Adjustments at School

We made some minor adjustments to Jake's schedule last week which really seemed to help. We are now taking him and picking him up instead of having him ride the bus. It really cuts down on the amount of walking he has to do at the beginning and end of the day. Add to that, his bus is always the last one to arrive after school to take the kids home, so that was another ten minutes of just standing there waiting after a long day. We are also having him rest during his homeroom time which oddly enough is three hours into his day. (I remember homeroom being first thing in the morning.) He sits in a comfortable chair, in a quiet area with his head phones and music for about 20 minutes. We noticed a big difference in his fatigue after just a couple of days with these two changes. We're hoping this will be enough while his stamina is improving.

I think some of Jake's "differences" (his words, not mine) are starting to bother him more at school. Tonight when we were doing his stretches before bed, he said to me that he hates how he is different from everyone else at school. When I asked him what he meant, he talked about having to wear a leg brace and having people "check in on him." I explained to him that his case worker also has 24 other kids she checks in on, he just doesn't notice, so no one else probably does either. As much as we talk about how everyone is different and have things they may not be happy with, it doesn't seem to help. And bottom line, he's right. He's dealing with more issues than most other kids his age and there isn't much we can say to change that.

That point was driven home again today. Jake had asked if we could go rock climbing since we hadn't been in weeks. It seemed like a good idea given we have a long weekend and an extra day of rest. Watching how quickly and easily Luke climbed up the wall and then how hard Jake had to work to go less than 1/2 the distance Luke had was hard. I stood there watching him vacillating between being so proud of him for wanting to even try and being so sad that so many things are such a struggle for him. I try really hard to spend most of my time and energy in the "I am so thankful for all the things he can do" mindset, but there are times that watching his struggle so hard with things that were so easy before, simply breaks my heart. They both had a great time climbing, each in his own way, which at the end of the day is all that is important.