Over the past few months Tucker’s blog has been so neglected…we have had so much going on, and no time to process any of it.
The summer is very busy for Chris and me both at work. We also try to fit in many appointments over the summer so that Tucker doesn’t miss too much school. Then in early June Chris sprained his ankle (badly) and added to the dr appointment/medicine/daily needs list around here….and we were really reminded that caring for Tucker is a two-person job! This pregnancy has been hard on me (everyone keeps praying for September to come so that they can say they’re ready for it to be over, haha), so I have not been nearly as useful as I like to be. We take care of Tucker in certain ways, and we have just been unable to do that lately.
Tucker had a very hard time transitioning from school to the summer time….bringing back behaviors that have been gone for over a year since he started ABA therapy. Weird behaviors like chewing on his shirts until they’re full of holes, stereo typical autism behaviors like playing with poop (thank God that one ended quickly!). Dangerous behaviors, like escaping from the house and walking down the road, long enough to be picked up by one of Chris’s friends….enough to make this mommy cry her eyes out for days. He developed a bald spot from pulling on his hair from anxiety…luckily we think it’s growing back.
Tucker has 35 hours of ABA therapy per week, and his team this summer has been amazing. With my pregnant brain and my hectic work schedule, I haven’t had to worry about them missing any shifts or neglecting anything. His feeding is getting much better, he is learning all of his letters, and they take him all over town for rewards, like playing in the McDonald’s play land and going to the mall. He can now wait for 8 minutes….which is such a big deal I can’t even explain that. Chris and I can barely wait on things we want for eight minutes ;)
I don’t have much leave time off of work…well, I do have a lot of time, the issue is that I use it up very quickly with Tucker. There are dr appointments, procedures, IEP meetings and conferences at school, then the regular events that all parents want to attend like field trips, etc. Of course this spring I used a lot of sick time for OB appointments, time off for asthma and morning sickness, etc. so we have been rationing out my remaining leave time over this summer so that I’ll have a few paid weeks off when the baby arrives. This means that Chris and his brother Andrew took Tucker to Houston for a 24 hour EEG while I stayed home to work. This was back in June, and I was a nervous wreck. I was so upset when I realized that the tech had to restrain Tucker physically to get all of the leads on his head….I never would have allowed that….ever. Chris said Tucker wasn’t acting up, the guy just came in and said they restrain all the kids, so then Tucker started crying and didn’t stop for pretty much the whole 24 hours. He and Chris were miserable. Tucker is usually so interested in the medical procedures, well during that hospital stay he cried every time he saw scrubs. The following week Mom, Gina, Jene’e and I took him back to Houston for a sleep study. He started crying when he saw the guy come in to attach his leads, but luckily this tech was amazing and Tucker just needed me to hold his hand to sit still.
Mom, Gina, and Jene’e had an adventure around Houston after 9pm trying to find food for the starving pregnant lady ;) It was scary, to say the least, but I was so grateful they were there. Tucker has also seen the eye dr, pediatrician, surgeon, immunologist, and dentist. We missed seeing the mito specialist in June because she was on maternity leave.
Despite all of the craziness this summer, Tucker has had a lot of fun as well. Chris and I took Tucker to Kentucky in early May to visit my family. We had been promising Tucker that we’d take him to KY for months and months, but it never seemed to work out for us. So we decided that early May was good for both of our jobs, and I was about 18 weeks pregnant, so not too sick anymore, but not too big or worried about blood pressure yet to stay home. Tucker had so much fun! And so did Chris and I, Chris even went to the KY Derby with my uncle and cousin. We made the 12 hour drive in 13 hours with stops on the way, then took more time on the way home. Tucker was so good in the car, we hope Easton likes the car as much as Tucker does!
We started the summer out by celebrating Tucker’s 6th birthday in Lake Charles. This is pre-sprained ankle, haha, so Chris and Tucker had a blast playing in the water park with Morgan, Grace, and Molli. Tucker is the odd one out being the only boy, so he played dolls with Molli and Grace and then got upset when we wouldn’t let him take a bath with the girls! On the way home we brought Tucker and Molli to Chik Fil A to play on the playground, they were so happy.
At the beginning of the summer we spent a good bit of time at Susan and Joey’s swimming in their pool. Tucker loved that, but as the summer went on I got more tired and Chris couldn’t really swim or climb into the pool with his ankle. Matthew and John Michael came down from Kentucky and spent a week with the family, so that was a lot of fun. There were BBQs, trips to the movies and pool, and of course video game times. Tucker is so funny with the boys, he sits right in the middle of them and acts like he belongs with teenagers.
During our trip to Houston, we finally brought Gina and Jene’e to the Galleria mall (it’s not really called that anymore, but we still call it that). They shopped while Tucker made another Build a Bear and then played in the huge kiddie play area. I had to drag him away because it was time for lunch and another surprise-the double decker carousel. He got to ride it once before lunch, and then once again after lunch. He was so happy.
We signed Tucker up for one week of summer day camp. It was at a Baton Rouge park, and the first day I brought him he cried for an hour. He knew the playground was outside, but he couldn’t go outside because it was inside time….so he cried and cried. By the second day he was up at 5am asking to “go to summer camp.” On Tuesday they took the kids to the movies, on Wed they spent the day at the camp, then Thursday they went to the water park, and on Friday they were back at the camp. Tucker’s therapists went with him each day, the other campers were jealous of his “girlfriends.” We didn’t sign him up for more time at camp because it was a very long drive from our house. I just learned of two other camps that are closer to our home and meant for special needs kids, so next summer he’ll probably go to the nearby camps for several weeks.
Sissy and Pops treated the 3 of us to a weekend in Biloxi at the end of July. It was very nice to get away, and the weekend was full of Tucker’s favorite things-staying in a hotel room, swimming in a pool, and playing on playgrounds. We even took him for a short trip to Wal Mart (I drink 5-6 bottles of water per day, and I ran out), where he got a big bag of Cheetos. We also took him to two different arcades where he “rode” the motorcycle games. He really just pretended to ride them, he also used all of Chris’s quarters in the claw machine trying to win a stuffed animal. I hope he doesn’t expect every hotel we stay in from now on to have all of that fun stuff!
As of today, I am 33 weeks 3 days pregnant. This is over 6 weeks more pregnant than I have ever been. This is fantastic and amazing….it is also surreal. I am such a first-time pregnant lady, asking my OB so many questions, wondering about delivery, bottles, breast feeding, etc. Things that moms with one kid should already know. I had never heard of getting asthma during pregnancy (which I have) or carpal tunnel syndrome (which I also have) or all kinds of other odd maladies. I have heard of the hormones and crying, I think Chris just avoids me now because he is scared he will say something that will make me cry ;) We went to an ultra sound at 30 weeks 5 days, and Easton weighed 3 pounds 14 ounces…Chris and I were in complete shock….I said “no wonder why my back hurts! There is a real baby in there!” hahaha, Tucker never had a chance to get that big and cause all of this craziness…so by now Easton should be well over 4 pounds, that is just insane to me.
Tucker knows all about Baby Easton….well he thinks he does! He can’t wait to change his diaper….over and over again, so we better stock up now. You ask him “what do you do with a baby?” “how do you make a baby stop crying?” “what are we going to do when Easton is born?” and the only thing he answers is “change his diaper.” He practices putting the baby doll to sleep, just to “wake” him up a few minutes later to fake change him. We are going to have to lock Easton in his room so that Tucker can’t go in there to bother him.
Tucker starts Kindergarten next week. He will spend about 60% of his time in the special needs classroom, and about 40% of his time in the typical KG class. We will see how this all works out, Tucker has been wanting to go back to school ever since his last day of PreK, but of course KG is a whole new world, so hopefully he loves it too.
