A Day

Today is what I call a very successful day. Since my last post life has been pretty normal, that term I take very lightly when it comes to describing my life. We are almost finished with our Mental/behavioral health in-home support which comes into the home to help families deal with crisis behaviors (which the scars that are still on my arms are proof of the need of that), this will be a big switch for my family and my other in-home support worker as we won't have her helping us with every behavior issue we have. I feel I am very prepared to figure this out and she has taught us so much about how she thinks Eden's behaviors should be handled and educated us for future issues as well.

We still have a lot of planning for even the smallest tasks and use lots of preparation when going places when there are going to be new things (sounds, lights, smells, and food). Today for instance, we had decided we wanted to go out to eat and to the beach (ocean not the lake we usually go to). This is just one of those things we haven't had a ton of success with in the past, but we are a lot braver than we used to be. We put Eden in her swim suit and told her we were going to the ocean. All the ride down we were so much more stressed than she was because last time we went to this same beach Eden screamed the whole time and we had to disappoint Tanya who was happily playing in the water to leave after 10 minutes. Today, we went stayed a whole 1/2 hour (which doesn't seem like much but for us a completely successful trip) She played in the water and even touched the sand with her hands (which is the first time she's done it without a prompt!) She washed her hands in the water which I could tell was difficult for her and left with out incident. She was ready to leave and we timed it perfectly because I think another 10 mins or so we would have had to chase her down the beach (she runs when she gets overwhelmed with loud noises).

To top it all off we then decided to tempt fate and take her out to eat. We've been to the restaurant before and there is a room with a ton of stuffed animals (real stuffed wild life). Eden panics when she sees this stuff and I don't know why. She may be scared or not actually know what she's feeling but she's had a panic attack in that room before. We haven't been there for more than a year and that's all she kept telling me was, "Don't want to see animals." She didn't freak but was very scared and we went around that room. Another success! She ate a very little bit of dinner (but I think she was done before we got to the restaurant) but waited almost patiently while we ate and went to the bathroom only 2 times. Once we left, I told her what a wonderful job she did and we came home. I love these days.

She's talking and letting us know in little ways what she needs, and more importantly (I think) is that we are listening to her and giving it to her. I love the way she listens to her body and lets me know what she needs, I should take lessons from her and I would probably be a healthier person. HHHHMMMM...