tumbleweed the extended australia trip

[Drailed]

Jesus, now you mention that - sounds like a nightmare. Whats the problem with the grandfather? Bit touchy feely?

[diggerdickson]

Manic, violent alcoholic, and chuck in a few other disorders. Not kidding here. I stood toe to toe with him once when he smacked my boy and i watched his eye twitch uncontrollably. He will never see my kids agian. Tracy's cousins are awesome but her immediate family is a twisted bunch of fuc&ks who I never want to see agian.

[diggerdickson]

You can choose your friends but you can't choose your family. It took Tracy 40 odd years to break free from their hold. Is she effected from it all, unfortunately yes

[PeepeelaPew]

...

[diggerdickson]

I get Tracy's longing to be around her cousins. She has never had a good family life and its hard for her at times. We leave tomorrow though Tracy's heart is very heavy. It's hardseeing our kidsmissing out on extended family though not this time. We are at gulgong showground and as soon as we got here Tracy's headache lifted. Tomorrow we drive like hell though its going to be a tough week or two for the missus as memories are dragged up and friends are left behind

[Drailed]

Vacate Digger, vacate. Mudgee is too small a place to live amongst such poison.

[diggerdickson]

We have been holed up at kenilworth for a while now. Looks like we are staying till Christmas at least before heading back south and up the middle to the rock.

We are mainly here to try to get some help for Noah. Our pedo is here and so far we have had two appointments. He is on a cocktail of medicines. The first is Risperidone 1 mg and the next is fluvoxamine maleate 50 mg for his anxiety. He has developed a terrettes tic as well. We have started him seeing a pysc as well to try to help with his anger management.

In the meantime I've let myself go with stress eating ( lots of sugar ) plus drinking during stressful times. I've just bought a season ticket to the pool here and will start some training to try to get fit agian as I want to try to get ready for the first cyclone swell.

Well that's all and will give a update later on my boy. If anyone's ever up this way drop in and say gday

[ctd]

My son (aspergers) also used to get tourette's tic but as he has become older (now 14) they are much much less. I think that reduction over time is pretty common. FWIW. Anger management is also useful

[PeepeelaPew]

...

[diggerdickson]

Noah is just 11 and his tics have only Just started in the last six months.

Legion, I think you might be right mate.

The pysc wants us to start a behavioural management programme. Sigh, I thought that was called parenting.. Will go to one more session though I've got a gut feeling this pysc at the one for Noah.

We just found out that we could have got some support for early intervention down at Maroochydore years ago. Unfortunately no one decided it was important enough to tell us. Could have helped so much. Dr Scorer could have told us this instead of leaving us to struggle on our own. Time for a new doctor

[Davros]

It's a merry go round. Does your young fella quality for the NDIS? Hopefully you guys get some respite.

[diggerdickson]

What is NDIS, sorry for my ignorance

[diggerdickson]

And yet, it is a merry go round. You have to fight for everything.

[Davros]

National Disability Scheme. You may be up for some funding and care. Check it out it covers a wide range of conditions and let's face it something back from the government is always welcome.

[ctd]

From the sounds of it you should be able to get in the NDIS. It's a bit of a run around as well but it helps with funding etc

[Drailed]

Honestly mate, being on this bus going from pillar to post.... Is it possibly making things worse?

[diggerdickson]

Honestly mate, being on this bus going from pillar to post.... Is it possibly making things worse?

Nah mate. Its actually helped a hell of a lot in a strange sort of way for many reasons. Whilst we were renting we were caught in a cycle of continually moving houses every six months. It screwed both kids up. They never got settled into a bedroom before we were moving again. Either the house sold or the rent went up so much we had to move. Now they have there own beds that will never get sold out on them. I will never quite understand how people with aspergers think but this point means so much to both our kids. They can stick things on the windows or walls without fear of the consequences.

The main disadvantage to us has been getting medical help for Noah. This has become an issue for him this year only and that is why we are now stopped at Kenilworth till we get it sorted. It could take another six months, or longer, if that is the case so be it.

As for schooling we found the system failed our kids unfortunately. The best thing we could do for them was to home school them and this is what we do. Our oldest is thriving on this, while Noah is struggling. With his meltdowns he would struggle even more in school. We are considering pulling up stumps as Noah may now need more support than what we can give him. If that is the case we will head to Warnambool and look for somewhere to rent and enter the rental cycle once more.

Time will tell, we will be guided by what we believe is best for our kids for their futures rather than what we want to do. Ideally I would love to go back to work, live in a house, surf at isolated reefs and beaches down south, earn some coin, maybe even buy a few luxuries for us. Though at this time my kids need me more at home.

There are so many other reasons to keep moving, though we are always aware that one day it may change without notice.

I know I cant really answer that question Drailed without really going a hell of a lot deeper than what I have, and I dont really want to do that.

So moving from pillar to post, seeing Australia, learning natural history, experiencing life to the fullest for our kids, it defiantly aint making it worse, but right now maybe, just maybe, it aint making it better either.

[Cranked]

Good on ya digger, you seem a great parent to me