One step forward

 

Tator's new haircut. Sorry the pictures are so bad, I took them with my Ipod.

 

Yesterday Tator had a Fall Festival at her school. She was so excited and talked about it all week.

When she came home from school I was upstairs putting away laundry. She came running upstairs to show me all the things she had made at the festival. A kit to make a dream catcher, papers to make a totem pole, left over food(?), and a kit to make a bag like the Indians carried their medicine in. I'm not sure why none of it had been put together at school. But anyway, when we were done looking at it I told her she should go downstairs and put her stuff in her drawer right away so her little bothers didn't get into it.

Anytime she brings anything home from school her little siblings love to look at it and this makes her very upset. She was already VERY dysregulated and I knew if they started touching everything she was going to get mad and escalate very fast.

When I came downstairs she was sitting on the kitchen floor with her stuff all over the counter and on the floor all around her, including her little brothers. I got down on her level and took her face in my hands and said, "you need to put this stuff away and get it back out later when your brothers are doing something else." She continued on with what she was doing. I let it go about a minute and a half and as her brothers were grabbing stuff and she was yelling I got back down and said it all over again only telling her if she didn't put it away it was going to be put up for awhile.

I let it go for about another minute then said, "Ok, now you need to go put it in my room." She grabbed everything yelling and crying as she carried it to my room. Then she threw herself down on my floor crying and carrying on. I got down and took her chin in my hands and asked her, "didn't I tell you if you didn't put it away it would be put up for awhile?" She just continued to cry and carry on so I told her she needed to go to her room for awhile and calm down.

Then she stood up and went. No fighting or arguing, no running away from me, no throwing things, or hitting and kicking me. I gave her about 10 minutes then I went back up and sat down on her bed. She was laying across it crying. I asked her if she was calmed down now and she said she was still a little sad. When I asked her why she crawled up onto my lap and said she was afraid I was going to throw her stuff away. I told her I wasn't going to throw it away it was just going to stay in my room until tomorrow.

She hugged me and started to calm down. I went over with her again about why I wanted her to put it away and knew how upset she would get if something happened to her things. I told her I knew how days like this, that were different from the normal days, left her feeling very out of control. She hugged me again and said she was trying to take one day at a time.

We came back downstairs and she was very calm. We were able to run her brother to town without her having any problems in the car. After dinner I rocked her for awhile then we sat on the couch together and watched T.V.

So far today everything is going pretty good. I sure hope this is how the rest of the weekend goes.