Tag: visit

Some days just suck

Alex had pinkeye on Sunday, the day he was going to be driven up for a visit. This marks the first time since June of 2010 (the month I moved up to live near him) that more than a week passed between visits. It was a pretty bad day. Rarely have I felt worse about my decision to put Alex in a group home than this week. Continue reading “Some days just suck”

New 4×10 schedule, and the baby

I’ve recently gotten approval at my job to work four ten-hour days rather than five eight-hour days. This allows me to visit Alex once on the weekend, and another time mid-week. It’s really nice to not have to feel like I need to get a minimum of 2-3 hours in any visit or else “waste” a week. It’s also nice not to have to feel like missing a visit is the end of the world. If we get sick or something, we can still see Alex once during the week rather than having a two-week span with him wondering where his family is. Continue reading “New 4×10 schedule, and the baby”

No videos, but a decent visit

We saw Alex this weekend for over three hours, and it was a pretty good visit overall. He had quite a few moments of rage, but none that lasted longer than a few minutes, and none that got as intense as the episodes he had before the group homes. It was nothing in comparison to two weeks ago, but that was, as I mentioned before, an incredible and very unique occurrence.

Sadly, we got no videos this time, because things were a bit too hectic. At the time, videos seemed like a big tradeoff – spend time with him or get videos of him. Unfortunately, when he’s a little bit volatile, we will always opt to just be with him instead of trying to break out the camera, catch a minute of happy, put it down when he gets made, try to grab it for another few minutes of happy, etc. Oh, well.

September updates – some amazing visits

I was hoping to make a real effort to get updates with video, but I’m finding this is a lot more pain than I expected. The amount of video we have is enormous just from the past month, so I’ve had to just throw together a quick “best of” video. But first, some general updates. Continue reading “September updates – some amazing visits”

Alex’s sibbing is still a major problem

It’s been about a year and a half since we made the decision to have Alex placed outside the home, and still he has these horrible periods of sibbing (to “sib” means to engage in self-injurious behaviors).

We took some video during a recent home visit (about a week ago) demonstrating just how much rage and anxiety Alex still has. He appears to be “stuck” in a behavior of hitting his chin into his shoulder, and even his bath time doesn’t fully calm him down. Continue reading “Alex’s sibbing is still a major problem”

Does Alex know us anymore?

As we were camping over the weekend, we visited Alex on Monday this week, and it was a pretty awful visit. Within about two hours we had to leave due to how much Alex was hurting himself. Though sad, this wasn’t terribly surprising given how Alex has been lately… until we read the report the next day and realized Alex was only unhappy around us. Continue reading “Does Alex know us anymore?”

Visitation updates for July and other fun stuff

Recently, our visits have taken a slight turn for the better. On Saturday the 2nd, Alex was driven to our home and had a pretty awful day, but on the 3rd we visited him with his cousin and grandmother, and while the visit started off pretty rocky, he ended up having a pretty good day for once. Continue reading “Visitation updates for July and other fun stuff”

Another bad day

Today was definitely a lot different than last weekend. We had to watch Alex beating himself up, bite, scream, and generally have a rough time. And every time it seemed we’d figured out what he needed to be happy, it turned out to be a short-term solution. The shower helped… for about half an hour. Food helped for a few minutes. Water helped for a few minutes.

To be fair, we got about a 50/50 mix of happy and sad today, but we ended with Alex very unhappy. Ending on a bad note means he probably continued to be unhappy after we left, and the fact that he started out so happy makes it feel as though we failed him in some way we just couldn’t manage to figure out. Continue reading “Another bad day”