The "Ding Dong"

It's definitely been one of "those" kind of days -as in the title to this post.

A lot of anxiety going on here as Mandy left this morning around 5 a.m. to take Kurtis to Dubois Hospital for a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy -schedule for around 8 a.m.

Because of concerns we have with Kurtis compounded by neither of us having a freaking clue what to do with a child his age, of his comprehension and communication level, in terms of care after a procedure like this, Mandy asked the surgeon to at least consider keeping Kurtis in the hospital overnight -as opposed to discharging him today. And, the surgeon -knowing Kurtis is autistic and has a lot of "issues" in that respect, agreed with her request.

Mandy is planning to spend the night with him there but that still doesn't alleviate any of the things she's been coping with -alone -all day today at the hospital. He in pain -obviously, naturally -and has no idea what has happened to him, what's going to happen to him next, lots of strange people surrounding him which isn't exactly one of his favorite things for openers and well, needless to say, he's one very agitated, very upset, very angry little guy and his poor Momma is about beside herself now too.

My older daughter is on her way up to my house as I type this and we are going to go over then to the hospital in the hopes of at least giving Mandy a tiny window of relief. Small comfort for either her or Kurtis really but right now, it's about all either Carrie or I can do. Katie is going to be home so she will watch Maya -and she's already trying to bribe Maya into being well-behaved as is humanly possible, considering this is Maya we're talking about here.

A little bit of an update on Maya and some of her nifty little things from the past couple of days.

Sunday morning, I heard a vehicle pull up outside our house and I kind of figured it was my son -sounded a bit like his truck -so I called to Maya to see who was here. She looked out the windown and told me "It's the 'ding-dong!"

Ok, who's the 'ding dong' I asked her and the reply to that was "Uncle Clate."

Yep -that nickname, along with several others, is one of the favorites that my son frequently gets called. Mandy and I frequently call him or refer to him in our conversations as "Nummies" - which is our version of "numb nuts" -just to give you a small example of how loving and kind we are within our family and to each other. In our defense, if you knew Clate, you'd understand these nicknames fully -as anyone who reads my blog who knows him would glady attest to I'm sure! We don't do this behind his back either -he gets these names addressed to him, in person, to his face.

Today, Maya has been fairly well-behaved -well, at least for the morning hours which she spent laying on the couch, watching cartoons. By afternoon though, I think she was getting a tad bored and stymied by Kurtis not being here too. She really has been quite good about her mother being "missing in action" though and only gave me a miniscule amount of grief over that. She does know somewhat that Kurtis is sick (well, he is -from the surgery ya know) but she doesn't know/understand all the issues here other than that a doctor is seeing him so as a result, several times today, Maya has told me that I need to take her to see the doctor "Cause my ears hurts and I has ';pointment." How she will respond now when I actually leave to go to the hospital -well, hope and pray for now meltdown for Kate to have to deal with!

She's had her normal amount of things she manages to get into -today, yesterday, Saturday too. Here's some of the things she's done:

A couple of years back, I bought some little round decorator-type candles, votive size in the colors yellow and blue (not mixed, but solid colored candles as these are the colors of the Swedish flag and I got them for decorations for the tables at our family reunion.) I had them stashed -I thought -in my room in one of my dresser drawers. Note: I said I THOUGHT I had them stashed away there but apparently not well enough hidden from little prying eyes and fingers. I didn't know she's found them until Mandy informed me that she (Mandy, that is) had found three of these yellow candles in the tea kettle when she went to heat some water for tea but heard and felt something -besides water -obvioiusly being in the tea kettle. When she asked Maya about these candles being in there, Maya told her she was "Cooking eggs."

Saturday morning, Bill went to fix himself a cup of tea and put the tea kettle on the stove thinking it had water in it already. Well it did but that water it seems had been mixed with a healthy dose of ovaltine -Maya's idea of making her own hot chocolate, ya know.

Today, she found the three "eggs" she had been "cooking" (No she never got the burners turned on, thankfully for that small favor) but she did find a butter knife that someone had left laying on the counter -still had some left over peanut butter on it and she smeared that on these "eggs." Lovely!

Then a little later today, she was out in the kitchen, messing around and when I went out to check on her she had a small cereal bowl (one that we use mainly for Kurtis) and she had some kind of dark brownish-black liquid in it. I asked her what she had been in to and she gave me some kind of answer but I couldn't understand what she was saying. Took me about five trys to get a response that I understood. Her answer: "It's a scientific experiment!" I bet it is! I have no idea in the world -nor does Mandy -where she heard those two words used together -"Scientific experiment!" After looking around a bit, I figured she had poured some pepsi that someone had left in a small bottle on the counter and poured that into this bowl. Whether or not she had put something else in there, I don't know, and that is what scares me because one never knows what is going through her mind and what she can find to mix together too! Seems no matter where I try to put things so they are out of her reach, she either finds that item or something else, just as bad, to replace it in her "evil doings."

Sunday, Mandy and Bill worked almost all day in the bathroom -trying to get the walls all prepped to repaint it and also, doing some sanding on the floor too so they can put the new tile Mandy bought several months ago down in the bathroom as soon as possible. Mandy selected a really pretty light green shade -a little bit lighter and a bit brighter than what I would call a "leaf green" or a light leaf green -not a lime shade though as it's a bit lighter and brighter than lime green. Well today, I went in the bathroom and on a wide ledge that separates the area where the vanity is from the commode and tub, Maya had managed to get hold of a bottle of head and shoulders shampoo, smeared a big blog of it on this ledge that had just been painted yesterday and then, she found a paint brush too so she was one busy little beaver, painting away with toothpaste on this ledge!

Sheesh! I don't need to worry if I get a return visit of cancer and have to take chemo that causes me to lose my hair, cause at the rate things go some days with Maya, I may have already pulled my hair out, one strand at a time, ya see!

Anyway, that's the things Miss Maya has been into the past couple of days -that I can remember anyway!

Tonight, after Carrie got here, we went over to the hospital to see the little guy and try to give Mandy a little break. Carrie stayed there -sleeping in a big recliner chair in his room and Mandy is in the bed they have set up for him -a single bed with the guide rails but he is not used to sleeping in a bed like that so Carrie is holding him and he finally fell asleep around 11 p.m. Seemed to take forever for him to conk out tonight! Twice while I was there, a nurse came in to give him some meds and it took the nurse, Mandy, Carrie and I all together to hold him down so the nurse could then squirt a drop here and there into his mouth!

But the good thing is, he has actually had a little bit to eat -a couple ounces of milk and had a piece of bread and butter along with two pieces of cheese from a ham and cheese sandwich Mandy had and then tonight, before I left, he even managed to eat a raspberry bar -one of the organic soft-type cookie bars that Mandy had bought this evening and he didn't fuss too much about eating that though.

Hopefully, he will be discharged in the morning and I think now Mandy and I can handle him once we get him back home too. It has cut back a little bit on his screaming anyway and that's a good thing, isn't it? My ears sure do say it is!!!