but she has improved in her relationships with peers. She makes one on one friendships well, but even in a small group she cannot keep up because she can't hear. Well, she can "hear" but she can't "process" under the strain of several voices, and more activity going on. And it does SEEM as if she is uninterested in the other children, but once there's less noise and she can handle it she shows interest again. She also has fascination with certain sensory experiences, not so much snow but she'll play with playdough, finger paint and water in her fingers for long periods. She sometimes will draw the same picture over and over. But it's not all the time. I am not sure, I don't even know if my daughter might be high functioning autistic or aspergers rather than auditory processing disordered, but if she is high functioning I am not sure that label would give us any more information about how she functions than we have now. She is allergic to wheat, and when we challenged her on it last year she looked full fledged autistic without a doubt. When we took her back off of it she improved. But if we had taken her in for testing that month she would have had the dx for sure. Because so many of these disorders look so similar you probably have a lot of reading to do! Try looking at "When The Brain Can't Hear" and "Like Sound Through Water." They talk about auditory problems. Also, as an experiment, try slowing down your speech to almost comically slow for a few days, with a sing song sort of tone. See if he understands you better. I warn you that this will feel REALLY strange at first, and embarrassing to do in front of other people, but if it helpful you will know it very soon and it will be worth it. But in any case, know that you are not alone out there. There are a lot of us who have kids that don't "fit" into a box or a label. It can seem a scary no-man's land. I wish I had a box for my child. A manual or a picture of her brain that said "this is it." There isn't one. But I swear that sensory processing disorders and autism are part of a bigger picture. Like the 4A disorders the other person was talking about. Our knowledge has only hit the beginning of this puzzle. I keep searching for my daughter's box, a label that will tell me what to do to help her, but I've found that I'm just wading through it as best I can and hoping things work out for the best.

I am now on my way out to buy that book! I've read The Challenging Child, Positive Discipline, How to Talk So Your Kids Will Listen, From Difficult to Delightful in 30 Days (Do not recommend unless you want to read a litany of whining about how ADHD is NOT REAL and is really just a parental problem), etc., etc. From what you say it sounds like Explosive Child is more than just a pep talk or a lecture, so I am in! Thanks for the tip!

I just saw someone posting about MEP Math and they put up a link to the FREE math curriculum. I was wondering if anyone has tried this, has opinions, or knows anything about it. I looked in the first practice book and it looks very similar to my daughter's Singapore early bird. Just wondering if it's a viable program that might be a good choice. I really want my daughter to have a good math program b/c her dad's an engineer and she seems to have his mathematical mind. I'm overwhelmed with all the choices but I'd love to use something free if it was a good program... Thanks!

My 4 year old daughter is in speech therapy and OT for sensory processing, auditory processing problems and problems with "perspective taking"/socially delayed. She's about to graduate out of OT because her self regulation is very much improved. She'll continue speech. She has some rigidity issues still, but they seem kind of permanent and they are not overwhelming. We are just so glad to see her smiling and talking to us- it's a very wonderful thing to have a happy child. I have an odd question though. Do any of you have kids who make the same picture over and over? She did rainbows for months, then hummingbirds for a while, and now she is back to rainbows but she has added a pot of gold and a "gold man." She is drawing the same thing again and again. Sometimes she draws other things, but she'll get into a rut and go back to rainbows for days. It kind of bothers me to see it go on and on. Is this normal? In so many ways she seems like she is making great progress. I don't think she is rigid enough for an Asperger's DX. And I am not sure what that DX would do to help anyway. She does have a desire for friendships, she is just clueless as to how to go about it. She can make friends one on one, but in preschool I see her just follow kids around while they seem to try to avoid her. Anyway, I don't want to go to the OT and SP with every little question, so I thought maybe some of the mom's on the board would have some insight into the picture concern that I have... I also have a ton of curriculum questions but I am scrolling through the old posts and finding a lot of answers. This is a great forum that seems to have a lot of knowledgeable members. I am so glad I found it.