Full Schedule

We've had a very busy, productive few days! On Tuesday we went to a Mom's Club playdate. It was nice to get out and get an earlier start to my day. It's kind of refreshing to be up and out the door early, like I already have a good start to the day. Dawson wanted to leave 30 minutes early, so we ended up going. There were about 8 moms there with about 15 kids, so it was very chaotic and noisy. It just got to be a bit much for him after a while, but he did seem to have some fun. Gabriel loved it, he was on the floor with the kids, playing and smiling.

After we got home, a friend I met at ECFE class came over to help clean and organize. She organized my pantry cabinet and got many things cleaned up. She also brought baskets she'd found on sale and put them to good use. I love them! Now all those bottles and things aren't tipping over on our shelf that doesn't have a solid surface.

 Dan hung lights on our balcony. Dawson loves the Christmas lights. He shouts "Chriscris lights!" everytime we see them around town. He was very excited to see the clinic has a Christmas tree also. I'm getting excited to get ours up.

Dan and I went rollerskating Tuesday night. Our friends couldn't make it, but it was nice to get out anyway. I was so tired when I got home afterward, I felt like I hadn't stopped moving all day! It felt good though. 

Gabriel is still pretty darn cute and he knows it.

 He's trying so hard to crawl and he's getting so close! He's starting to move his hands forward now, so I'm guessing it might only be another week before he's really moving around. He's pretty content to just play most of the time though. He's teething now, has about 4 coming in on the top from the looks of it. Poor little guy has been more fussy this week because of it but it hasn't been too bad.

 I held Gabriel up to say goodnight the other night and Dawson decided he wanted to cuddle Gabriel. So I put him on Dawson's pillow and they both decided that was pretty fun.

 Then Gabriel found his musical seahorse that Dawson has taken over and was looking at it. Dawson was very happy to have him in his bed. Plus he was showing off for the camera. When I went to take Gabriel back down, Dawson blocked my hand with a serious face and said "no mommy, Gabriel sleep here". To cute! Unfortunately I'm against letting 8 month old babies sleep in the top bunk, no matter how cute of face I get begging me! I did finally get him back and into his own crib.

 So Dawson decided to join Gabriel instead. I heard giggling. A sound I really missed, Dawson and Tyler used to cuddle and giggle every night at bedtime. I went in his room to find this. I love that they are bonding! Dawson is paying so much more attention to Gabriel these days. They're gonna be best buddies.

 Dawson was having some more aggression issues and trouble finding things to do at home, so I got him some beans and used Tyler's med box that I'd just cleaned up to make a little sensory tub. He loves it! He often goes to it during the day and it really seems to calm him.

On Wednesday Dawson had an appt, so my organizing friend came early to play with Gabriel. She'd planned on coming to finish cleaning and organizing anyway. She even brought her mom who wanted to help. They washed the floors, counters, sinks and bathtub, vacuumed, and organized more things. I got a big box unpacked and some organizing done too. When Dawson got off the bus, he gave her 4 year old boy a big hug and even a kiss on the cheek. I think he likes having a buddy around, especially after seeing him a few times now. They came for just a playdate over the weekend too. We definitely have to schedule more playdates. It's so cute seeing Dawson enjoying having people around.

She had brought this cube storage to put in the closet to utilize more space. The shoes had been sitting in a pile at the bottom of the closet or on a rug outside the closet. It's so much more open to not have shoes there! Has a spot for hats and gloves too. Dawson caught on quickly that this is where his shoes go. Today he'd just ditched them on the rug and I just had to ask them to put his shoes away and he remembered they go in here now and put them away.

Dawson's Psychologist appt went well this morning. This lady didn't grab at him or try to ask him questions he didn't understand. She just observed and talked to me. She answered some questions and gave some suggestions and we talked about how he understands things and what might help him to understand better. Dawson played a magnet puzzle, wrote letters and numbers on the dry erase board and then played catch with a ball. He threw the ball really high once and bumped the clock on the wall, which proceeded to fall down and the glass broke to pieces. Never a dull moment with us it seems! He didn't get hit or anything, he ran and stood behind me though, looking at it with that "uh oh!" look on his face.

After the appt we went to "The O Store", which is Target. He sees the big red O on the side and just calls it the O store. He was very excited to find out Grandma was there. We had planned to meet up, but Dawson didn't understand the concept of Grandma being at the store. He heard "Grandma" and wanted to go to her house. Once we saw her van, he was very excited. He got to look at toys with Grandma for about 20 minutes, then it was time for school. So Dawson and I went to his school, he had a slight tantrum, but it was over when his teacher brought out the iPad for him to play with. Apparently all the Special Ed teachers have them for the kids to learn with and kids like Dawson really do well with them. He was navigating that thing so well! Swiping his finger to the side to go to different pages, pointing to things and finding the games he likes. It was neat to see him enjoying it so much. Too bad they're so expensive! Afterward I went back to Target where my mom still had Gabriel and we looked around some more. I think I'm set for Christmas ideas for everyone now.

Gabriel and I got home and he was napping, so I let him sleep for a bit. It looks so nice in there. Feels so good to walk in and see empty kitchen counters instead of a cluttered mess. I round the corner and find more free space! It's so refreshing. I decided to bake some cookies. Someone had brought over some cookie dough that's already made into cookie blobs, so I just had to put them on the sheet. It really seemed too easy! Turned out to be a good thing though, since Gabriel woke up and wanted to nurse. Shortly after Dawson got home on the bus, a friend stopped over with a meal she'd made. They've been so nice to have! Not having to worry about cooking, especially when we've been so busy or just so unmotivated to make anything decent, has been great! Otherwise I'm sure we'd be living on pizza and chicken nuggets because it's easy! Instead we've had lasagna, homemade soup, meatloaf, chicken enchiladas, beef stew, chicken/rice dish, and many other good meals. I'm constantly blown away by people's generosity.

This evening we had ECFE class. Dawson decided he wanted to play outside, but it was too cold and dark for that. Once we got in the classroom he was fine though. Gabriel loves class. He flirts with all the moms and teachers and is right at home. He was so used to all the attention at the hospital, he's not used to things being so quiet at home. So we get to places like that and he just lights up and is so happy. Gabriel likes the ball pit, he actually dives for it and sit there and watches the kids jump around and throw balls. Dawson takes running leaps into it and Gabriel smiles so big. It's nice to see them happy.

It's still pretty hard to be in the same preschool room and gym that we were in with Tyler. Tomorrow it will be 1 month without Tyler and I still sometimes can't believe he's really gone. I still have moments when I'm in the store or doing something where it feels like I should be keeping an eye out for 3 kids. It's like one is missing and then I remember I only have 2 now. It's still so hard, those moments when I think about him not ever being here again. He's in my mind every moment of every day, but there are still times where I really think more about things and it's so painful. Dawson has been having a harder time too. Yesterday when we got in the van he said "go see Tyler". I talked to him about it again and he ignored me and said "no, go see Tyler". The one that killed me was "give Tyler kiss". All he wants to do is go give his brother a kiss, and he has no idea why he isn't able to. I sure wish I could find the words to help him understand. So far, nothing is really working. No parent or sibling should have to go through this.

Thoughts and Places

These last couple days were tough. Yesterday marked 2 weeks since he died and it was harder than the 1 week mark. This time I had more questions. Wondering what, if anything, was he aware of that day. If we could've done anything differently. Thankfully I haven't thought of anything that could've been changed for the better. He was so very sick. I got his death certificate yesterday and there was 4 causes of death listed. Bone Marrow Transplant, Renal (kidney) failure, VOD (liver failure) and VRE bacteria. The VRE was his first problem. He got 105 fevers from it, but got rid of it. He stayed on those meds to prevent it from coming back and it did anyway for a very short time. The cultures had been negative, so I have no clue where they found the VRE during the autopsy, but they must've found it somewhere. I'm nervous to get the Autopsy results back. I've been advised not to read it myself, but to have someone summerize it for me.

My cold is thankfully much better today. I can breathe laying down and my head doesn't feel like exploding when I bend down to get something. I do still have a stress headache and other physical symptoms of stress, but not having the cold is a really good start.

I woke up this morning thinking about my planned meeting with Dawson's teacher. He starts school on Monday, so then I was wondering if the bus would come to our apartment or if we'd have to walk to the road, which is a fairly long walk to make with a child who doesn't like walking in the cold winter air, with a baby too. Then I realized that Tyler will never get to ride a school bus. He loved walking Dawson to the bus and coming with me to wait for the bus to get him after school. He'd get so excited and say "bus!". The first time he was bummed that he didn't get to follow Dawson onto the bus. He did get to ride the shuttle bus between RMH and the hospital though. That made me feel a little better. He grinned and went all the way to the back seat to sit.

The meeting with Dawson's teacher went well, she came to our place which was very nice. She plans to do a home visit once a month to chat about how Dawson is doing and play with him a bit there. There's only 6 kids in his class, so that will be a nice slow start for him. He used to get more anxious with more kids. She said he could go over to the regular preschool too if he gets to liking having more kids around. She also mentioned that in the Spring we'll start talking about Kindergarten. I still can't believe that's next year already! My child can't possibly be old enough yet, where does the time go? I look at him and I have no idea when he got so big. Doesn't help that I barely saw him the last 6 months. He's really gotten the short end of the stick during all this. Even with getting him into services, it's still hard because he's still being bounced around. He did Speech at Children's while we were there, but that was only about a month by the time it was his turn on the wait list. Then the Autism Center for 2 months. Feels like it was just enough time to get into it, meet nice people and leave.

I took him to a Psychologist yesterday. That didn't go well at all. I explained to her that I wanted some advice on how to deal with his aggressive behaviors that he's having. He's confused and hurting along with the rest of us, but he isn't able to express those feelings and often acts out with aggression. I told her I haven't been pushing the subject, but it's always open to talk about and I mention it now and then when I feel he looks like he needs to talk about it. He will sometimes admit he is sad, but wants to go no further with the conversation. I don't want to make anything worse. So she decides to ask him if he knows what happened to Tyler. If he knows where Tyler is. If he misses Tyler. All questions were frowned at and answered with "No", which is his "I'm not talking about it" answer. He went to the other side of the room, she followed. So he went under her desk instead. When he got out of there, she tried again and he went under the couch. Then he was bouncing on the couch and she tried sitting with him and tried pulling him down to her lap. Dawson doesn't like surprise hugs most of the time, he freaks out. He said no, let go and she didn't. So he tried to bite her. She stopped him and then he hit her and ran away again, only out of the room this time. So I had to go get him and thankfully that was pretty much the end of our session. I had been hoping for some advice. I told her that he wasn't going to talk. She just took notes on what I said and didn't have anything to suggest to me other than a referral to a Psychiatrist to put Dawson on meds to calm him down. What the heck?! He's a confused little boy, he needs to have patient people to help him work through his confusion and problems, not be drugged right away and then see if we can work on something.

I later found out that she's not even a Psychologist, but a nurse practicioner who makes referrals and listens to people. She just thought he was hyper and needed to be calmed down. She didn't notice that he was just trying to get away from her. She even grabbed the hood of his shirt once and pulled him backward. Then on our way out she said we could make an appt to see her again in 2 weeks if we want. I think not! Thankfully I have a few friends who recomended other people, so I'll be trying that instead. I think having him back in school will help as well, but I want to make sure all the bases are covered and that we're doing everything possible to make this better for him.

I did get some laundry done today, with Dawson's help. He loved having something to do, he got to put the quarters in and put the clothes in too. I also went through the flowers again. Over half of them are gone now. I'm sending some to a friend who's friend makes flower jewlery and wanted to do that for me. I also decided since Dawson has been feeling cooped up and so have I, that we should go to an ECFE class. I had called and got the info about the one we'd been going to in April that we were already signed up for and it was tonight from 6-8pm. It was high on my list of places I was afraid of going because of all the memories attached. It was one of Tyler's favorite places and we had so much fun there. It was hard being in the same classroom. I could almost hear his giggles as he'd run around the room. He would often come sit on my lap during parent time and I was almost waiting for him to come running over to me. The gym was the worst, remembering him sliding down the slide and jumping into the ball pit. I was starting to think I'm crazy for going but then as I watched Dawson play and interact with the songs they sang and played at the table with the other kids, he was having so much fun. He needed to get out and do something he enjoyed. Even Gabriel loved being there. Dawson finally looked relaxed and had a calmer day. He was even happy to head to bed.