Tuesday, June 9, 2015

F is for Family

F is for Family.  We had a family reunion on Dauphin Island, which was an obvious cause for concern.  Obviously, I wanted Apollo to be able to connect with family that he doesn't always get to see, but I worried that his social anxiety may rear its ugly head, or worse - that we would have a total and complete meltdown and be stuck an hour from home with people who aren't familiar with Apollo and would essentially come across as strangers to him.  I was less concerned with the adults, as he seems to be okay with most people who are grown - it's strange children he freaks out around.  There ended up being 11 kids under the age of 18 there, including Apollo and he was familiar with 6 of them, so there were only 4 strange kids.  In the best interest of everyone involved, I gave Apollo an extra Melatonin to take the edge off and reminded him that everyone there was a cousin.  Success!  The magic word! I admit I could become tempted with this special word to get Apollo to feel more comfortable with every strange child, but then it would lose its effectiveness and I absolutely don't want that.  So Apollo is willing to let down his guard for family in general, even strange family, and I will leave it at that - only actual cousins can be cousins. He did start to get agitated early in the day, but he crawled under the couch cushions and took a short little nap and he was much more relaxed afterwards - he even played a little bit of tag with some of the cousins. 


F is for Frolic.  After hanging out with the extended family for several hours, we downsized back to my aunt's condo and took the kids to the beach.  With it being just the "super six" that Apollo is used to, all of his walls crumbled down and he acted much like a normal child would.   Well, as normal as Apollo gets anyway.  He had so much fun digging in the sand, sticking his toes in the surf and finally diving into the waves.  I had to make sure that Apollo stayed in the super-shallows as he doesn't know how to swim yet, but he was content enough to sit in 4 inches of water and splash and giggle.  The kids spent over 30 minutes doing this - just diving into the water and splashing like they didn't have a care in the world.  Even little Phoenix was getting into the action.




F is for Finally.  As in we finally have our glasses!  They came in this week, so we swung by and picked them up - and let the chaos begin.  He is NOT happy about them.  In fact, I would even hazard to guess that he hates them - mostly.  I do think he is getting better with them now that he realizes he can actually SEE with them on, but it is going to be a long uphill battle to normalize the glasses with him.  Orion was simpler, but I think his vision is a bit worse than Apollo's, so the glasses made a bigger difference for him.  So far, I think we are looking mostly at astigmatism and (hopefully) not a serious one.  The good news is that with the glasses on properly (and him not snatching them off his face every two minutes), he can read 1/2 inch print from his lap.  I will take that any day!  Plus, he looks super cute and studious with them on.  He was disappointed he couldn't have blue ones, but I didn't want Orion and him to mix up their glasses, since their prescriptions are vastly different.  As a compromise, he got the same glasses, but in gunmetal gray.




F is for F@*k Up.  To wrap up this week's recap is going to one of the more irritating moments of my LIFE.  I am normally even-keeled, extremely patient and have found myself able to handle more of people's bulls&$% than most.  That probably comes from being dealt a mediocre hand and making it work.  Learning to cope with and help Apollo conquer his condition has bred a sense of control I never thought I would have.  Don't get me wrong, I lose my cool - all the time and over silly things.  But when it really counts, I am almost always able to calm myself and keep it inside... to play nice.  However, Apollo's doctor caused me to slip over that thin line between calm and chaos - he screwed up Apollo's medication.  In fact, he sent over the wrong prescription!  When I noticed Apollo was out, I immediately ran up to Wal-Mart to pick up the refill of his new dosage.  However, the doctor sent over the wrong prescription and insurance wouldn't authorize it.  First thing the next morning, I began calling the doctor - and calling and calling and calling.  I left so many messages I could recite them in my sleep!  A whole day and nobody could manage to pick up a phone and return the message of a mother whose child was out of medication and was unable to pick up more.  So he missed his first dose that night.  The pharmacist assured me that missing one dose wouldn't be detrimental to his well-being, so I sucked it up and took Apollo to the doctor's office the next morning for his rescheduled therapy appointment - only to find out it had been cancelled AGAIN.

Apollo has not seen his therapist since he started medication over 2 months ago.  Now I am even more frustrated, but decided that since I was in the office, I would get the medication issue sorted out then.  I demanded they fix it, they assured me they would and I got a call around 10 AM that they had sent over the right prescription.  Again, I go to Wal-Mart only to find out that that pharmacy is out and they had to transfer it to another store.  Then comes the doozy - the other store won't fill the prescription because the medication Apollo has been put on (which has been a lifesaver!) isn't even supposed to be prescribed for kids under 6!  Apollo was FOUR when it was prescribed.  It works so well for him though that I lost my cool a bit with the pharmacist and told him to tell me what I needed to do to get my kid his medication because missing a second dose and coming off of the medication abruptly could cause rebound hypertension, which is without saying, a potentially dangerous situation.  In the end, I went out for a THIRD time in one day to attempt to get his medication (with a migraine - hello auras!), apologized to the pharmacist for letting mama bear out of her cage, was reassured that they understood but were just covering themselves from any lawsuits, signed a waiver that I understood he wasn't supposed to be prescribed this medication, left a nasty voicemail for the supervisor at the doctor's office and FINALLY got Apollo's prescription with the reassurance that I won't have to sign another waiver and next time will be easier.  It had better be - sometimes it can be a little difficult to put mama bear back in her cage once you set her free.

2 comments:

  1. Aww I love the reunion pics of the kids playing in the surf! That situation with the medicine was just crazy! Glad you got it sorted out though. So how often is Apollo supposed to wear his glasses? He looks so cute in them!

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  2. He is supposed to wear them at all times, but that just isn't going to happen - at least not right away. Hopefully, as he gets used to them, it will become second nature to him.

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