It is Sunday night. I can hear Ewen talking to DH. DH is sitting in the chair next to Ewen's bed. Ewen is still huffing but it was slightly better today which calms my heart. He had his friend here and they did lots of video games and editing. But we also all went to an arts and crafts festival for a couple of hours and the skies were blue and the air, 73 degrees. The boys got their hair spray-painted blue at one of the booths which was really fun for them. At first Ewen wanted to keep his hair blue for his first real day at his new school tomorrow, but he changed his mind tonight and washed it out. He still is weird about water. When he decided to wash it out, instead of getting in the shower he started to pour water from the sink onto it. I saw this and told him he was going to turn the bathroom and the rug blue and to get into the shower. I bought him some new clothes for school tomorrow, and a Trapper Keeper type of folder-holder with lots of zips and pockets and it has a long strap for carrying on the shoulder. I also got him a planner to write his homework assignments in and a journal since I think I remember that Amira used to journal in that class every morning when she had the same teacher. One thing interesting about tomorrow is that a classmate from his former school/class will be joining him at his new school. This child's mother pulled him out of class last week when she heard the teacher "bullying" him. It looks like I'm not the only one who thinks that his old class is a negative environment for the kids because of the teacher.
We gave Ewen 3.5 ml's of Prozac tonight. It seems to be helping his tics a little to bring it down, but I am also afraid to loose how well he has been doing with getting all the way out of his funk. He has done less frequent and quieter huffing. But he has been swishing saliva around in his mouth a bit now which is really irritating. His is still patting his legs and tables but not as deliberately.
I watched him at the festival today and he was able to walk around the booths and look at the pictures and photographs and not be too antsy to be interested in what was going on around him. He even talked to some of the artists about their work. I was really glad to see that he could think about things besides his own constant comfort and getting quickly to what was supposed to happen next. He is always in such a hurry to do everything. I think that one of the reasons he likes Agar.io so much is because the player is always speeding around the board like a lunatic. He has a problem with eating because of being in such a hurry. He crams the whole thing he is eating, into his mouth, then has to chew for ages and sometimes feels like he has to spit it out because he has too much in his mouth. He works on swallowing food every time he goes to CBT. But he is working just on swallowing there. I will try again to talk to his therapist about Ewen learning patience and taking small bites. She didn't seem to hear me last session.
I think about where we were before all this, before December 15th 2015, and I wonder if we are back to how things were now. The answer is no. It is different because of his tics. He wasn't huffing all day before all this. But right before this started happening I remember worrying about his patience. I let him take his book to school because he couldn't stand just sitting there when he had finished his work and the rest of the class were still doing their work. I wonder if never being bored has something to do with it and always having a video game to turn to at home or in the car with his device, spoils him for those times that he has no screen to switch on. but then I think about when my anxiety disorder was really bad and it was the same. I needed distraction to feel ok and even then I could still feel my heart race. Back then we didn't have devices to keep us not-bored all the time but I still felt the same thing he did with the anxiety...to need to fill the time with something that isn't our own thoughts.
I wonder if his therapist can work on that at all. I wonder how much the Prozac can help that. I suspect it can help a lot, but we can't put it up because it sets his tics off.
Before all of this he would just have random tics that went away quickly and weren't much to worry about. But now the tics are severe and he would probably be diagnosed with tourettes if he was tested for it. I don't want Prozac to give him tourettes syndrome.
He is still needy at night. He is still not content. He is still troubled but trying and trying. I wish I could wave the joy wand for him and let him settle under it's comfort. I wish...
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