Read more about the article I feel like I’m drowning
My thoughts

I feel like I’m drowning

I'm not in the best place tonight. Everything that's going on around me is slowly but surely wearing me down and burning me out. Life can be difficult to cope with sometimes and depression doesn't help matters at all. I can get stuck in a cycle of repetitive thinking and typically, that means I can't stop thinking about one of my fears. The thoughts just swirl endlessly around in my head, slowly driving me crazy and jacking up my anxiety to crazy high levels. It truly wears me down and until I get out of this funk, it will continue to do so. The weird part is that I know why I'm worrying and I know it's not rational but it doesn't make me feel any better. 😔 I really,…

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October 12, 2018
Read more about the article An example of how repetition helps Gavin learn or maintain skills
Autism Parenting Insight / Gavin / My thoughts

An example of how repetition helps Gavin learn or maintain skills

It's been a difficult day because Gavin is definitely struggling but it's sort of a mixed bag. I'll give you an example. I mentioned to him last night that he needs to shave because if he's going to grow facial hair, he needs to maintain it. His goatee comes in pretty nice but the rest doesn't. If he doesn't shave the rest of his face and neck, it honestly looks like that episode of South Park where Cartman glued someone's pubes to his face in order to look like he had a beard. After his IVIG Infusion, Gavin remembered that he needed to shave. I give him major props for that because even remembering is a big deal for him. ☺ He decided to completely shave off his goatee and…

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October 12, 2018
Read more about the article Gavin’s been freaking out all morning
Gavin / My thoughts

Gavin’s been freaking out all morning

We have nothing on the schedule for today, aside from the activities that happen every Friday. The kids have school, and Gavin has his IVIG Infusion. Everyone is dragging this morning cause it's been a very emotionally dragging week. Gavin's already caused some unnecessary stress. He was washing some dishes and began screaming. I'm talking a blood curdling, my fingers have been cut off kinda scream. Lizze runs into the kitchen screaming for me cause Gavin sounded like he was in a seriously bad way and she wanted backup. Turns out he accidently sprayed the hose and the trigger got stuck. He got water on the floor and didn't know that simply turning the water off would solve the problem. That was it. A small amount of water on the…

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October 12, 2018
Read more about the article I need to clarify something so please give this a quick read
Cats / Cleo / Family Pets / Ferrets / Maggie / My thoughts / Zane

I need to clarify something so please give this a quick read

I wanted to take a minute and do two things. First, I want to thank you all for the love and support you've shown over the past few days. We all very much appreciate it. ☺ Secondly, I feel like I need to provide some clarification in regards to the pets we've lost over the last year. Some people have expressed concern the we've had 3 animals die in under a year and at least 2 of them were cancer related. There have been suggestions that we look into our environment to make sure there isn't a reason for them having cancer. I wanted to clarify a few things and hopefully, that will provide some context that you'd be missing if you haven't been following our story for long. In…

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October 12, 2018
Read more about the article An update on the mass in Gavin’s forearm
Gavin / My thoughts

An update on the mass in Gavin’s forearm

I'm a fucking mess today. It's not one particular thing either. It's everything as a whole and it's stirring up my depression. I'm getting stuck in repeditive thinking and that's not a good thing for me. My anxiety is through the roof. Anyway, Gavin's appointment went well in the sense that he did well and the staff was amazing. I was able to see the mass on the screen as she scanned it with the ultrasound. I sketched a rough picture of one of the images I saw and it is a little worrisome. The mass is sitting right up against what I think is his cephalic vein. It appears to be a separate object and not a ballooning of the vessel wall itself. What I did see that has…

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October 11, 2018
Read more about the article Dear God, I’m not sure how much more I can take right now
Akron Children's Hospital / Cardiology / Gavin / My thoughts

Dear God, I’m not sure how much more I can take right now

It's been a rough week and yesterday, we lost our 3rd pet to cancer in less than a year. The kids are devastated and everyone's a mess. We did manage to get the boys to school but not without a great deal of effort, which pretty much drained us of anything even resembling energy before the day even began. With that in mind, you can probably understand why we're so stressed out about Gavin's appointment today. Gavin has a solid mass on his right forearm and it's concerning enough that his doctor sent him for an ultrasound, which is being done in about an hour. We scheduled this about a week or so ago and it's been a long wait. The mass in his forearm isn't a lymph node and…

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October 11, 2018
Read more about the article It’s been an incredibly long and heartbreaking day
Autism Parenting Heartbreak / Family Pets / Ferrets / My thoughts / Zane

It’s been an incredibly long and heartbreaking day

I'm going to keep this super quick because I'm exhausted and if I can get the kids to fall asleep, I'm going straight to bed. It's been a really long day, full of tears and heartache. Yesterday I shared about a very difficult decision we might be having to make in regards to Zane, one of the boys service ferrets. You can check this link for the background. We took Zane back to the vet this morning and our worst fears were realized. Zane's back legs were now almost completely paralyzed and it was progressing quickly. He was much worse off this morning, then he was the night before. The vet explained that there were three possibilities. Unfortunately, all three possibilities involved tumors and none of them resulted in a…

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October 10, 2018
Read more about the article My wife and I have a very difficult #Autism parenting decision to make
Autism Parenting Insight / Family Pets / Ferrets / My thoughts / Zane

My wife and I have a very difficult #Autism parenting decision to make

Lizze and I may have a difficult decision to make in the morning. As you know, our ferret Zane has been very sick. Over the last week or so, he seemed to doing better and we were all quite relieved by that. Unfortunately, we're noticing that his back legs now seem to be partially paralyzed, which indicates possible neurological problems. I spoke with the vet last night and he's going to see Zane at 10am. We will try and figure out what we need to do but any of the tests that would need to be done would likely be in the hundreds of dollars and there's just no feasible way for us to pull that off. Anyway, the vet is going to advise us if it's either something that…

5 Comments
October 10, 2018