Homeschool, Earthquake, Doctors Appointment and Ritalin - What a Week

I never meant for a whole week to go by before I updated here but this past week was simply not my best friend.

Monday was a quiet day and since we were starting school on Tuesday I gave Austin and Amanda a very easy day, letting them sleep in and basically have most of the day off.

Tuesday we started our schoolwork. I thought I had everything well planned and I was excited to get things started. As it turned out Amanda really didn't like the science I had planned for her and I greatly overestimated the amount of time Michael could sit still and work for me.

Then, midafternoon, we were hit by a 5.8 earthquake. Having never felt an earthquake before I have to admit it shook both Amanda and I up a bit. After the initial surprise I thought it was pretty interesting but Amanda really didn't agree with me there. Austin didn't feel it very much so he didn't have much to say about it.

Wednesday afternoon Michael had his five year check up. I had quite a bit I wanted to discuss with the pediatrician and he graciously listened and talked with me until I felt we both were on the same page. Michael has been having a LOT of behavior issues, along with difficulty sleeping at night. The tantrums are hard and long, the mood swings are wild,  he's bouncing off the walls, and very defiant at times. We've tried everything we know to do on our own and seem to be getting nowhere. And quite frankly, I was feeling tired and discouraged. After talking with me and reviewing his record the pediatrician had two recommendations. The first is to get a full evaluation done at Kluge Children's Rehabilitation Center. This would include physical, developmental, learning and psychiatric evaluations. I am full agreement with this. The other suggestion was to begin him on a trial of Ritalin. I hesitated here. I know children sometimes need medication, and I have no problem with that. Austin has been on medication for migraines, I am on medication for OCD. But I guess I wondered if there were other things we should try first, of if maybe we should wait until the evaluation was done. Sensing my reluctance he didn't write out the prescription immediately. But as we talked about how the other children are handling this, I think we both realized it is causing them some stress so he gave me the prescription. He said to just try it and see if we feel like it makes a difference. He pointed out that if Michael does not have ADHD we really won't see much difference while he's taking this. Either way it will help us understand what we are dealing with and what course to take from here.

So Michael started the Ritalin Thursday. Between starting new medicine and the four shots he got, he really wasn't in the mood for much schoolwork on Thursday. I was still working on some other options for Amanda and looking at a different schedule for Michael so we didn't get much done Thursday either.

Along with all this I ended up getting an awful itchy rash that started Thursday and has been getting increasingly worse. It started on my arms but has worked it's way up my neck and face, and is also now on my legs. I have no idea what is causing it but it is driving me crazy! Along with the rash I wasn't feeling very good, headache, sore throat, achiness. The rash is still bothering me, but otherwise I am starting to feel better. Depending on how I feel tomorrow I may make myself a doctors apppointment to see what going on.

Anyway, I write all this too simply say - We really didn't get very far with homeschool this week.

But, I reworked our schedule, reworked the record keeping system, and found some new options for schoolwork, and I think we're ready to hit the ground running tomorrow morning.