The Harrison Family: October 2017 - Halloween and more family challenges

Just as things start to settle down post flood - God throws some curve balls our way

Carter my sweet yet sensitive boy. He is so smart it is almost scary but he is still very immature. We had challenges with him in schools for some time now. He has a lot of energy and gets board easy and gets himself in trouble. I do not have problems with him (except the typical 4 year old stuff) but he really struggles at school. We took a lot of protective measures this year to try and avoid problems. I had him seeing a counselor this summer and we have been working with the school counselor Miss Drake to get him in the right class and we even met his teacher before the year to try and get off to the right foot. We knew that Carter would likely be bored in the classroom as he is more advanced than most of the others so we even talked through ways to keep him stimulated through the use of computers. I think Carter around a lot of other kids gets really excited and almost anxious and acts very impulsively. He wants kids to like him so he does silly things to try and make them laugh or get attention (either good or bad). He is also very sensitive and gets his feelings hurt and when that happens he at times will respond by being physical with another kid. He also is like his daddy and very OCD - and when someone doesn't do things the way he thinks they need to be done or follow the process he thinks - he struggles. This has been really hard for me because when he is with me I really do not have problems and do not see a lot of the behaviors the school sees. The school got a new principal this year - a very nice lady names Ms Muncher and I think she is close to my age. Well she came into the classroom and observed Carter upset in time out and saw him knock over the chair he was sitting in and she made the call to suspend him... yes you read that right... my 4 year old was SUSPENDED. Imagine my thoughts when I get that call at work at 8:30 AM telling me my son is suspended for a day. I am hysterical and crying and feeling like a complete failure as a mom. How can I have a pre-k kid that cannot go to school? In typical Kristen fashion I jump to action - I call his pediatrician to see if there are any behavioral doctors that can help - and she referred me to Dr Mosier who is claimed to be the best in the business. I also decided to enroll him in Karate - some friends told me it was good for structure and discipline and I thought - what can it hurt I will use all the help I can get. I also scheduled a meeting with the school principal, school counselor and his teacher to align on what is going on in the classroom and to lay out an action plan. While i was super upset at the school for suspending a preschooler I was pleased with the response I received from our meeting. They acknowledged that they needed to do more to keep him challenged and did not do what they were planning to do during the storm. This was a tough thing to go through for sure but things with Carter have improved. With Carter my motto is progress not perfection.

Riley - my sweet girl... she unlike her brother is doing fantastic in school. Her dreaded ears have started giving us trouble again. I Noticed an infection in her right ear and although we went to the Dr and had multiple antiobiotics nothing seemed to cure this infection. Her ENT said we needed to see a specalist - I though an ENT was a specialist but I guess there are just Ear Dr's too. Riley's ENT referred us to a specialist downtown named Dr Chang. Riley, Justin and I met with him and it was the WORST Dr visit I have ever been to. He had a horrid bedside manner and talked right through Riley. He wanted to do a surgery on her and told us that one of the side effects is brain matter leakage... Riley was sitting right there and hysterically crying and he just kept talking. I left there and knew there was NO way that man was cutting on her head. I knew we had to get another opinion. I found a Dr at Texas Children's hospital and met with him and he was amazing. Much better experience and he explained things to all of us and was fantastic with Riley. He decided he wanted to do another round of tubes first - and we would go from there. Surgery was scheduled for November 2.

Waiting for the Dr

Halloween this year was a ton of fun. The kids school had a Halloween family fun night and we went to that with Kristen and Jeff. Riley chose to be Princess Tiana and Carter Thor. Mags was not happy with her moms halloween costume of choice so she wore Riley's snow white dress. Its a little big but still looked cute!

Thor and Princess Tiana

These three!

On halloween night we decided to go to a trunk or treat they hosted because a lot of neighborhoods are still vacant due to flooding. We went with Kristen and Maggie and had a great time. After trunk or treat we came back to our neighborhood with a bunch of new neighborhood friends. It was rainy and miserable weather but the kids didn't care and had a ton of fun.