Sunday, October 31, 2010

It's been a while!

Well, lots going on, but since Naomi killed my old computer by spitting water on the keyboard back in July I just can't get back to all those old things that were once in the favorites and so easily accessed! Plus, I'm hopelessly addicted to Facebook and Farmville!
I'm doing fine, lots of times it feels like I'm just putting little fires out all over the place!
Naomi has been off Zonegran, the med we tried starting in January 1010, since July. Once again we only saw improvement coming off the drug. More vocal, just more "there" and interactive. She is slowly making progress. There are tiny things she does that seem monumental. She has been doing itinerant services for the last two years and this year we've incorporated it into the classroom setting a bit. So once a week she goes to preschool for 1 1/2 hours. She sees PT first then her itinerant teacher takes her in a classroom and she's with her for an hour. Also during that time she is seen by OT and Speech in the classroom. She loves being in the class with kids. My only concern is it messes with her naps, which are always changing! She only sleeps about 1/2 hour to an hour but she needs that. So that's the only reason I'm hesitant to send her more. We tried to get a chair for her and it was too expensive but then I saw an almost identical one for her that our insurance should cover made by Rifton so we're still waiting to hear about that. It's getting the company that orders then to push it through that's the hold up I think. She still gets therapy once a week at the local pediatric therapy place she's went for over 2 years now. She loves riding the bike during PT.
Isaiah struggled at the beginning of 6th grade. He was doing his work but it wasn't making it to the right place so he was getting 0's and late assignments. I didn't know the school has to do an evaluation on your child for a learning disability if you request it. I called the school and left a voice mail for the principal on a Friday morning and when I hadn't heard anything back on Monday afternoon I went and mailed a certified letter requesting testing, and got a call on Tuesday. I took Isaiah to Cleveland Clinic for a hearing evaluation and it's fine. I've also been talking to a professor at a local university who teaches LD teachers about the neurology of learning. Isaiah shows a lot of signs of Central Auditory Processing Disorder. Basically his ears hears fine but his brain doesn't process what he hears correctly. He's also a very visual learner and has poor auditory memory. So that's hurting him a lot. There may be some attention issues too. But I'm getting everything checked I can before I take him to the pediatric developmental neurologist in December. We went to Kent State University to the Pathology and Audiology department to have his tested for the CAPD but I won't know the results until next month when we go back for 2 more shorter tests. It's just frustrating. He's a very bright kid, but doesn't learn like the schools teach. He's still getting B's and C's, and that's after the rough start so we'll see what the next 9 weeks bring.
My Dad is still kicking and he retired October 30 after working at the same place close to 40 years. He is a Vietnam veteran and the VA has given him full disability because his cancer may be connected to the use of agent orange exposure while in Vietnam. The cancer is still there. Still stage 4, but it's not doing anything. He says he feels good. My mom went in to have a swollen part of her thyroid taken out to be biopsied and it ended up that the swollen part was fine but there was a smaller area next to it they hadn't detected and it shows positive for papillary cancer. Which is a good one to have. One dose of radioactive iodine should take care of it. With little to no side effects.
My kitchen is finished! Bill worked hard this summer and got that done. Now, as expected, little things here and there are happening. Small roof leaf, new gutter it just seems like you fix one thing and something else happens! Friday I called the gas company because once in a while we smell natural gas. The meter is out front and when I went out to get the mail I smelled it pretty strong. So I called and they came right out. It was an underground leak so they had a crew come out Friday late and fix that and put a new meter in. Well then they detected a small leak in the house. Told me to get a plumber in and call a 1-800 number and they'd come out Saturday to fix it. So I got a plumber in here on SATURDAY, you know that cost extra! I hated to have Naomi in here with no heat or hot water. So he fixed what they said leaked then we called to have them come back out. They said they may not be here til Monday and I was LIVID. Someone did end up coming back out but the thing is, you need the plumber and the gas company here at the same time incase there is a leak and he can tighten it up. Well, there was still a leak, but they couldn't find where it was. They sprayed all the joints and nothing. So they wouldn't turn the gas back on. The plumber came back out and we just had him redo everything he hadn't done already. So he was here about 8 hours total yesterday. He put a gauge on the meter and it should tell if there is a leak. Then I'll call back the gas company and get them back. Though now they will charge me $60 for coming. It's just seemed to snowball. It's cold in the house but no hot water is the worse!
Well, I guess I better save this. It's been a long time and this is about all I can think of to update :)