Outwardly, Emerald is giving us very little indication that she is upset Gabe is going to school and she is not. We explained that he was going to "boy school" and that we were going to look for a school for her; she accepted that explanation with no fuss and doesn't seem bothered in the slightest that she isn't getting to go.
But she is having more accidents.
After Benjamin was born, Emerald regressed and stopped using the potty meaning that Michael and I had to essentially retrain her. It was tough with a lot of frustrations all around but we finally got back to her using the potty consistently.
Since about a week before Gabe started school, Emerald has been going into the bathroom and peeing on herself. It isn't that she isn't getting in time or is struggling with removing her clothes--we started putting her back in pants with no buttons or zippers and that made no quantifiable difference in number of accidents. She just pees on herself, removes her wet clothing, and comes and finds Michael or me to help change her.
Besides that, we are still having trouble with her hiding in the pantry or in her room to "make her tummy feel better". As far as we can tell, that means that she needs to pass gas and doesn't want to do so in open company; as it is, she only hides like that when she does need to go, the rest of the time she will just let one rip, consequences be damned.
We are starting her on some cranberry juice and we are taking her to the doctor to make sure it is not a physical issue, but I think she is just having more trouble with Gabriel being gone than she is letting on, which is resulting in the increased accidents.
Other than that, everything is great!
My workload has lessened considerably sending one child away for half the day. Gabe requires so much attention and monitoring that I was scarcely able to do anything else. It was rare for me to be able to answer a phone call during the day because Gaby would start sobbing and screaming until I hung up and held him (don't even ask me what THAT was all about). Now I am able to handle business over the phone about student loans and bills, medicaid, or comparing prices before we buy tires...things I was completely unable to do before. The sound of the dishwasher bothers Gabe, so I had to be careful to only run it when he was sleeping, and Benjamin crying drove him to distraction.
I miss my Gabriel very much, but the pressure and stress has decreased knowing that he is somewhere safe where he can learn and do all his therapies so I can focus on Emerald and Benjamin.
Benjamin is just about crawling. He can sit infinitely in crawl position or get up on his hands and tippie-toes, but once he is there he doesn't know what to do next. Using a combination of rolling, launching, and army crawling he is able to get from place to place fairly efficiently if not a little clumsily.
He has been super mega fussy--he doesn't want to be held, he doesn't want to be set down...he pretty much just wants to eat all day long, chew on his vibrating and singing cow toy, and drool. Sounds like teething, but no fever or any indication that a tooth is coming in. He absolutely loves eating though. Every baby food we try him on he absolutely loves, and he has taken to trying everything anyone else is eating as well. His favorites so far have been macaroni and cheese, brownies, sweet potatoes, and bananas. The only thing he has eaten so far that he has genuinely not liked has been baby food carrots; when he ate the steamed carrots we had for dinner he loved it, so I can't entirely blame him for not liking the yickier baby food version.
Everyone seems happy with our new arrangement--we get up earlier in the morning to see Gabe off to school which means we are able to make the most of our day. Maybe soon we will start attempting to walk to the library for story time or to the park, as the weather is getting nicer and nicer. The wind has been wretched, but the days have been warmer and sunnier.
I think that is all for me rambling for now!
--andie--
No comments:
Post a Comment