From the haze of my brain

  I have told you how well Seth has done this year but he still has some major triggers. Add the stress of the holidays with the disruption of the much- needed schedule and my surgery and you get a little boy who gets squirrelly. He ended up in the principals office at school and lost privelages at home. I was able to talk him through his emotions and he settled down at school.

  The night before Christmas eve we drove 2.5 hours to ride The Polar Express train. All 5 kids were wearing matching pajamas and looked so cute. The train ride was awesome. They read the book, played the songs from the movie and served hot cocoa and cookies. Ahren spilled his cocoa on himself and Kaytee and Ashley grabbed napkins and cleaned him up. (when another child gets attention the RAD kid gets triggered) After the train ride we picked up food and hit the road for home. Two and a half hours later we pulled into our driveway and unloaded. Seth would not get out of the van. I finally had to reach in and pull him out. He was covered in ketchup. His shirt was soaked in it, his lap was gooey and he even had it on his back. There was much more ketchup than one packets worth and the spots were wet, not partially dried like they would have been if he spilled when he ate hours before. I didn't say a word, just led him to the laundry room where I stripped him down and wiped him off. I did the same with Ahrens Jammie's since his were chocolatey.  I got them into clean pajamas and tucked them into bed and kissed them goodnight.  Then I drenched the Jammie's in stain remover and loaded up the washer. 

  This week Seth has alternated between moping and whining and bursts of wild out of control behavior. He has lost or broken half of his gifts prompting me to send Santa a letter asking him to not bring presents next year unless Seth can learn to care for his belongings. I showed him the letter and he just shrugged. He didn't care or pretended he didn't care. 

  Yesterday we had a couple of boys over for a play date. They played well together for most of the day and then mid- afternoon I heard the boys all saying things like 'gross, that is disgusting, don't ever say that again'. Uh-oh. I intervened and asked what was going on. They all agreed that Seth had said something really bad, but they were too embarrassed to tell me. Finally Levi whispered it to me and I briefly saw the world spin around me. Seth had said something of a very graphic sexual nature. I immediately removed him to my room and left him in timeout on my bed. I then talked to the other kids and apologized to them and assured them Seth was going to be severely punished. They all went back to playing and I left Seth on my bed. I told him that as soon as his Dad got back from the store he was going to get his punishment. I hadn't thought what it would be but I know the anticipation of it would be making a huge impact. Chris got home a little later and what do you know? Seth was sound asleep . Amazing...... Well not really. He uses that tactic to avoid unpleasant things. We let him 'sleep' for a couple of hours and then he received his punishment. Grounded, no playing with friends and the loss of his major Christmas gift to play with while he is grounded. 

  We still have a week of vacation to go so this story is not over. Hopefully it will end with a whimper and not a bang.....