Help from his Team

Last week was a rough one for Chris. Looks like the lack of sleep finally caught up with him, because he was rather grumpy at home in the evenings, and he started getting into a little trouble at school.

The first time was Monday for yelling at an adult on the way in from the bus. His teacher didn't see this, but our best guess was that it was a different person who tried to escort him in than the week before. Because she didn't see it, she opted not to discipline him, and we had a family discussion Monday night about how anyone wearing a school nametag was ok to escort him into school. But that wasn't the last.

Tuesday, we got an email. He got his first Dart. That is like a demerit, or like the checks on the blackboard we used to get in our days. He's allowed 2 darts, but if he gets a third he is supposed to go to the Principal's office. His teacher uses colors to coordinate them: 1 dart is yellow, 2 darts is orange, and 3 darts is red. He had been warned to put his book away at the end of a song, but he wasn't doing it, so he got a dart. Apparently he insists on finishing the entire story before putting it away. By the time he got home that day however, he was at level orange (or two darts). When we asked about the second one, he said he spit on a boy. I asked who this boy was, and he didn't know. This one really upset me, because when I asked him for details he said there was a boy trying to get in his line in front of him, and he didn't want him to because he had dark skin, not peach like his. Chris has never spoken like this in his life, and it upset us.
Our family had a deep discussion that night about how we Do Not judge people by the color of their skin. God loves a rainbow, that's why he gives us rainbows, and He made everybody a little different, and we cannot say we don't like someone based on their looks. I said we have to get to know someone before we can say we don't like them. On his own he decided to go up to the boy and tell him the next day, "I am sorry and I won't spit on you anymore." I haven't heard of other spitting problems since.

Wednesday, he came home with another dart. No line problems, this one was for hitting an adult in the cafeteria. A bit of background: He had a meltdown when he got home Monday about fish crackers in his lunchbox. He had a packet, and didn't finish them, and he was upset about a cracker mess when he got home. He had me write a note Tuesday, to let them know he wants the leftover crackers put in a ziplock baggie so they won't go everywhere in the lunchbox. And that worked on Tuesday, but when he came home Wednesday, there was no baggie and no crackers, and report of hitting. In addition, Chris was very upset we'd forgotten to pack his juice, so he'd had to buy milk, with no money. No doubt this whole thing bucked his system. He told me that a boy had been bugging him, so he hit him to stop. Then he hit the teacher that tried to throw his stuff away. I could see it. The boy bugging him made him lose it. And when he loses it, the arms fly. I don't blame them for giving him a dart if he lost it. I'm surprised they didn't send him to the principal. But the are threatening to sit him by himself at lunch.

That made me cry. How in tarnation is he supposed to make friends if he's isolated from all his peers?! We ask him if he has any friends, and he says no. I did get out of him that there's a nice girl that sits with him at lunch who "has light peach hair, her name has an L in it, and she rides bus 11." Well, that's good and vague, hopefully this girl is a friend. Because it saddens my heart to think otherwise.

Well, we took Thursday off. We had appointments at Riley, and free tickets to the State Fair. Dr. West was so impressed. He had been experiencing some discomfort during his flushes, I told him to make sure to tell her. And as soon as he saw her, he did. She was very attentive, and she suggested some gas-x, we had mylicon drops at home, so we went with that, that night at Chris's reminder, and it does seem to help. After that appointment, we met with his Mr. Doug, his therapist. He suggested doing some play-acting of situations. We pretended he was the boy and Chris was trying to eat his lunch. And it worked. Worked at home too. Chris told me, I would like to play with you, but I need to finish my lunch now. I pretended to bug him in line, and he said, Help Please! Another pretend time, he said, I want to play, but let's do it at Recess. I was proud.

But would it work in school. Well. Friday, he got a green smiley face from his teacher. The only complaint we got was that he didn't want to sit down on the bus, but wanted to talk to everybody. Typical. Yesterday and today he got Green smileys, and we got no notes sent home. Happy Happy Days.

In addition, yesterday we had our Team meeting. We met with his teacher, the OT, ST, audiologist, school counselor, and pyschologist. Even the principal popped in. My word, we had such a great strong team of women fighting for Chris. All of them willing to listen and learn his history. They are going to keep doing testing. But already they've implemented some great changes to help him. Since he has a bit of a weak core, and gets antsy when they do floor time, they gave him his own chair. He loves it! And they gave him a chewie, something that's ok for him to play with and chew on instead of his backpack or shirt. And not one of them had anything bad to say about Chris. They said he's fun, he likes to learn. He's doing a great job. His teacher said we were having a bit of a problem with hitting and spitting but we've had a good day today. I explained what we were working on. The counselor wants to do a small group session where they practice social situations. I love the idea. Eric pitched in to make it ethnically diverse, so we can make sure he's comfortable with all of God's rainbow.
On our way out of the school, we stopped by to observe him in action. They did math time, and sat on a rug in front of the class, Chris was up front, in a stadium chair, he pulled that blue chewie out of a ziploc baggie, and commenced to waving at us with it. He was so proud to have us there. He even got chosen to lead the counting to 100 song, that comes with hand and foot motions of course. I'll try to get the video up later. But he was AWESOME! And a young girl, CLaudia, who rides bus 11, hopped up to help him out. Oh yeah, I think he's made a friend.

And he was so excited to have us there, the last thing he told me when he got on the bus this morning was Mommy come and visit me at school again today. I told him I didn't think I could, but when I did come, and I will again, it will be a Surprise!