Sunday, January 16, 2011

What Do You Other Parents Do to Prevent the Disasters?

Over the years, there have been disasters after disasters due to Jadyne's autism. Some were near deadly, others very costly, others just plain maddening.

  • 2 yrs old: I wake up (thank GOD) in the middle of the night to find her playing in the middle of the kitchen floor with all the cereal off the shelves dumped on the floor, just playing like in a sandbox, like nothing was wrong, although she had turned ALL THE KNOBS ON THE GAS STOVE. We all could have died if I hadn't awoken. No noise awoke me, just a sense something was wrong.
    SOLUTION: Per her Master Level Behavioral Therapist suggestion, I put a lock on her door to make sure at night she stayed where I put her. Not long later, a babysitter called CYS stating I was abusing her for locking her in her room. CYS never even opened a case, but this was only the beginning. CYS has been called probably 20 times in the past 7.5 yrs over similar things. No I'm not abusing her; I'm keeping her from killing herself and the rest of us!
  • 3 yrs old: I had taken the lock off her door due to that idiot babysitter. I got a call at 2am from my neighbor below me asking me where Jadyne was. I lived on the 3rd floor and her 2nd floor bathroom was "raining". There was Jadyne in the middle of the floor in the hallway once again playing rubbing her hands in the water like nothing was wrong. She had stuffed a shirt in the sink and turned the faucet on. $1800 in damage. Mind you I was a single mother working 80 hr work weeks just to make ends meet.
  • 4 yrs old: She got into paper ripping. She'd rip an entire telephone book if she could find one. There would be millions of pieces all over the place.
  • 5 yrs old: This was the fridge time. I had to put locks on the fridge. It was a challenge to find a lock she couldn't figure out how to undo. She'd have eggs broken on the floor, milk spilled. She'd get into the pantries, had to lock those too. At one point I literally had to SCRAPE glued flour off my kitchen floor. Again, it was a challenge to find a lock she couldn't undo.
  • 6 yrs old: This came the fun time (not so much!) Fecal smearing. She had done it occasionally before, but it was worse than ever. Any chance she got she would spread her feces from her diaper all over her walls, her hair, her floor, her bed. I actually had to burn her mattress, and I scrubbed the walls so much the paint actually began to come off.
  • 7 yrs old: Now she's fascinated with writing. She colored all over her bedroom walls before. We can hide the crayons all we want, but it just takes one pen left out, one person forgetting the disaster that can occur, and she's off to the races with that writing tool. She'll cover a wall, her arms, her legs in just minutes.
Just lately, I don't sleep. I sleep 1-3 hrs and only at night. The other night I woke up at 3am, and she was up. She had gotten into the kitchen, found an almost full container of whey protein powder and dumped it all over my carpet. Another morning, I awoke after her. She had gotten into my office and although she didn't rip my papers, completely disorganized all my papers in all my file folders. She also spread toothpaste everywhere. While I was cleaning up a mess she made in the basement, she got into my red nail polish upstairs (while she was SUPPOSED to be watching Dora, her favorite show). She painted my window and desk with red nail polish, also.

It may seem to a NORMAL parent, as I've heard 10k times, you just aren't watching her. Keep a better eye on her. Right. And then when do I do laundry, cook, clean up her messes, clean up normal messes, vacuum, do normal household duties, sleep? Apparently never.

She did GREAT while her brother was at his father's and she had my one-on-one attention. However he was very sick this week. He needed more of my care. So she's decided to lash out. It's so aggravating.

Any other parents that have gone through this that have answers, please I'm all ears. Any parents without a disabled child, please keep your comments to yourself. Don't care if that sounds harsh, but I've heard all your uninformed opinions before, and they simply don't apply to this lifestyle. Thank you.

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