First Day Of In Person School

Posted on by MICHELLE N

After more than a year of shut down because of the pandemic Covid-19, and William had to attend on-line classes, now he can go back to school in person for summer school.  He’s so excited!

Jefferson school is about 15 minutes away from our house, it’s not too far; but now that he’s old enough we decided to let him take the bus.  A week ago I asked if he wants to take the bus to school, he said Yes.

Summer school starts from 8:00 AM – 12:15 PM.  They will not serve breakfast and lunch, they will provide snacks to be eaten in the classroom only.  For lunch they’ll pack it and we take the food home.

7:00 AM I texted Mr. C to make sure he knows that William is allergic to peanut.  William has been with Mr. C since Nov last year but because it’s always online meetings so I wanted to make sure he’s aware of that.  He replied back that William is not assigned to his class for summer, but he’d let his new teacher knows.  “What’s William’s  teacher name?” – I asked.  “Mrs. Rodriguez” – he replied.

I woke him up around 7:00 AM: he asked for breaks as usual before brushing teeth.  I told him about the school plan of not serving breakfast ,and that he has to finish breakfast before the school bus comes so that we won’t be late for the bus.  He had a cup of milk and half cup of the cereal.  We waited and waited but there was no sign of the bus.  10 minutes before 8:00 AM, I called the school and they said the bus  was running late as it was the first day of the school, and they told us to be patient.    10 minutes pass 8:00 AM, I decided to take William to school by car.

By the time we arrived, there was only few students and their parents were there; I guess the rest already came to their classrooms.  The lady took us to the office, she asked for his name and tried to find out who’s his teacher.  We waited for about 10 minutes and his teacher came out to take William to classroom: William was so eager to go with her.  I also gave William’s medicine to the lady, asking her to give it to the school nurse.  I asked her why the bus did not come to pick up William; she gave me the school district transportation number to call.

So I called the number (714-558-5811), got the mail box, I left the message.  30 minutes later I called again, a lady picked up and said William is not in their list to pick up!

Feeling lost I called the school again (This is impossible because I did ask Mr. C to give us the transportation and he said OK), this time they gave me the transportation coordinator number (Mrs. Lisa 657-289-5919).  I called, her mail box was full I could not leave a message.  20 minutes later I called again, this time she picked up; I told her that William was not in the bus pick up list.  She said something about the transportation is not provided for home school student, which really confused me!  Then she said she was driving, and that when she got to her computer she’d find out why William is not getting the transportation.  So I waited for her call.

As I was driving to the Optometry, Mrs. Lisa called.  She said for some reason William name was not there so she requested the transportation office to add his name in.  This would take a few days so probably he won’t be able to ride the bus until next Monday!

Things never come easy to us, isn’t it?  I took the day off today from work mainly to renew my passport, but it turned out I had to deal with the school bus issue.

On the way back from the Optometry, I stopped by at Costco to buy William a hot dog and churro for lunch, then drove directly to school.  It was 11:30 AM, I was so early so I stood in the shade waiting for his class to over at 12:15 PM.

12:17 PM, I saw he was walking with his classmates and teacher toward the gate.    He ran toward me when he saw me.  He did not seem to  be happy at all, so I asked if he liked his class, he said “Yes”.  I gave him the lemonade and the hot dog to eat while on the way home, but he said “I’m full!” and refused to eat; but when I offered him churro, he took it right away.

1:30 PM, Mr. C called to say sorry; he just did not understand why he filled out the same paperwork for Williams as his classmates but all his classmates got the transportation but not him.  The class roster also said he has transportation.   So somehow the transportation office did not get the request for William’s transportation.  I guess this is why we never get a call from them about the pick up time; the one question that I asked Mr. C twice “What time the buss will come to pick up William?”.  Mr. C was surprised that I did not get any call from them.  Now we knew why!

So his first day went well to him, I think.  He asked why the bus did not come today.  I told him the bus will pick up him next week; so this week we’d drive to school.  He kept asking Why?  I simply told him that we needed to register for the school bus to pick up; and that takes time.  Poor little boy, he was so excited to take the bus today!

First Time on Medication for ADHD

Posted on by MICHELLE N

As Ms. Elyse, the Nurse Practitioner from Center of Autism, suggested to try the medicine (Methylphenidate HCL 5mg) on weekend because the side effects might be tummy aches, headaches, and lost of appetite for the first few days, I decided to let him have it on Saturday.

He was ok when I told him that he needed to take this medicine to help him focus.  He took the medicine with no problem.  After 10 minutes, he complained about the tummy aches, so I rubbed his belly, but that went away after 10 minutes.  Other than that, he did not have headaches or loss of appetite at all.

After 1 week of medicine, I noticed he had more aggressive behaviors like slamming doors, kicking things he saw when he was upset.  So I stopped giving him the medicine.   His aggressive behaviors went away after we stopped the medicine so it’s definitely this medicine is not good for him.

Tooth Hurts!

Posted on by MICHELLE N

Late Thursday afternoon, William complained that his tooth hurt.   I asked him to open his mouth and point to where he felt hurt, he pointed on the bottom right.  I saw swollen gum so I thought that’s where it hurt.

I told him rinsing his mouth with salt water would help to sooth the swollen gum; and to my surprise, he was willing to try.  I asked him to keep the salt water in his mouth until I counted to 20; and we needed to do it 3 times.  I did it without any problem.

Later he seemed to feel hurt more, so I gave him some Motrin; that helped him to sleep easier.  He woke up around mid night and complained about his tooth; it was more than 6 hours since I gave him Motrin so I gave him another 5ml; and 5ml Benadryl to help with his running nose.  He felt asleep about 1 hour later.

Friday morning, he was still sleepy so I texted Mr. Castenada about his tooth and asked for excuse from class.  “Toothache is no fun, let him rest” – replied Mr. C.

The whole Friday I’d give him Motrin every 6 hrs and had him rinse his mouth with salt water several times.  I texted my good friend Nhi at the All Children Dental for appointment, we got one at 9:00 AM on Saturday.  Knowing how he was so terrified on his first visit to the dentist about a year back, I primed him that we needed to see the dentist to check on his pain.  “No pulling tooth?” – He asked.  “No, the dentist will just check to see why your tooth is hurt” – I assured him.  I also primed him that they’d need to take the X-ray so that he needs to sit still while doing the X-ray.

Saturday morning, he woke up early around 7:30 AM.  I gave him some milk and cereal for breakfast before we headed to the dental office.  We arrived around 8:30 AM, he did not seem to be scared at all, I’m glad.

After filling out the forms and waiting for 10 minutes, they called his name.  They asked me to wait in the waiting area but I told the dental assistant that she would need my help because he would not sit still; so she let me in with him

She took him to the x-ray machine; to my surprise, he sit still and listened and did what the lady told him to do.  Two year ago I had to sit on the X-ray chair and hold him!  My little boy is growing up and starting to understand things.

After the X-ray, he was asked to sit on the chair and wait for the dentist.  He jumped on it with some enthusiasm.  I primed him that the doctor would need to see his teeth so he need to lie down still and open his mouth.  He nodded.  The assistant came to clean his teeth.  As soon as he saw she picked up the cleaning tool, he jumped off the chair so quickly and stood next to the wall!  Finally I had to hold him and lie down on the chair for the lady to clean his tooth.  It was a quick clean for about 2 minutes.

We were told to wait for the doctor; so I got off the chair and let him sit there by himself.  I reminded him again that the dentist will need to check his teeth so he needs to lie down still and do not move his head.  But then when he saw the doctor  apply some cream on his teeth, he jumped off the chair again and spit out on the floor!  One more time I had to hold him lying down so that the doctor could exam his teeth.

“We need to pull out this tooth!” – the doctor said.  Later when we got home, I realized that it’s the tooth that had the root canal 2 years back!  Why he has pain on the root canal tooth and that we have to pull it out?  Does that mean the root canal failed?  I felt so sad that William has to go thru this for the tooth that is NOT supposed to hurt if the doctor did a good job on the root canal.  The root canal procedure was supposed to save the tooth, but it did not!  He went thru that traumatized experience 2 years ago for nothing!

Doctor Vo said to make appointment for pulling the tooth.  I told her we’d call to make the appointment, so for now please prescribe him some antibiotics to help with the infection. So she did! ( She was not gonna prescribe anything until I asked).

William left the office feeling happy I think (no teeth was pulling out as I promised him).  We stopped by the SaiGon pharmacy to get his antibiotics medicine right after leaving the dental office.

We got him, gave him some lunch and we started the antibiotics and continue with Motrin because he still felt hurt.    He said the pink medicine does not taste good at all and that he hated it.  He said last time we had white medicine which tasted better.  I do not remember what was the color of the antibiotics last time but he kept saying it was white!

After 3 days with antibiotics, we finished 1 bottle, his pain is gone, so I stopped giving him antibiotics.

I was debating if I should make dental appointment for him for next Saturday or not; it’d be Memorial holiday weekend;  We need to have him start on the ADHD medicine that Ms. Elyse prescribed for him; she said that would give him headache and tummy ache for about 3 days so we should start on the weekend, which means this Memorial weekend is perfect to start.  If we don’t, then we’d have to wait till the next weekend.  This is the 2nd weekend after her prescription so I don’t think we should not delay further.  Thus, I decided not to make that dental appointment; and that we’d start on the ADHD medicine instead.

He’s no longer feel pain on his bad teeth, last time I checked.  “My tooth feels better now!” – He said.

3rd Meeting With Ms. Elyse

Posted on by MICHELLE N

Zoom meeting at home.  We talked about giving William medicine to help with his focus.  She prescribed short acting medicine Methylphenidate HCL 5mg to have in the morning, which will last around 4-5 hours.  Side effects would be tummy aches, headache  for the first 3 days and loss of appetite.  She suggested to give it on the weekend.

Hiking Trail Bonita Falls

Posted on by MICHELLE N

We primed William the night before that we’d go hiking; and to my surprise, he was ok with it.

It was a cloudy day which is perfect for hiking.  The “Hiking Trail Bonita Falls” is in San Bernadino National Forest, which is about 1 hr driving from Santa Ana.  We arrived to the parking area around 10:00 AM; and there were a few parking spaces left.  Actually there’s no designated parking lot: we parked along the road and then walked to the 2 green portable restrooms where there’s a little trail to get down.

Once we’re down, we’d have to cross a little creek: there are some tree trunks and rocks lying  across the creek so if you don’t to get wet, you can walk on these.  William walked on it fine; he was scared at first but kept walking and made it to the other side with Tim; I was so scared that it took me so long to cross it; William was waiting for me at the other end and handed out the wood stick toward me so that I could grab it.  Thank you for trying to help, my little boy! 🙂

There’s rocks every where; there’s no established trail!  The worse part is that there’s no sign at all.  We kept walking on the rocks and asked people for directions when we saw someone.  We walked so slow that a few groups of people could easily passed by us, leaving us alone by ourselves.  We thought about giving up a few times.  William looked tired but he did not complain or cry/whine at all.  He was so good today.

“It’s a hidden trail to go up to waterfall, keep to the left” – the man said.   So we kept to the left and kept walking, still have no idea how far we needed to go because there’s no signs; the only signs we saw along the way are the paints that people sprayed on the rocks; there were some arrows pointing up.  When we were about to give up, we saw some people coming down from what looks like a trail to our left far ahead; “That must be the way to the waterfall” – I told William.  So instead of going back to the car, we aimed to that trail.  And finally we got there!

But, it’s not it! it’s the beginning of the trail to go UP to the waterfall: it’s an up hill which is full of more rocks!  We walked slowly, took breaks often and drank water; at one point William wanted to go back to the car; then suddenly there it is, we heard the sound of the water!  So we encouraged him to keep walking and finally we found it.  It’s just simply beautiful!

William tried to get near to the waterfall, he enjoyed sitting on the rocks and looking at the water; we took some pictures and short video clips.  It’s a small area so when it was started to get crowded,  we decided to leave.

The way back of course is faster because now we know the way; but it was so windy that William asked for his jacket.

We crossed that little creek again to get to the other side; but this time we did not care if our feet got wet!

“William, did you like the hike and waterfall?” – I asked.  “Yes” – he replied softly.

I’m glad that he’s starting to like hiking and being outdoor.  Last year we went to the Malibu state park, he ran back to the car as fast as he could when he saw a small butterfly!

Meet The Nurse Practitioner (2nd time)

Posted on by MICHELLE N

It was Friday, we had a meeting at 10:00 with Ms. Elyse, the Nurse Practitioner from the Center for Autism as scheduled.  I took a day off to take William to their office.  I’ve been priming him about this appointment since yesterday, William was not scared at all, in fact he kept asking me “Can we go now?”.

They called me on Thursday to confirm the appointment. Upon checking in, they checked our temperature and asked a few questions about Covid-19: if we live/meet with someone with Covid-19, if we have fever, etc.  Then they asked us to wait; the office is nice, big and … empty!  I guess because of covid-19 they don’t bring clients to the office unless it’s necessary.

After 10 minutes waiting, we got called by a lady.  William ran to her immediately.  She asked William to take off sandals and step up on the scale; she measured him and took his blood pressure.  William did what she asked without hesitation!  Never seen him so excited in a doctor’s office before. She asked if there’s any reports that we need to give it to Ms. Elyse so I gave her the forms that filled out by Ms. Newmand and Mr. Casteneda.

Then she took us to a room and asked us to wait for Ms. Elyse.

Of course William could not sit still while waiting: he touched this and that, he opened the drawers, he tried to pull down the window blinds.  Ten minutes after 10:00 AM, Ms. Elyse knocked on the door.  She asked us to sit in the corner far away from her desk, which is understandable with the rule of 6 feet apart in this pandemic time.

She asked if Williams wanted some toys, “No, I don’t need it”, William replied.  Ms. Elyse asked, “What do you think, mom?”.  “Maybe some Lego” – I replied.  Ms. Elyse left the room and came back with a small box of Lego blocks and gave it to William, she assured that these are sanitized.

Ms. Elyse  had the forms in her hand; she said that based on the teachers’ ADHD rating scores, William indeed has the ADHD.  She asked if I’m ready to discuss about medicine for William, I said “Yes”.  Then I told her about William’s sleep issue, that he cannot sleep until midnight.  From that moment on, to my surprise, her questions are about his sleep routine, what time he eats/showers/brushes teeth, does he watch TV in bed, etc.  I told her William takes shower before dinner around 7:00 PM, finishes dinner around 8 :00 PM, then we do some homework in the bedroom before he sleeps.

Then she suggested that we moved the brush teeth and shower time to 9:30 PM, give him some Melatonin 3mg and by 10:00 PM has to be in the bed room, read some bed time stories and turn off the lights.  She said shower might help him to relax and Melatonin takes some time to work; and TV/ipad/iphone/homework before going to bed will trigger his brain to work which is not good for falling asleep so need to avoid.  “Let’s try that for 4 weeks!” – she said.   “And no nap time!”

William during this time some times stacked up the Legos, some time walked around the room; One time he got up to Ms. Elyse’s desk but she immediately asked William to go back to his chair.

“Do you think improving his sleep routing will help with his being hyper?” – I asked.  “Most likely!” – she said.

One hour passed by, the last few minutes she checked William’s heart beat; asked William to pull up his shirts and looked for birth marks.  She said there’s one, very light in color on his right near the stomach.  I did not think that’s the birth mark until she said so.  Our time was up, she took us to a different way to exit the office.

Somehow I have the feelings that Ms. Elyse tries to avoid prescribing medicine for William.   In the first meeting, she said she never prescribes medicine in the first meeting; and that we’d discuss in the next meeting.  Now that we met the 2nd time, she focused on improving William’s sleep; and said that sleep might have negative affect on his focus.  It’s not that I want William to be on medication, but I wonder why.

And I never saw she smiles, even just once!  It’s so stressful to take care of an autistic boy, as well as all the meetings like this really bring me down.   A smile can bring some comfort, I think!  Somehow I remembered the first time we met the neurologist Le Thanh, he made the conversation fun and interesting.  I wish we can go back to his office but our family doctor’s billing lady said Dr. Thanh is no longer in the network of our funding source.  He’s such a nice man.

William weights 51 lbs, 47.5 inches tall and his blood pressure is good.

 

 

Blood Test

Posted on by MICHELLE N

We got the lab order from the mail from Center for Autism, Ms. Elyse ordered those for us for the tests of Genetics Chromosome and Fragile X (FMRT) w/ Reflex to Methylation Lavender; so I made the appointment with LabCorp from their web site, the appointment was  Monday morning.  Fasting is required so I chose the earliest time available which was 9:15 AM.   I sent out emails to my work that I’d be late for about an hour.

LabCorp location is near the Fountain Valley hospital which about 10 minutes from our house.   All 3 of use were going, we left the house around 8:30 AM.  William kept saying “I don’t like blood test” but he did not cry.  Email confirmation from LabCorp said to check in thru the phone so we did.  When we got to the office, there was about 9 people ahead of us.   9:30 AM and we were still not called so I walked up to the front desk and asked.  It happened that our paper was right there, she picked it up and said she was working on it.  She asked what’s the doctor name because she could not find Ms. Elyse name in the record.   Then she said the address on the lab order paper does not match with what listed in her computer.  Half more hour passed by, I walked up to her and asked if she got what she needed.  She said this is not some regular test, she had to call the San Diego office to find the code, and that this lab does not offer the other test.  And for the Genetics chromosome test, we had to fill out the form.  I took the form and looked at it, all questions are about symtoms, I had no idea how to answer so I walked back to her again.  She said she never deals with this form before but to take this test I have to fill it out.  So I told her that I’d take the form the Ms. Elyse.

It was 10:30 AM.  We wasted 2 hours for nothing.

“Why we did not have the blood test?” – William asked. “Because we need to fill out more forms” – I answered.  We hurriedly drove back home because I needed to get back to work; feeling worried that I have to take more time off for the next appointment and the worse part is that we don’t know which lab that offers the other test.

Beautiful Wildflowers

Posted on by MICHELLE N

It’s Sunday morning, while we were still in bed, I told William that today we’d go to the yellow flower fields.   Knowing that he does not like flowers, I told him to choose. “We’re going to the flower fields, if you don’t want to go, you can stay home with aunt Lily; Mama & Papa will go alone.  Do you want to go with Mama & Papa or you want to stay home?” – Of course his answer is “Yes, I want to go”.  Prime him ahead most of the time works out fine; I guess when he knows what to expect, he less likely to have behaviors for activities that he does not like.

Tim just had the Covid-19 vaccine shot yesterday morning.  He felt tired and asleep until noon.  William asked me several times, “Are we going or not?”.  I told him “Papa is not feeling well so we might not going”.  Around 3:00 PM, he asked again;  Tim woke up by this time so I told William to go to the bed room and ask if Papa wanted to go.  William ran in and I heard him asked “Papa, are we going to see the flowers?”.

It was the first time ever that we saw him so eager to go out to the flower fields.  He hates flowers, he has never wanted to go near any flowers.  Last week we went to see the mustard flowers in San Juan Capistrano, he insisted to sit in the car and refused to go out.

So we loaded up with some water and chips/cookies and soon on our way to Chino Hills State Park, where we heard that the mustard flowers are all blooming beautifully this week.

It took about 1 hour to get there: it was so crowded, a long line of cars after cars waiting to get to the park entrance, I guess because everyone wanted to see what nature has to offer.  We saw lots of people walking back to their cars that parked along the road with sweat on their face: it was a sunny day and probably it was a long hike for them.

As we approached the park entrance, it was such a beautiful scene open before our eyes: hills and hills full of yellow flowers!  Under the bright sunlight the yellow flowers were even shinier!  William seemed so excited!  When the ranger stopped us to give us some instructions: the road is narrow, with lots of people walking, so drive slow and safely.  William said “OK” to each of his instruction!

The park entrance is $5.00 which is not bad at all.  The road up hill is indeed narrow but lots and lots of flowers along the road.  It’s such a beautiful landscape that no words can describe.  Whenever we stopped to take the pictures, William would get out of the car and ran around.  Whenever he gets excited like this, he does not care about his safety.  He’d run around in the parking lot which almost gave me a heart attack of worrying some cars might hit him.  He’s very fast, it’s hard to catch up with him.

We drove all the way to the end, and  told him we’d hike a bit.  He jumped out of the car and so ready to hike! It was the first time ever that he’s willing to hike around the flowers without complaining!  I think he was just bored of staying home :).

The park closes at 7:00 PM so we headed out; we stopped at this most beautiful view point on the way out.  William was still so excited that he was running around.  I love to see him this happy!

He felt asleep for about 15 minutes on the way home. I’d be tired if I run around that much too.

Chino Hills State Park
4721 Sapphire Rd, Chino Hills, CA 91709
Open: 8:00 AM – 7:00 PM
$5.00 park entrace

There’s lots of hiking trails so wear comfortable shoes. I heard there’s rattle snakes here so be carefull.

First Meeting With Ms. Elyse

Posted on by MICHELLE N

It was our first time to meet Ms. Elyse, the Nurse Practitioner.  Due to the pandemic Covid-19, it was a zoom video meeting.   She requested that we moved the camera so that she could see William’s whole body, not just the face. William as usual would not sit still: he kept moving around, jumped up and down on the couch.  Ms. Elyse asked him some basic questions like his name, mom and dad names & phone numbers, our home address.  William said “I don’t know” but with my help of telling him the first word, he’d finish the rest.  He was sleepy (or bored?) that he ran into the bed room several times, I had to bring him back to the zoom meeting.

Ms. Elyse asked a lot of questions, most questions are similar to those in the intake application.  Then she confirmed that William has Autism and ADHD.  She suggested to meet William in person in 1 month to discuss about the medicine for ADHD if I’m interested.  I said “Yes”.

She said to send William for blood tests:  Genetics Chromosome and Fragile X (FMRT) w/ Reflex to Methylation Lavender.

She’s a very serious person, I don’t think I saw her smile at all during our zoom meeting.