My Lizzie Lizzie Lil Bits

[Lafnalot]

Lizz has been with her father for two days now. She has had therapy on weekends, which were all that was available at that time, so she hasnt seen him in a few weeks. I was glad for the break for her (I wont lie, I was also glad for the break from her. I love her but she is a high maintenance kid). He is even doing the work I sent with her by her side.

We had a break through in math which was an absolute delight and hand clapping time. (I dunno if I should be posting this in this arena or in the aspergers arena, or in the arena for me as the adult with bipolar because it all is so intertwined. I will leave it up to the mods to decide if it belongs somewhere else-lol.)

The joy of homeschooling is the ability to literally go at the speed of the child. She is whipping through language arts (give her a formula to follow and she aces stuff) but was struggling with the math section we were on (Roman numerals, Mayan Numerals etc...other counting systems) and was just melting down everytime we went through it. She began to work on self control with her behavioural therapist and I watched her start to get upset with the lesson she was working on, put it away, come back to it later, put it away, come back , etc etc. I gave her a sheet with the notes she had hand written that i put in typed form for her...her eyes lit up while working on it this time (again, give her a formula) and she aced every question in that area. She was overjoyed, wanting high fives at each correct answer.

She also voiced and named emotions other than anger recently. She was lent a game card from her older sister which broke and she fet responsible for it breaking. Instead of coming out crying and yelling and being angry, she was crying and saying how badly she felt for Sammie, how she felt responsible and wanted to get it replaced for her. She spoke of how she felt Sammie would feel having lost all her saved games ( new thing, empathy)This is NEW for Lizz, I was just in awe and let her talk only adding small statements to keep her flow of words coming.

Then a day or so later, she got her feelings hurt by a friend. Instead, again, of being angry and simply throwing a tantrum, we talked about feeling HURT and how she wanted her friend to know she had hurt her.

These are ground breaking things for Lizz. She is able to begin to empathize, name not only her Emotions (!!!)but what she feels someone else may be feeling!! Evrything is not labeled "anger".

Remember when your child first took a step without your hands holding them? Or when they began to talk, no matter how behind or ahead of other kids they were? This was the feeling I have had the pleasure of feeling watching her begin to explore the abstract area of the world and relationships with people.

Tuesday we go see her doctor. There has been some screw up with her insurance all the month of November so I havent been able to get her blood work done. Part of me is feeling like I should have known to get her lab work done those two weeks of October she had it, but my brain logically knows, who would have known? Not to mention between all her therapys (at least three or four appointments a week) and my own something was going to slip through the cracks. Having her out of the school system has helped immensly with her anxiety. She mentioned to me the other day "Ive seen no dead people since that one day in school!" So I don't know if Dr M will want to medicate her as she has made so much progress since then.

We shall see