Living in Chaos: Survival

Life is getting better...Update

Passing Peace...

Quietly, she sits, afraid to make a sound,
to breathe, to blink her eyes,
for fear that this harmonious moment may fly away
on feathered breezes into the balmy afternoon

Timidly, she savors the sweetness of the silence,
tasting and testing the fleeting pleasantness
heralded upon the scented winds which blow softly
caressing her cheek with a velvet grazing

Wordlessly, she lifts a song of praise to the heavens
with heartfelt thoughts of gratitude
for the gift of grace which has come to rest
within the battlefields of her irrational world

Unobserved, she remains closeted,
absent from perception
as customary enemies have shaken hands
upon a temporary field of truce and consolation

Wonderingly, she is amazed and astounded,
staggered and surprised at the occurrence
heretofore unachieved, whose miraculous manifesting
was previously thought, an impossibility

Admiringly, she gratefully takes pleasure from the view,
which ephemeral, may disappear
within a moment to leave behind
but a shadow of the marvelous happenstance

Ecstatically, this one instant of validation and glory
has established recompense for all past wounds and injustices
she has endured, repaid within the transitory experience,
wherein the momentary joy she feels will last,
for an eternity

I haven't written since last Friday, so this entry is in ways of an update.

It has been up and down, rise and fall, on the rollercoaster of David's life this week. Through the weekend, David has seemed to remain edgy, he is also tired, and I can see him gaining weight. I did add 12.5mg tid of his PRN Thorazine, to his daily medications. this has seemed to help to stem some of the severity of his agitation. It also seems to have increased his lucidity and ability to communicate in the evenings.

David seems to have the most difficult time in the morning. Given a choice, with nothing else more pressing, he would sleep until noon or later. He is tired, groggy, irritable, and edgy. Dalton on the other hand is hyper, invasive, obnoxious, oppositional, and pig-headed in the morning. He has been waking earlier than normal, so I have had to deal with getting between these two to keep the peace until David leaves for school.

Saturday, David had a rough morning, he and Dalton got into it before we took Dalton to his Challenger baseball game, however, he had cleared some but the time we got home. he mowed the neighbor's lawn for $$ and did a decent job. Gene was upset that David did not mow ours first. This got David upset.... We did manage to give a bit of space, and after we all had lunch, a nap or rest, etc... David did mow our lawn Sat evening. This is a definite improvement. I see that he is able to have motivation to do atask, and follow through and complete it. he is also showing the ability to do things we are asking of him, even when he woudl rather not, sometimes...

Sunday evening, David has a pretty good evening after a rough start to his day. Gene took the boys to the park and they played at and walked by the creek for a couple hours, until it started to rain. Gene had taken a nap Sun afternoon. I had tried to do the same, but did not do so with Gene. Instead, I lay on the sofa in the family room to play buffer between the boys. They kept taking turns trying to irritate the other, and initiate disagreement... So I stayed home while they did the park thing.

This week has been a similar pattern, I think it is becoming consistent... I guess this is a form of stability, at least to the extent that we have an idea what David'd temperment is likely to be at a certain time of day. Mornings are touchy at best, and afternoons, immediately following school are similar, ezpecially when Dalton gets home as well. However evenings, seem to settle out. We are able to have some good times now, that we had not been having before.

Monday evening, David was clearheaded and we actually had a good conversation about school, college, jobs, living arrangements, and future plans. We have his IEP conference (first one folowing his evaluation) on Thursday. We discussed the pros and cons of a GED, the need to get a job or volunteer, the necessity of maintaining school friends, even if he does do the GED, and our hopes for his future. It was an enjoyable evening. David was even able to play some basketball with Dalton, as long as Gene and I played interference between the edginess of their interactions.

Yesterday, David had his CBC dond for the Clozaril, and TSH levels for his endocrinologist. before we left, the boys had gotten very upset with each other, Dalton wa just home from school, David wanted to be left alone, and Dalton was unable to do so. David them went into his controlling behavior and yelling at Dalton instead of coming to me, then it spilled onto me as well...
I was pretty upset with both of them in the car. However, we did manage to calm down overall by the time we got to the lab, and on the way home. David had a goodevening and even did history homework!!!!! This is the first homework he has done in two months! I am amazed.

Overall, I am pleased with the progress of David's recovery. We are getting there. It is slow, but progres is being made. When we see his pdoc on Friday, we plan to ask about increasing the Clozaril so we can stop the Thorazine. We also plan to ask about shifting the heavier dose to the evening, and less in the morning. David is not happy about the sedation he is experiencing.

Today is a new day, and the lesson of the week is to appreciate and savor the good times when they occur to be able to recall them later when things are not going so well.

There is always a light, no matter how dim, if only we seek to find it.

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