Wonderful kids

The kids are out of school for the summer. Their last day of school was last Friday, the 5th of June. I went to the awards ceremony and saw Annee promoted to Jr. High. It was great. It is really hard to come to grips with the fact that I have a teenager, or an almost teenager. She has grown so fast! I don't feel old enough or competent enough to be raising a teen. It really seems unreal.

Annee has had a few health issues in the last few weeks. I had her evaluated by a psychologist to see if we can stop her hand clenching and eye blinking. I was positive that it is because of anxiety, and not a neurological issue. He confirmed my thinking. He diagnosed her with anxiety and mild OCD. The OCD surprised me a little. I didn't realize some of the things she does is directly related to being obsessive and compulsive. But now that I know more about it, I am seeing a lot more obsessive and compulsive behaviors in myself. I don't have anything that interferes with my life, so it is fine. But some of Annee's can tend to interfere with daily activities, so we are treating it. Dr. Connolly put her on Zoloft. We don't have the dose right yet, but hopefully it will start to help her a lot.

He suggested weekly counseling, so we went to a counselor last night. Her name is Lezlie. She works with Michael Bowman, who has counseled both me and Annee before. Lezlie is very nice and has a lot in common with Annee. For example, she grew up without a father also, so she can give some specific insight into that problem.

Lezlie did her own evaluation and thinks Dr. Connolly is "spot on" with his diagnosis. So they are going to work on both the anxiety and controlling the OCD in her weekly therapy. Annee is really happy with her, so I think this will work out great. I really hope Lezlie can help her not focus so much on things she can't change. Annee dwells on that kind of thing way too often.

I took Ty and Dessa to Dr. Harris last week to adjust their meds. I thought they both needed to have their doses increased. He agreed for Tyler and we have upped his dose. He starts the new dose tomorrow, so we'll see how that goes.

As far as Dessa goes, we found from her height and weight that she has only grown 1/2 an inch since November and hasn't gained any weight in a year. That worried us both of course. So we decided to take her off the meds for the summer, as one of the biggest side effects is lack of appetite. We hope that with out the meds, she will eat a lot more and gain weight. If so, we will evaluate what to do then, whether we put her on a different med or see how she does in school without it. If she doesn't gain some weight over the summer, he said she might have some problem with absorbing food, and we will test for that. If that is the case, she would have to be on a special diet. Needless to say, I am hoping it is just the meds. So far, it seems that way. She went out to lunch with mom and the others yesterday and she was the only one who ate her whole meal. That never happens! I am very encouraged by it. We'll make her a porker yet! ;) Totally kidding of course.

Ty has been great lately. He is getting to be more silly and fun. He and Dessa like to play in the back seat of the car, and he can really get that girl laughing! It is a good sound to hear. Ty doesn't laugh a whole lot, so when he does, it really makes me smile.

My kids are the greatest. They are the light in my life and keep me going every day.