I'm taking a break from story telling because I feel compelled to write about something we've been dealing with very recently.
Meltdowns:
Every child has tantrums. A tantrum is never easy to deal with for any parent and I am not making light of what other parents of typical children deal with because I'm sure that there are some real doozies that every parent has to deal with, but to me, there is a definite difference between a tantrum and a meltdown (and I also believe that a typical child can have a meltdown). A tantrum is crying, throwing themselves on the ground, and general disobedience, but doesn't last longer than a few minutes. A meltdown (imagine a nuclear meltdown, it's aptly named) on the other hand, is when a child completely loses control of themselves, tries to injure themselves or others and seems to go on FOREVER (a minimum of 30 minutes). Most of the meltdowns that we deal with last around an hour or two until both child and parent are completely exhausted. Why does a meltdown last so long? It's because the child is SO upset that they literally cannot calm themselves down. I gave a detailed story of a meltdown that happened while traveling in the car with Braden in my last post, but here is what a meltdown at home is like for us now. Braden weighs seventy-nine pounds and the top of his head almost hits my chin. (Granted, I'm only 5'2" but he seems tall for his age.) He is seven-years old, but wears size TEN clothing. He's a BIG boy! It's becoming nearly impossible for me to safely contain him during a full-blown meltdown. It's even becoming hard for Jeremy to control him. (I'm afraid to think about teenage meltdowns! Yikes!)
Last night I came up to bed at my usual time (around midnight) and I could hear Braden awake in his room, which isn't unusual for him, he is usually awake for at least a few hours sometime during the night. He must have heard me come up because as soon as I laid down in bed, he came into my room and asked "Where's Daddy?" I told him that Daddy was sleeping downstairs and for him not to bother him. Then Braden decided he wanted to play on the iPad, to which I responded that he couldn't because it was the middle of the night and he was supposed to be asleep. I knew this would set him off, but I'm not about giving into his every whim, just to keep the peace. I'm one of those crazy parents who is trying to teach him that the world doesn't revolve around him. He immediately growled at me and said "iPad!" loudly. I didn't want him to wake Jackson who was sleeping, so I took Braden into his room and TRIED to reason with him (which, I also knew was not going to work). He got more and more agitated and kept asking for Daddy. Jeremy wouldn't give into his request for the iPad anymore than I would, but Braden loves Daddy, A LOT, and is willing to try ANYTHING to get what he wants, so he started growling and stomping around his room (shaking the whole house). Jeremy was woken and came upstairs to help. Braden got even more upset when Daddy told him "No iPad" so he began crying, kicking and hitting at whoever or whatever was closest to him. We were both trying to be patient with him, but in the middle of the night when you're tired, that's not the easiest task. Braden was crying uncontrollably, hitting even himself in the head. No amount of reasoning would work. We had to restrain him using our full bodyweight (and all my strength) while he fought us. The meltdown lasted two hours until he literally wore himself out and fell asleep. Jackson thankfully only stirred a little throughout this ordeal (yes, I said ORDEAL and no, I'm not exaggerating). This is a pretty typical meltdown for Braden.
Medications:
There are so many different therapy options for treating children with Autism, when you first get that diagnosis, you have no idea where to begin. I don't know every option out there, but seriously, if you just Google Autism treatment, you get a million hits. The most difficult decision I've ever had to make was whether to put Braden on medication. When we moved here, he wasn't taking any medication, but he was spending so much time in therapy, that he was doing awesome. When that all stopped and the adjustment disorder kicked in, we were at a total loss. The aggression that he had was insane. We didn't want him getting kicked out of school for hurting someone. He even hurt me several times, and with a new baby on the way, I was very, very worried. The doctor suggested putting him on a medication to lower his adrenaline levels and would make him less aggressive. I was at my wits end and with no help (other than Jeremy), we decided to go ahead and try it. It was a last resort for me, but if Braden was going to have so many behavior problems that he wouldn't be able to progress, and the medicine could help, it was worth trying. It wasn't a decision we made lightly. He was put on a low dose and things seemed to mellow out for a while. Over time, though, and during a particularly difficult school year at a really crappy school, we added another medication. Again, it helped a little, but the side effects caused him not to realize his stomach was full, so, he put on a lot of weight after starting that medication. I'm not against children taking medication if it's absolutely necessary and in our case, it was.
Here is the other issue with medications, especially when a child takes multiple meds. It requires things to be monitored and there is a delicate balance that has to be kept in the body. So, making any changes to the medication regimen is super scary and can reek havoc on your household. We found that out with what we call the "Zoloft" debacle. It was two weeks of hell. No kidding. So we don't make medication CHANGES lightly either. Braden has always been a big kid, but the medication he was on was causing him to gain a lot of weight. He was constantly wanting to eat and we were constantly trying to keep him from overeating and it was causing more meltdowns. We decided to try a different medication in the same class of drugs but was supposed to have less of the overeating side effect. Well, sure, he's eating less, but holy moly! The meltdowns, aggression, defiance and more are all back with full force. The crappy thing about this medication is, we will have to taper him off of it, which means we will be looking at several more weeks of this. Then we will have to decide whether we want to put him back on the other medication. It's very frustrating and confusing. We want to do what's best for Braden, we will obviously have to talk with the doctor, pray about it and suffer through the consequences of that choice.
More:
Ok, Meltdowns and Medications aside, I want to talk about More. What is "More"? It's all those little moments when Braden says something so quirky and random that Jeremy and I can't stop ourselves from bursting out laughing. There are so many of these little moments that it would be impossible for me list them all, but you can check mine or Jeremy's Facebook timelines to find a few of them. The funniest thing about these little moments is that he doesn't skip a beat. We will ask him a question, expecting a certain answer, but he will answer us with something completely wild and definitely defying our expectations and it's usually a very clever way of looking at something. It's these little moments that give us a little glimpse into how Braden sees the world. There are also many little moments when Braden will crack up over something so silly we can't help but laugh with him. His laugh is such a wonderful sound.
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