I'm back, from out of space!!

HELLO!!

I'm still alive and kicking, kicking quite well I might add!  I have been feeling pretty good, in fact, I haven't felt this good for a LONG time.

The reason I haven't blogged in a while is because I swapped the kids bedrooms over - Jamies and Alex's, which I knew was going to be a nighmare for Alex, everything that made him feel safe - ie his room - was gone and he was given a strange new room, his anxieties all came back, he was almost as bad as he was before I had to take him out of school, the evenings were a complete nightmare, he thought monsters were going to smash through his walls and get him, he kept dreaming about zombies and was fighting sleep every night, it'd be after midnight and he's still be throwing himself around everywhere getting crazier and crazier. We eventually succumbed to something I didn't really agree with - Melatonin. Alex was all for it, he obviously knew he needed to sleep but just couldn't stop being scared and that caused the hyperactivity. He actually asks to have it now!  And it has completely saved me and my partners sanity! because Aspergers causes a lot of anxiety, anxiety means that natural melatonin just doesn't happen, it's like sleeping when you know the enemy is near, it just doesn't happen! So the Melatonin really helps.

Alex is still not quite back to normal, but he's not mentioned monsters coming to get him in his new room for a few weeks, we did watch 'Brave' the other day and he got all scared about a bear coming to get him, but thankfully, that didn't last very long :) He's in between obsessions at the moment, which for an Aspie is quite a tricky time, he's not really got that regular thing that he needs to keep him feeling that everythings OK, but he's doing pretty well considering and it's opened him up to new things, it's like he's seeking the right kind of stimulus, I have no idea what it's going to be, he flits from one thing to the next so quickly I can't keep up with him! He's started playing chess on the laptop, at first he was just sticking his pieces all over the shop and hoping for the best. He didn't quite get it at first but his dad (thankfully one of us knows how to play it!) showed him some tips and explained how to win, and then I had to intervene because his dad was just telling him where to put the pieces. I explained that Alex will give up using his own brain if he's just told what to do, so more explanations were given to explain why what goes where, and then I managed to get his dad to just let him mess around and see what happens, because to me, and by watching the way Alex experiments with everything, that is how learning happens, by making mistakes and seeing what happens, seeing consequences and I've noticed with Alex that he'll do things all sorts of ways, he will not stick to the rules, he wont do what you're supposed to do, he'll spin it and throw it and make it go wrong, he has no fear of losing, and through that, he learns so much more.
So he's learning to play chess, which I'm quite chuffed about.

Jamie is STILL deschooling! well, she's probably nearly ready to start learning stuff again by the fact that she keeps being bored, although, she did admit to me that because it's her birthday in just over a week, and Christmas in 3 weeks or so, she's SOOOO excited, she's having a birthday party, we're hiring a little hall out which I've not done before but it'll only be a mess around party, but she's so excited about all these things that all these NORMAL days are so BORING and nothing exciting EVER HAPPENS, so mabye thats why....
But she has been deschooling. After she came out of school she was so enthusiastic about learning, she did quite a bit, work sheets and reading and writing, she didn't really give herself a break from 'school'. Then about a month ago, she decided that she wasn't going to do ANYTHING but watch tv and bum around. Considering the amount of pressure she was under at school to be smart and stay on top, I'm not surprised she wants to give the whole thing a massive break. So she's been watching Spongebob, and Adventure Time and films and she's been really enjoying it! She's really coming out of herself and being her usual wacky self in public now, which has been a bit strange, but I can see now that she's allowing herself to just let go, which is really amazing because thats when she'll find out more about who she is, she has no need to be the best, no need to push herself to do things she doesn't really care about, she can just do whatever she wants in her own time with no pressure.
Saying that, I'm giving her until the new year, using this time while she's deschooling to cram as much work on the house as I possibly can, I'm absolutely determined to get the things done that I want done by the new year, so that by January, We can focus on FUN. Fun for all of us. And I'm really looking forward to it.

Amelia is coming on in leaps and bounds, she can now say practically everything she wants to tell us, (she tells me about all these things that her scaring her, I'm not sure if she's extra sensitive than the others were, or she's just better at telling me....) I am worried about the habits she's picking from Alex, he's teaching her to be rude and fight, I'm not very happy about that, I'm having to make sure they don't spend too much time on their own together, as she's a very sensible little girl, she'll work it out as long as I'm there to show her that certain behaviours just aren't acceptable.
She is so funny, she has such a brilliant sense of humor, and she's as bright as a button (I might even say she's smarter than Jamie was at that age!) she just seems to 'get' things without me 'teaching' her. Like crossing the road, she just knows instinctively to look for cars, and not to go into the road unless I've told her it's safe to do so, I've not taught her that, she's just become aware of it. She loves to be involved  in all our activities like making biscuits and painting as she wants to do whatever everyone else is doing and she's so capable of so many things, I even trust her to pick out the eggs at the farm shop, much to the panic of the miserable woman who works there (it's completely put me off going there actually)
It's brilliant seeing her personality come out and see who she is and wondering how she's going to develop.

As for me, I started writing a 'mood' chart a few weeks ago, after I found out that I have PMDD. Finding out about that completely changed everything! PMDD is depression that goes along with PMT, which TOTALLY explained why I was so down and depressed for a couple of weeks, everything was terrible and hopeless, and then one morning i'd wake up and everything would be normal for a bit, I didn't understand it, I thought I was going mad, but now I understand, and I've sorted out a few things like taking the right contraceptive REGULARLY(which is quite hard when you've got adhd!) I've actually been feeling really good for a while now, and I've started excersising and doing LOADS more!
After changing Alex's and Jamies rooms around, (I did it in 5 days on my own!) I can do anything now! And I WILL get everything I want done by the new year. And it's brilliant because I've been promising my kids that I'll get it sorted....I'll get it sorted, but never actually getting it done, but now I am, I'm actually doing it!!

Theres SO much more I need to tell you but for now this will do. Whats brilliant about writing a blog is I concentrate on all the positives, I forget the late nights where Alex wouldn't settle, and the times where I was too tired to make the right decisions, but that doesn't matter so much now because looking at all the positives, we're actually doing OK.

I probably wont get to write another blog before new year, I just wanted to do this one to let you guys know that things are good and getting better all the time :)

Actually, I'll do another one tomorrow night because I've got a whole load of photos to show you!