Ooops...

Very much 

Oops... 

 I didn't do it again... I forgot to write this blog... got lost in my head... oh baby baby, oops you think this gets updated and it's sent from abooooooooooove 

but I'm not

that

organiiized. 

Sorry, not sorry. Hello again. I wrote almost all of this a month and change ago and then failed to post it. (extra appropriate given this blog details my AuDHD diagnoses... point made) 

So hop onboard train Exxcecutive Dysfunction and come along with me for a tour of the Wright late-autumn!

As we last left it, the victory of Allan's final covid shot culminated in... a little convalescence...

She slept all of the Saturday after her shot, and was very low energy on Sunday. By Monday we assumed she was feeling better but she was still totally spent. To add insult to the injury (ironically) the bandaid they'd given her for her flu shot gave her a pretty bad rash reaction. And that may have been related to her being up in the middle of the night. I read up on it and apparently it's rarely an allergy and usually more often irritant dermatitis. But nonetheless, it was brutal. 

And emotionally wearing. Which I know because later that day I tried to wipe something off too roughly and she broke into tears bawling "I don't want to grow up to be like you!!" I thought she was just generally cursing her name, but then she clarified she didn't want to be allergic to everything and always have rashes. Ugh. Sorry kid. I have no clue what might happen with that. 

Regardless, she was sick enough (if she was sick. We figured it was the shot, but who knows) to miss school and even if it was a close call, she'd lost an entire weekend so... 

Thought we'd see if she got bored staying at home. 

She actually didn't. It was a chill mellow day. 

That ended with a desperate need for a playground that I could not sate, given it was dinner time. I told her several times that at eight, she is mature enough that I'm comfortable with her going on her own. But she was not in the mood. "What if I forget the way?" I was like "dude, you do that two block walk every day. But yeah... it's possible."

Anyways, she was happy enough to go to school the next day. Which was good beacuse it was, after all, Halloween!

Which was AWESOME

She was, as is custom, a black cat. She wanted me to be a witch of course. And Andrew added himself into the mix as the devil. Dashing bloke indeed. 

(wearing several layers of insulation underneath his suit because it was actually pretty cold that night. 

And full of lights!

Had the week ended there, that might have been about enough. (DAIYENU!!)

But no! The show must go on. Wednesday was a relatively mild early release (as always) day. Then Thursday there was a field trip! Oh my! To the SCIENCE MUSEUM!

And a playdate. That did not end super well. Allan was a bit overstimulated and probably would have been happy to just have a mellow day at home. She did begin the playdate by ignoring her friend entirely. This created some discomfort. I fed them both some apples. Her friend ate all of the apples - four of them - and then - you'll be shocked - came down with a tummy ache. Around the time Allan decided she wanted to play. Ended up with Allan screaming and her friend literally hiding from her so well I started to get worried she'd run out the door and I'd have to explain to her parents that I'd lost their kiddo (turns out she was just in the tent and Allan missed her entirely when she went to look... phew). 

Meaning by Friday Allan was pretty over it. The day didn't go well from what I hear. 

Kid gets tired is all!

The weekend was somewhat refreshing and full of feels. By Monday Allan was relatively back to her baseline. Almost. She was tired in the morning so I offered her these mint chocolate cliff bars that have caffeine in them. Not that much and she's had one before without much effect, but she was wired on Monday. I thought maybe it was the bar, but then she was equally hepped up by the evening so who knows. I reminded her dutifully that she had intended to try out her loop earplugs at school that day. So she did. And they had fallen out by the time we were midway to school. Ensuring that she went to school in a miserable spot. Mother of the year of course. 

i did however find the lost earplug after some breakfast and a little recovery. They were in the street in a puddle. This is why you need to always get bright flourescent objects for your children. Easier to spot in the dingy abbadons of despair that they will inevitably lose them in!

That Monday was a bit of an exciting day as I had my autism evaluation in the afternoon. So obviously I could not accomplish that much during the day other than feel a little nervous, tend to my monster list of notes/outline and generally try to tamp down the chaotic sprawl of a weekend at home!

Allan has a regular playdate with the same playmate on Mondays, but Andrew wasn't necessarily too keen on watching two kids on a playdate (they can sometimes go awry in two-parent-minimum-kind-of-ways). And same at the alternative household. Dads can work and watch, but playdates are a lil extra. But in this case, Allan's bestie is very persuasive. When I went to pick Allan up, I was waylaid by bestie and dad. I explained we couldn't have her over and she was like "that's ok, Allan can come over!"

Of course since this was impromptu, we weren't quite ready to put the plan into effect. So, Allan and I walked back to the house to grab a boostere seat and - very important - a stuffy. And then after all kinds of to-do... she was off! I was free!

 With a half hour to wait.,, 

I went upstairs and staged my interview area with a drink, a good cross breeze, a few layers, the right number of pillows, my extensive word doc and my journal with a couple of pencils.

 And... it was still like 20 minutes early. So I logged into the telehealth site to make sure everything worked. It did. I waited until 15 minutes to go to actually "knock" and get myself into a waiting room. The email had said to check the link about 15 minutes before so I figured this was reasonable. I always wonder if they can watch you in the waiting room and basiscally diagnose from there. I spent my time playing Britney Spears' Toxic (I'm in a bit of a Britney SpIn after reading her book and introducing Allan to the music video genius of her work. Watching Oops I Did It Again is a frequent morning event now) and figeting/singing/talking to myself. 

The eval was exhausting but affirming. A lot of talk later and we were discussing whether a diagnosis should be officially billed to insurance and put on the medical record. I said "let's do it" and now I'm official!

Oh and not just Autism but also ADHD. Which I guess most of the time if you're autistic you're prolly a little ADHD too. AuDHD officially. Which is weird to me because I am pretty damned organized and pretty intensely focused... well... when something grabs my attention. 

My understanding of the "attention" in ADHD is that it''s less of a deficit of attention thing and more like you can't really chose what you focus on. I remember watching Avatar (the icky blue alien one, not the cool nicktoon) in 3D in the theaters. I remember it bothering me a lot that in a 3D world I could not shift my focus the way I would if I were just looking at an actual scene. The flower behind the actors would always be blurry no water how I tried to bring it into focus. I had no choice unless the camera decided to shift. That's kind of how I see ADHDyou don't get to shift focus at will. 

Add in the autistic tendency to fixate anyways. Oh I will be focusing. My attention will be intense. But shifting it is maybe a lost cause. From my understanding it's a bit of a constant battle in my brain between routine and familiar and new and exciting. 

Obviously for some people the ADHD has a higher weight. For me, I think I tend towards the familiar and just honor my dopamine challenges by losing my wallet and forgetting to shower for the third day in a row. But I coulda done that just being autistic! Still! 

I guess I do own three or four copies of almost every important item placed strategically throughout the house lest one of them be "misplaced" or broken! Some people need meds. I just need 15 nail clippers, 2 backup phones, and five or six thermometers in every room of the house... 

I'm madcap and/or absentminded is all! Something Katherine Hepburn can play anyways

And the world kept spinning with this new understanding of myself, which I suppose I'd already reached in many regards. Having an official diagnosis did not change a ton for me, but I'm glad it has happened. And I do think it gives me slightly more permission to listen to myself and be true to who I am. 

And hopefully that transfer to Ms. Allan as well. She's always been pretty good and being true to herself... at least at home. I do worry that she's getting more and more of an imperative to "act normal" or at least be "less weird." Less of a "cry baby". Less not-like-everyone-else. And that feels tiring. I know it is for her. She says so. We started a game of ranking tiredness from 1 to 10. On days where there's school she's up to 9 and 10. On weekends and days off, she's at 2 or 3. 

The return from Thanksgiving was rough. With a slight cold and a complete fear of school, she stretched out sick days almost all week, except for a really really rotten Thursday. I was getting out the backup homeschool emergency plans. But she recovered over the weekend and had a good first week of December school anyways so... a nice big question mark going into the new year!

We're trying to expand her accomodations at school to give her more breaks. I just hope that is enough. Because I do notice small signs of burnout. And I've been there. And I would rather she not be. 

We get the rest we can. Allan likes compression. Sometimes my resting my legs across her back is even better than a hug (and fairly comfortable for to boot, so no complaints here!)

Maybe she just needs a tent or a fort that can be built over her desk!

Accomodations are on their way, but things are a little harder than we expected. 

Ironically it turns out Allan's not diagnosed with autism! Psych! Or anti-psych! The lady we were working with (the one we interviewed with, filled out forms for and talked about wanting to get our daughter evaluated for autism from) certainly kept inviting us to schedule meetings when we said we were looking for an evaluatino, opined that Allan's results indicated autism very conclusively before ending an appointment with us... but I guess she thought she was going to write a letter to an actual evaluator. Or help us with our 504. Or... something.

Allan's OT can't diagnose. The other therapist who has been sure about this for a while and gave us a ton of resources also can't diagnose. Nobody who's onboard with what feels more and more apparent cannot diagnose. So... Allan remains in waiting list vaccuum with an "anxiety" and "social anxiety" diagnosis

So the process continues. Luckily she has some really awesome people at the school working for her and they are really helping us out. 

It's just... I don't have that many spoons either. This is as lie. I like those little munchkin spoons so much I bought two packs of 10. I have a decent number of spoons. THey're just kind of little spoons. Pacing is vital. And, since our dishwasher continues to evade pure functionality, washing the spoons frequently by hand seems preferrable somehow. Which is to say, I have no idea. What day is it? What? 

Oh yeah, it's tiring but on we got. We have leads for an actual evaluatory. AND a new therapist (Penny is leaving us again, sob sob). AND a new OT (maybe hopefully). A lot of waiting and screw it, let's get on to the holidays, cuz nothing's getting resolved until after that. 

Hannukah is a go!

Though as much as Allan claims she love the sufganiyot (donuts) and wants them again next year, she ended up not eating much of hers and has subsequently requested the chocolate croissants that I always keep for treats instead of the holiday treats. Ah well. More for Andrew. Who had better hurry, because they're starting to get stale!!!

I imagine I'll either write five blog entires before the new year or check in again some time in February. The mystery of it all!

But just in case, Happy Happy HOlidaze and best wishes for the new year 2024 is gonna be lit! We got tons of candles, so I guarantee it!