schizophrenia Archives - Page 181 of 303

Teaching Gavin to help manage his own health care

Once again, Gavin has been shorted supplies for his IVIG infusions. As it stands, he doesn't have enough left to do his next infusion on Friday. Rather than simply take care of it for him, I asked him to put a reminder on his tablet to go through his supplies and figure out exactly what's missing. Once he figures that out, he'll report to me and I'll call the hospital and put the order in. It's so important that Gavin be as involved in his health care as possible. He can't make make his own medical decisions for obvious reasons but we want him to play as big a role as he's capable of being. Getting him to utilize his tablet for something other than games is important as well.…

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May 15, 2018

Elliott / Gavin / My thoughts

Ending the day with good news

I'm going to end the day on a positive note. Elliott is feeling better after a few days of being under the weather. With any luck, he'll be returning to school in the morning. In another piece of good news, Gavin's IVIG infusion went well. He was able to complete the entire process on his own and as far as I know, there weren't any leaks. There are plenty of times where the IVIG Infusions are a disaster and he needs to be restuck a few times. Any day that ends with Gavin having a good infusion, is a good day. I almost don't care about anything else that happens because these infusions are such a big deal. A bad infusion can set the tone for the day.. Gavin did…

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May 15, 2018

Clozapine / Gavin / My thoughts

Managing Gavin’s meds can be a huge PITA

One of the more frustrating parts of being a special needs parent is dealing with medications. One of the most frustring parts of dealing with medications is getting them filled on time. Gavin is on an antipsychotic known as Clozapine. Clozapine is the most tightly controled medication in the US. Clozapine requires bloodwork before each refill and because of Gavin's recent bouts with Neutrophilia, he can only have seven days worth of pills at a time. He can't miss more than one dose or he will have to be pulled off the meds. These refills are extremely time sensitive That means four times a month he needs bloodwork and I need to worry about his refills. There's a very specific process that must take place in order to get the…

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May 14, 2018

Autism Parenting Struggles / Gavin / My thoughts / YouTube Video

Micromanaging #Autism: Dealing with feeding problems

I wanted to take a minute and drop this video here, as well as pick your brain. Feeding problems can be quite common in kids with Autism, for a number of reasons. Unfortunately, it's not something that is always outgrown, as evidenced by the fact that after 18 years, it's still a problem. I'd love to hear your experience and find out how you've addressed feeding problems in your family. https://youtu.be/nJUhA5_aPJM

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May 14, 2018

Autism Parenting Woes / My thoughts

I’ve been having trouble sleeping

For the last week or two, I've been having really hard time sleeping at night. I wouldn't call it Insomnia but rather something else all together. Not that I wasn't under tremendous amounts of stress before but this year in particular, has been very stressful. Some of this stress comes from obvious places while other, not so much. It's like the moment I lay down to go to sleep, my world just comes crashing down around me. I get panicky and feel as though I can't breathe or swallow properly. I know that sounds really weird but that's what happens. I end up having to move to the couch because I find myself so frustrated and sometimes the change of scenery helps. I've tried things to help fall asleep because…

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May 14, 2018

My thoughts

We want to make some changes

We want to get into some new routines prior to summer break because it will be easier to transition the kids if it's something we've been doing for a couple of weeks already. The boys only have ten days of school left and I'm beginning to stress out a little bit because our grocery budget has taken a hit. I'm working to overcome some of these obstacles but the reality is, it's much easier said than done. For now we will have to work within our means, while we strive to do better. One of the things we wanted to start doing is returning to the farmers market. We used to do this all the time when the kids were younger but it's been years since we've been there. The…

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May 14, 2018

Family Time / Lizze / My thoughts

This was very last minute

Elliott is sick. Emmett and Gavin are in Y-Town visiting my grandmother. Them going in the trip was sorta last minute but we figured it would do them some good to get out of the house and we could use the break. ☺ I sent Lizze to take a nice long, guilt free nap, and I hung out with Elliott. We ordered her favorite pizza for dinner and will be endulging on that as soon as it arrives. Things are tight right now but we got Lizze a Google Play gift card and a stuffed penguin for Mother's Day. She's never really been a huge flowers person, so this stuff was perfect. The kids won't be home for a few hours and the three of us will just hang out…

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May 13, 2018

Autism Parenting Struggles / Gavin / My thoughts

This is why we have to watch Gavin so closely around food

Gavin's not feeling so well. It began last night with him overeating at the cookout. Gavin has never been one with a functional ability to self-regulate. As an example, he doesn't ever really feel full when he eats. What happens is he will eat too much and end up making himself sick. He's been doing better over the last few years because we've been trying to create habits for him to help compensate for what his brain doesn't do correctly on its own. Unfortunately, we still have times where Gavin will eat and eat and eat, until he makes himself sick. Last night was a perfect example. When we're at home, it's much easier to monitor what he eats but when we're somewhere else, it's much more challenging. We dropped…

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May 13, 2018