A few of my favorite things

6. Kidney Stones

5. Little boy's ties in dirty #2 toilet water

4. Urgent care at 8 pm on a Sunday in the winter

3. Tonsillitis and other contagious ailments

2. Doctor co-pays

1. Pharmacy co-pays

 

This last weekend was tough. Peter discovered his dreaded kidney stones have returned. Since the lithotripsy (ultrasonic breaking up of the stones) 4-5 years ago, he has gone on to reproduce more. :( Bad times!

And, Sunday night I ended up in the urgent care with Ethan. He has tonsillitis. 

To start this long story off, it all began Wednesday, when Peter, Bekkah and Ethan went to the same urgent I took Ethan to last night. At that time, Peter and Bekkah were diagnosed with tonsillitis. Ethan was deemed "healthy." 

This last week was a difficult one for Ethan. Thursday, Peter stayed home from school a second day recovering from feeling yucky. Well, around 1:50 PM the dispatcher for First Student Transportation called me saying we needed to go up and rescue bus driver Dana. Ethan had removed his seat belt and did his usual shlump to the floor, where he remained for 30 minutes while screaming, yelling, and crying. Oh what fun! When we arrived, he had dirt and snot and tears all over his face, shirt and hands.

Because of his poor behavior on the bus, I have been in frequent contact with Transportation. When they changed his morning bus driver a few weeks ago, he's been exhibiting increasingly poor behavior. One day, it took him 15 minutes to get him on the bus. Last Friday, Tracy his newest morning bus driver, kicked him off the bus because he wouldn't sit up on the bus and wouldn't settle down. 

I am very frustrated with Ethan's behavior. I am an unwillingly reinforcing his behavior by removing him from the bus. When he raises a ruckus, I HAVE to come remove him from the bus. Now, he knows that when he acts up, I will come get him. The problem is that I can't just leave him on the bus both for the safety of the other children and because the bus driver has other stops.

Friday I went so far as to follow the bus from the school on the route. He made it from Etiwanda Ave. & Banyan St. and Haven Ave. & Banyan St. He made it a total of 3.3 miles!  I hid behind cars in the parking lot and followed from about 1/2 mile distance. Unfortunately, farther up the road I found the bus with its hazards on right off of Haven Ave. Ethan's new afternoon bus driver Angelica was having problems with him. It was Angelica's first day on the route! Trying to work with Ethan's desires to be independent and still keep him restrained, they are using a buckle guard. A buckle guard is a square-like device that you attach around the sear belt and the guard is then secured with a medicine cap that screws down and is "child-proof." So instead of trying to unbuckle the seatbelt, Ethan decided to slither out of the belt and on the floor. 

Where there is a will there is a way! And boy, does that child have a will!

I keep reminding myself that Heavenly Father placed him here with our family for a purpose. He came to this earth for a purpose. It is our job to love and guide him and help him discover that purpose. Ethan is amazing. Ethan is so strong, both physically and mentally. Once he has decided upon a course of action or something he wants- that is generally the way it turns out. He is now the size almost the size of a 6 year old. He is so strong! And, boy does he have a sense of humor.

One of the funniest things occurred last night. When the male triage nurse brought him back to get his stats. He took Ethan's blood pressure. The cup squeezed his arm. Ethan didn't like it. So, he looked at the nurse, and Ethan told him that squeezing his arm isn't nice! I tried to explain To Ethan that the nurse didn't do it, the machine did it. I told Ethan that he should tell the machine that it's not nice to squeeze his arm, so he did. It was so funny the way he says it. He says, "It's not nite." That's how he says nice. He has problems with his speech, most especially his front loading syllables. So, in the triage room, he says it with all seriousness to the nurse and to me. The nurse was amused at his behavior. And, for a change, Ethan wasn't out of control by the time we got into the triage; he was rather charming. 

With all the winter illnesses this time of year, the waiting time was about 1 1/2 hours in the lobby. I amused Ethan by helping him play games on my iPhone. We played bubble wrap, bubbles, and Scoops. We played Scoops for what seemed like forever until my eyes hurt. I kept trying to encourage Ethan to play the game on his own, but he was much more happy with me playing it. The point of the game is to stack as many scoops of ice cream on top of each other as you can while avoiding the evil veggies- red tomatoes, red onions, and white onions. So in the waiting room, Ethan keep exclaiming in a rather loud voice, "Oh no, not the tomatoes!" Then he would cheer me on as I avoided the shower of veggies. It was cute. I was very grateful that it was just him and I instead of more kids in the mix. Whew!

Earlier yesterday at church, Peter had to remove Ethan from his Primary class. He just couldn't behave. He only made it about a little over an hour. I had just returned from picking Bekkah up from her weekend stay at Karen Blackmer's house in Lake Elsinore. I med her mom at the Travel America truck stop parking lot off the 10 freeway and Milliken. By the time I made it back up to the church, I picked up Peter and Ethan and brought them home. On the way home, Ethan fell asleep, something that he NEVER does unless he is medicated. That's when I first knew something was up. Earlier, Peter took Ethan to the bathroom, and Ethan had a bowel movement. Peter had a rough time trying to get him cleaned up so he had Ethan lean way over. That's when Ethan church tie took a dip in dirty water. Can you say GROSS? When I picked up Peter and drove him home from church, Peter had had quite enough of the trials and travails of Ethan and church! But, at least, I got to attend the last hour of church- Relief Society. It was really nice. I enjoyed it.

So, that's how my Sunday went. I finally returned home from Urgent Care at close to 10 PM. I fixed Ethan some Bagel Bites from our freezer. He was intent upon eating little pizzas. And, we had them in our freezer. I finally sought relief in my pillow and bed around 11:00 PM. 

Here's a picture a what I'd rather be doing. I finally had to resort to giving him Ethan a nap in a bottle. He decided to fall asleep in the chair.