Don't give up

One of B's favorite new tunes is one from Thomas (the tank engine) that goes like this: "Don't give up. Show determination. Don't give up - you'll be a big sensation". It's adorable to hear him singing such big words and it's one of those songs that gets annoyingly stuck in my head. As I was humming it today, I had to laugh. It's actually the perfect theme song for life around here. We just keep throwing more and more challenges in our path and facing them with determination.

The biggest challenge right now has to do with an effort to up the "fun" factor of B's therapy time. The more fun he's having - the more he's motivated to work hard and learn. So we're restricting his favorite things to therapy time. It does seem to be increasing the value of his time spent there. The tough part is the rest of his time. Granted, he's in therapy roughly 7/8 hours a day. But that leaves a good 4-5 hours of downtime. He can't have his trains, his Ipad, his bed or his favorite shows and videos during that time. No downtime for B means no downtime for Mommy. It's tough. It feels like a constant dog and pony show trying to find something he might be interested in when it's so obvious what he actually wants. He will bring me to the TV, give me the remote and continue to gesture and push my hand toward the TV. Poor little dude. He's frustrated and I'm worn out. My only saving grace at the moment is that our pca is here practically full-time so she can share some of the "fun".

Tomorrow we start our potty training efforts. We will be checking B's diaper every 30 minutes to get an idea of his "patterns" and how often he is going. After a week, we'll assess whether he's ready to get started. I'm excited by the idea of being done with diapers - not so excited about the process of getting there. It was hard enough with our "typical" child.

The data looked good for this week though. He is talking up a storm - sometimes as many as 40/50 vocals in a session. We're about to introduce motor imitation. He has been able to imitate movements and sounds with his mouth lately which is ULTRA exciting. All the things that need to line up in order for us to really teach him to talk are starting to fall into place. It's soooo much harder than the way most kids learn and soooo much slower but it's happening. Slowly but surely. And we are not giving up.