November 4

This week we got 30 hours! Sonia (Carl's sister) is now officially moved in to her apartment and is my full-time assistant. Woohooo!! She does 4 SR sessions a week and watches Amy so I can get more SR time too. Sonia is also helping with laundry, cleaning, cooking, dishes, etc. It is so wonderful to have this help and she is great company too!

Sarah's language continues to get ever clearer. When she met Sonia's cat B. she did a very good attempt at saying his name. It might have even been fully correct, I just don't remember. Sarah also said Sy. perfectly at least once. She continues to ask for her various volunteers to come in. When she asks for A. to come in she then follows it with "new o(r)k." She often wants to sit on the front steps to wait for her volunteers, though this request is often several hours before their scheduled arrival so we don't do it.

During her bath today Sarah said that sharks, fish, and ducks swim in the water (each was a separate sentence).

Halloween... ah....another opportunity for me to reflect upon why I get so attached to things going MY way and get upset when they don't. Sigh. We let Sarah lie down for 20 minutes before attempting costumes.  She didn't sleep but I think giving her a break was good. She was frogging and I was out of my SR mindset of allowing it and into my Halloween mindset that it was time to get dressed! This is why it can be helpful to have two parents. Carl suggested giving her the break, reminding me that it was our desire (not Sarah's) to do trick or treating. Why is it sometimes so hard to remember  that the most important thing is having a loving relationship between myself and my family -- rather than getting out the door in costumes by a certain time? With all of these places where I lose my happy equilibrium I am reminding myself that the first step is accepting and acknowledging where I am and then I can change from there. I often try to skip the acknowledging and accepting and that sometimes works but not always.

We did manage a short bit of trick-or-treating, with neither girl particularly interested in candy but very interested in our neighbors, houses, and porches. Sarah went as a Steeler since she loves her jersey and could thus basically be in normal clothes. Amy went as a ladybug, having rejected the Tigger costume every time a choice was offered. (today Amy decided to be Tigger all morning!) We walked through the woods to see the friends with whom we used to spend Halloween before we moved to our new neighborhood. At least at their house we actually did go inside! N. said that she can see a big difference in Sarah's language and interactiveness compared to when we started Sarah-Rise. Yay! I know I write up all these notes to help me remember our progress but it is so easy to adjust to the new normal, even while being amazed and celebrating it, that it is helpful to have reminders. It is getting harder to remember when Sarah couldn't say almost anything she wanted.

This week I went grocery shopping with the girls, as I often do. Sometimes it goes smoothly the whole time and sometimes Sarah says she wants to be done the whole time. Sometimes Amy cries, but rarely. This week the cart I had them in had a broken seat belt so effectively it was one huge double belt. I thought it would be fine. Amy had other ideas. She cried several times and tried to climb out of the seat (which she could do). So we had to just wait for her to settle again. Through all of this Sarah was awesome. She only said she was done once. She ate her carrot. When Amy cried, Sarah gave her kisses. Sarah waited patiently as Amy had her little tantrums. Thank goodness it was only one kid having a melt down. I also didn't lose my own temper, which was an achievement. I was feeling stressed but I kept reminding myself that I never feel good when I yell at the kids.

Today felt like a harder day for both girls and I'm not sure why. I'd like to blame it on Halloween last night (rescheduled in Pittsburgh because of bad weather on the actual day) or on the time change. Maybe the why doesn't matter. It is often humbling though when there is a lot more upset than usual (especially Amy being upset) because then I have a much harder time too. Just when I think I have it all figured out there is something to keep it interesting.