We're only 2 weeks in but so far, the new schedule and routine is feeling a lot more feasible. My parent hours were reduced from 10 hours per week to 5 and boy is that a weight lifted. B has the same number of hours but they are spread out differently. He used to have 3 days in a row of 10 hours of therapy. Now, he only has Wednesdays that are that long and is done at 3:30 on Mondays and Fridays and even has a nap time built in for Tuesdays (which so far he hasn't taken advantage of). I think both he and I are feeling much less worn out.
The biggest change though has been in big brother. He has adjusted to this new way of life for us. It's pretty remarkable. He now carries on a lot of the time as if they aren't even here. The other day, our senior therapist was working on her computer at our kitchen table for a couple of hours. He played right there with his cars and all his crazy imaginative dialogue and never really required attention from either of us. This is the boy I know. He has always had an amazingly long attention span and pretty killer independent play skills. And it kind of went out the window when we started therapy. It was too much for him to handle all of that attention getting lavished on B without demanding the same. It was understandable and I tried really hard to play with him as much as possible. It was beyond exhausting. Don't get me wrong - I do really love and treasure our play time together. But unfortunately, I am an adult and I do have other responsibilities and things to do. And now I can. At least some of the time.
Our PCA is here regularly - probably something like 20-25 hours a week too. Hubby and I have a regular "date night" and I even have a couple of hours to myself to run my errands or do things I need/want to do. Tomorrow, I am meeting a friend for coffee. I don't remember the last time I've done that.
I still find myself wolfing down a sandwich in the car with no other time to eat or facing SIX loads of laundry. And I'm still really, really tired a lot of the time. But all in all, it's much more manageable. It's nothing remotely close to normal - it never will be - but I think I am starting to see how we might get used to it.
Quick therapy update: B is still doing great. We really didn't see any regression or major adjustment after his holiday "break". I'm pretty surprised. Pretty relieved. Pretty proud. We've introduced a couple of new programs: sorting and receptive 2d labels. He picked up the sorting immediately and didn't waste time putting things in a pile 1 by one. He does it by the handful. The receptive label programs involve showing him several pictures or objects and naming 1 and he has to pick that up and hand it to the therapist. This is a biggie. His lack of receptive language was my biggest autism red flag. He didn't seem to understand anything we said. But he's doing fabulously with this. I know he couldn't have done it a few months ago. I can see a major difference in that area. He now knows what I mean when I say things like "go", "lunch time", etc.
And he has become a complete Ipad addict. He has figured out the touch screen pretty well and can navigate it on his own to some degree. Right now, it is pretty much a personal youtube delivery system for all of the videos of Thomas, Elmo etc. that he so loves. But I can see huge potential for this in his future. What a different world these kids are growing up in.
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