I thought I'd update you since I've finally sort of caught up on life. About a week after we came back from Florida, I got sick. Really, really sick. As in I didn't eat anything solid for a week. I was drinking about 60 ounces of Gatorade and doing my best to keep saltines down. And, yes, it's taken me this long to get back in the swing of things.
Eli had a cough for about 3 weeks. Nothing big, so I really wasn't all that concerned...until he started complaining his throat hurt. Off to the doctor we went. He has bronchitis with a secondary infection (sinus...again). Any suggestions on how to keep sinus infections from coming back again and again?! I'm already giving him a fish oil supplement every day and taking him to the chiropractor. Not sure what else to do.
I've noticed that for about the past month (since we got back from FL) Amelia has really settled down. She's still immature (what 6 year old isn't), but it's a more "normal" immaturity if that makes sense. We've started to have some good times together and it's really encouraging. She's such a good helper, so I'm putting her to work every chance I get.
I really wish I could figure out how to make my videos smaller. I have a great video of her working on numbers. We'd been focusing on 0-15 for quite a while using flash cards. She still has a hard time identifying numbers without them being in order, but for the first time she was able to place them in the right order! I'm so proud of her! So we kept doing that for a while and now we're working on numbers 0-20. She still can't count very high, but she's getting it slowly but surely :)
We're also starting to transition them in to playing in each other's rooms. We kept them apart in the beginning because Amelia was putting small things in her mouth and because they couldn't communicate with each other. They're doing great! They have to ask to go in each other's rooms and the room "owner" has to be in the room playing with them. AND no toys in each other's rooms! That keeps a lot of arguing from happening. Slowly I'd like to give them more and more freedom with this. But I have to make sure she's safe first.
Today was my meeting with Eli's OT, PT, and speech teachers. We're determining the course of action for next year. It was both encouraging and discouraging. On the one hand, everyone said Eli is a very determined, hard working kid who is very smart. He's surpassed their expectations for this year. And they all said that considering his diagnosis, he's quite impressive. BUT he's still on the low end in his class and will probably have a hard time next year. Sigh. He's also going to receive special services to help him with his classwork since he'll require more time to complete things. I know they try to keep this from being a stigma for the kids, but it's still hard for me...I feel so bad for my kid knowing that life is always going to be that much harder for him. Everyone also said Eli has a very strong competitive side, which is good and bad. Good in that it drives him to proving he can do something, bad in that he may start getting frustrated that he can't keep up with his peers.
The teacher said Eli had an easy transition in to Montessori, and that he's with a great group of kids. There are 7 kindergartners in his class, and they all look out for each other (they're placed with 3 & 4 year old preschoolers and are their "buddy"...they help the kids follow the rules, etc).
But I'm still sad for my little man. Honestly, I don't think he even notices that he's behind his peers and getting extra help. He's such a little trooper.
Love those kids.
