My little one with autism is approaching 3 1/2. He’s a great little guy with a ton of personality and he’s so smart. I have watched him grow for the past few months in his therapy at school and it has been so exciting. We got a progress report recently showing he is meeting all of his IEP goals.

I have felt hopeful. I have felt proud of him, and often filled with intense emotion watching him advance. I have felt many things, but disappointment has not been one of them.

Over the past 10 days or so, we have seen major regression but it has only been at home. I have spoken with his teacher and his day care provider and they have seen no change in him. He’s still doing really good.

So why are we having so many problems at home? I just don’t get it.

I have had a really, really tough couple of months. Between starting work, the holidays, and everything else in between I have been one big, giant yoyo.

With pretty severe depression settling in, I started the Effexor and ended up a little manic. I knew it was likely, actually, I knew it was inevitable. Going a little manic created it’s own set of issues for me and this life I live. My doc spotted it long before I did, only I didn’t want to listen to her.

Typical.

So I had a very dramatic upswing, major irritability and crazy sleep habits started. To say I had trouble sleeping is an understatement. It was impossible.

My 3 year old son has autism. He is a wonderful little boy. He is very smart, playful, and so sweet. We love him so much. He is also our baby.

We worked with a program locally for about 6 months to get him into school. They provide a variety of therapies and work to help them. I really wanted him in a good program because I felt I was out of steam. I had spent 3 years working with him and teaching him that I was mentally and emotionally exhausted. I was ready to pass the torch to those more experienced with kids his age.

After a ton of testing and writing up a plan, he was accepted into the program. The program only in the morning, but it is a fantastic program. I was also on the hunt for a good child care provider for him for after his preschool. That was hard.

I had previously had some very bad experiences with childcare providers both in home and in a center. I was full of anxiety that for a while I didn’t think I would be able to place him in any type of child care setting. Until we met the most wonderful woman in the world!

I took some time to write about all the things I love about going back to work. With my kids though it has been a little tough. They have been so used to me being home that they don’t really know anything different.

I had expected my two middle kids to have the hardest time but to my surprise, they’re okay. When I get home they run to hug me as they used to always do with my husband. They greet me with smiles and kisses and quickly get back to whatever they were doing.

My teenager, now that is a totally different story. I expected he would handle it the best but it turns out, it has been the hardest on him. It took me a little while to figure out what was going on with him but now that I know, it breaks my heart.

I started working again last month. I have been anxious, but I have enjoyed everything about it. It’s a great situation for me and my illness and it’s working out very well. Let me tell you all the wonderful things about my new career.

I get to work in my PJ’s. Yes, that is awesome! When I’m having a tough day I can throw on my robe, park my bum on the couch and work. Ahh, that relieves a massive amount of stress for me. I can have a bad day and quickly come out of it because I can be free to be lazy and irritable at home and avoid any conflict with other people.

Yep, my teenager turned 16 this weekend. Aside from feeling old it was an exciting day. We took him to breakfast for his birthday and took him to the mall so he could go shopping. It was strange that my 16 year old was at the mall and didn’t find anything at all to buy. It was fun though.

He’s probably the only kid in his class without some type of a smart phone. I was okay with that, to me that screamed spoiled and I think he’s been plenty spoiled enough. My husband and I had tossed around the idea of buying him an iPhone for his 16th birthday, but we hadn’t made any firm decisions yet.

Anyway, I knew I had to change my cell minutes to unlimited with my job, so I was going to upgrade from my iPhone to a better phone. My husband and I decided it was time for him to have his own iPhone, versus a very basic phone with a sliding keyboard. Well, now he is big stuff. He has an iPhone which (for today) doesn’t have a broken screen like most of his friends. After squealing with excitement, he puffed his chest with pride. He almost cried.

He was pretty certain he would never get a smart phone, at least not before he could pay the bill himself. What he doesn’t realize is I have the best leverage ever. I’m such a sneaky mom!

Depression is sneaky. It’s almost like one day you’re okay and then next you are wondering what happened to your life. Well, it feels that way to me at least.

I have brief episodes of depression more often than I would like. I cant say that it is crippling or severe depression, but it’s annoying and nagging. It’s just like a rain cloud hovering over me. A simple med adjustment usually does the trick to kick me back into high gear, but not always.

I started effexor the first of the year because I knew I was feeling glum. I was sleepy, overwhelmed, weapy, and extremely sluggish. I had no interest in anything and I just wanted to be a bum. I knew it was time to bring effexor back because I felt like I had lost all hope for happiness. I was right.

She gave me the effexor knowing I was not doing well just by the signs and sympoms I was having. Yesterday she pulled out her sheet of paper to score my depression since starting the effexor and it doesn’t look all that good. I’m right at the bottom of moderate almost to severe. Yikes.

The decision to go back to work was a hard one. We went back and forth for a while trying to decide what I wanted to do exactly. Well, now that we have figured it out things around here are changing a lot.

I haven’t been blogging as much, but that will pick up real soon! It’s just been kind of nuts. I’m adjusting pretty well to all of this and I think I might actually like it. Yes, I said it, I think I like working.

I am on my own I don’t have anyone breathing down my neck and telling me how to do my job. I don’t really have anyone to answer to and I can set my own schedule. That makes a big difference when it comes to me getting out of bed. I don’t feel the pressure like I used to.

I have never had a hard time talking to my oldest son about sex. It has never been this huge hush hush subject. We are very open with him about everything.

Unfortunately, he is turning 16 next week and all that talking and open honesty hasn’t been as effective as I had hoped it would be. He has sex on the brain, and I don’t know how to approach it.

I am good friends with his girlfriends mom, and we talk a lot about how we will approach the sex thing when the time comes, and it appears the time is near and we are both just sorta going “Uhhh, what’s next??”

On Christmas Eve we were all standing around the kitchen as a family. We kept it simple and made nuggets for the kids. It wasn’t an “around the table” dinner; we were all too anxious awaiting Santa.

In the middle of the commotion my 3 year old walks into the middle of all of us with a distressed look on his face. He was gagging. This is something that happens pretty frequently with him because he tends to take larger bites and packs his mouth full of food. Typically it is not a problem.

I leaned down to him to see he was choking, really choking. He wasn’t just gagging. I didn’t start to panic right away, but I grabbed him and started the heimlich. A large chunk of food fell from his mouth and I felt relief, however, he was still choking. That is when I started to panic.