3/16/10 Happy Birthday Boys!

4 years old!!! Here's hoping for a great day. Ben adn Grandma and I made a birthday cake last night. Although we made a gfcf cake, I doubt Ty will even attempt to eat it but I can always hope. He's not so fond of spongy textures for sme reason. We actually made 2 little cakes so we could sample one last night to make sure it tasted good :)

This morning, Ben reminded me just how much I love have kids and then Tyler quickly reminded me just how hard it can be. I woke Ben up this morning, climbed in bed with him and sang happy birthday, he said snuggle me mommy and pulled my face right up next to his.. so cute. Wished I would have had longer to enjoy the moment. Tyler was pretty good this morning before we left the house, not too much resistance, however, once we pulled into school, the story changed. He didn't even want to get out of the car, then he wouldn't stand on the pavement so I could shut the door, then he wouldn't walk. i finally got him into teh hallway near the class room and he wanted to ride on of the ride on roller coaster toys. I said no Tyler, it's time to go to class, well from that moment on he refused to walk. I never quite know where my responsibilities end and the parapro's begin but I definetly watn to make sure he followed through on my request to first stand then walk. It's tricky because you have to find a way to support him through the task but make sure he still does what you ask.. So we bounced.. one big bounce then I said stand (i.e. put your feet down and put weight on them instead of kicking them up). SO he would then we'd bounce. we did this to teh classroom and I handed him off and said "whew"... I was wore out. See TY started wearing me out at speech yesterday... he's very floppsy lately and very resistant to doing what he's asked. it just takes an incredible amount of energy to keep him on task and doing what you ask while keeping him and yourself safe and uninjured. THen when we got home.... things that would normally not bother him were and again takes a lot of physical energy to get him through it. One of our leapsters is broken and the other was in STeve's car. He brought me the box of games and I said Tyler it's broken and the good one is in daddy's car. I explained it to him many times and showed him the broken one which only frustrated him more, kicking screaming, flailing.... it was heartbreaking. Then again, same issue with taking care of his plate, I finally settled with me carrying him and him carrying his plate to the kitchen. Kicking screaming mad when getting pajamas on...until finally in bed. I laid him down, sang "hush little tyler" with tears running down my cheeks.. all the while thinking to myself "Melissa, pull yourself together". Been saying that a lot lately, "pull it together". I didn't want to ruin Ben's night. My mom was there to visit and we were all going to make birthday cakes and snuggle and watch a movie so I pulled it together and we had a great time, Ben is an excellent baker and somehow his whole hand ends up in the batter at teh end :)

So our meeting at school went relatively well. We are going to be getting a little bit more direct speech services for Tyler each week, not nearly as much as I'd like but it's a good start. They are also goign to start Tyler on PECS (picture exchange communication system) http://www.pecsusa.com/pecs.php hopefully this will help bridge the gap between his language comprehension and his language expression which has to be terribly frustrating. His signs have kind of fallen by the wayside over the last few months.

So tonight, I'm hoping for a good night. An intimate family affair of cake or non cake eating on Tyler's part, present opening and laughter. Wish us well, we could use a really good family night.

Happy birthday babies!