Lizze's parents have once again come through to give us a desperately needed break.  This time they have taken Emmett for the night. The trick is to get him to actually stay the night.  He usually calls asking if he can come home and we of course tell him he can always come home. Having said that,  we really need Emmett to stay the night.  He is a huge source of stress right now,  not only for Lizze and I but for Elliott and Gavin as well.  Emmett is in a very weird place right now and is very aggressive and has become quite the little bully,  especially towards Elliott. I love Emmett to death and actually miss him while he's away,  but he needs a break as much as…

The Lost and Tired family van was stolen right in front of me and my 3 boys on the Autism Spectrum.  The past 2 weeks have been very difficult as many of our plan have once again been put on hold because we had to literally dumping every last dime we had into replacing our van that had been totaled out. The boys have been profoundly affected by this experience and honestly,  so have Lizze and I. I'm happy to say that while the impacts of this event will continue to affect us both financially and emotionally,  I have finalized the purchase of our new van.  Downtown Ford had basically given us the van before we actually paid for it.  I dropped off the checks today and our plates were…

Last night was a rough night for everyone.  Emmett didn't sleep and Elliott was up at about 3am this morning. Then there was the visitors.  I'm laying in bed and it sounded like cats were running around in the attic. It was so loud that Maggie kept waking up and running around trying to find the noise. I'm pretty sure it's squirrels and not cats but it's a problem nonetheless. I'll need to find an exterminator pretty quick before the boys notice the noise. Posted from WordPress for Android

We have been struggling for awhile now to get Elliott sleeping on his own.  Most of the time he ends up in our bed.  This eventually leads to me moving to the couch because our mattress is uncomfortable enough on its own and Emmett likes his space. However,  one thing I managed to get done with tax return before literally dumping everything into this van was by the kids new mattresses.  The goal was to get Emmett and Elliott bunk beds but that will have to wait till next tax return now. However,  I setup one of the new mattress sets in our room for Emmett and so far he's enjoying it. With that said,  however,  he's still climbing into bed with us. On the plus side,  instead of going…

My kids have everything been in rare form all day.  I mentioned earlier about Emmett starting another flare up.  Gavin is being....actually Gavin is doing pretty well,  all things considered. Elliott on the other hand is just an emotional mess. He cries at the drop of a hat and is generally more difficult to keep moving.  I don't know how to really helpful him but I'm really hoping the Zoloft helps to ease his anxiety because this little boy is just a bit higher strung lately. I think I would die,  I would just literally die,  if I could say "please go get ready for bed" and it actually happened.  Instead,  I have to remind Gavin because he forgot what he was supposed to do before he made it to…

We discovered a new problem this afternoon.  Well,  actually this has probably been going on a little while now and has only now come to our attention. I was laying down in bed and little while ago and I heard a loud chewing sound,  coming from the ceiling. Squirrels have chewed through the facia along the gutter line and entered the wall spaces.  They seem to be chewing their way in farther and farther.  It's actually really loud and will easily be enough to drive me crazy.  I'll have to call an exterminator and deal with the problem before the kids start to freak out about it.  Gavin is especially susceptible to paranoia as he is prone to seeing and hearing things that aren't there. These little critters haven't actually…

Emmett’s not in the best of places today to start with because he has hit another cycle of fevers and cold sores. We are basically going from one meltdown to the next.  The last one was over a tower of Jello he created from all the Jello cups I bought for him last night.  He couldn't decide which one he wanted so he unloaded them,  from the fridge,  in groups of two. He's very particular about things like this. Numbers and patterns,  colors and shapes are very important to him. He had eventually removed every Jello cup from the refrigerator and made a tower of them on the table in the living room.  We let him have them out for a little bit but then wanted him to choose the…

I've been talking about Elliott’s anxiety issues for quite some time now. I wrote about his issues with germs as well as his unusually high anxiety level. As time passed by,  these issues have begun interfering with his daily life and reducing the quality of it as well. In my experience,  kids with Aspergers are prone to issues with anxiety.  Does that mean that every child or adult with Aspergers struggles with anxiety?  No it doesn't.  Having said that,  my kids are perfect examples of Aspergers coupled with anxiety.  We had Elliott to see Dr. Reynolds last week.  Elliott was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder.  Which,  as I understand it,  means that he simply is overly anxious all of the time. After a long discussion and a whole lot of…