Our School Holiday So Far...

Don't you just love school holidays?  For the working parent, the drive to work is quick and stress free and for the stay at home parent, the option to get up when you want and not have the usual morning rush is great.

I have had both of these so far during the holidays.  Last week I was working, so the boys went to the childminder or nursery and I managed to get into work early pretty much all week.  My eldest had gone on holiday to Butlins with Laura from Tired Mummy of Two as he is friends with Laura's brother, so I only had to worry about getting the two little ones ready for the day.  PJ had a great time from what he tells me.  Thank you Laura for taking him with you.

This week I am home with the boys.  We had planned to go out as a family to Legoland on Sunday, but as the boys weren't 100%, that had to be postponed until the next day.  I was a bit worried about taking them by myself on the Monday without hubby there to support me, but thankfully, the boys didn't play up too much.

We managed to check out some of the new attractions, such as the Hero Factory and we also watched our first 4D movie in The Legends of Chima.  Both of which were fantastic.  I can see that I am going to have to buy some of the Lego Hero models for Aled's upcoming birthday!  I was really impressed that the boys kept their 3D glasses on throughout the whole movie.  Both the boys were fasinated with the movie and I caught Noah reaching out to try to touch the characters when the appeared to be really close!  I was a little bit worried with how Aled would react to the 4D element of the movie, but when the 'rain' and 'snow' came down, he loved it.  In all the times we've been to Legoland, I can't believe this is the first time that I've taken the boys in to the Imagination Theatre!


We also discovered that Noah is now well over 1m tall, meaning that he can go on some of the bigger rides.  I couldn't wait to get the boys onto Pirate Falls.  I think the picture speaks for itself!

Enjoying a milkshake

Yesterday we had some medical appointments to go to, so not as much fun.  After a bit of rushing around first thing due to the boys letting us have a lie in, we head off to PJ's CAHMS appointment.  The sessions are going really well and I'm positive that at the end of his treatment PJ will be in a
much better place.  As PJ's sessions are 1-2-1 with the therapist, I took the little ones off for a donut and milkshake (well, mocha in my case).

As soon as PJ was out of his appointment, we then had to dash off to Windsor for Aled's check up at the eye hospital.  It wasn't all good news for Aled though as after 6 months of wearing his glasses, his weak eye hasn't improved as much as it should have.  Therefore, Aled now has to wear an eye patch for three hours a day.  Thankfully, he is at a great age where we can tell him that

'Pirate Aled'

he's like a pirate and he is happy with this.  I also know that there is a girl in his class who wears a patch, so it's not something that is strange to him.  The box of patches that we have been given is great and there are 5 different fun designs on them, so he has a choice of which one to wear every day.  Yesterday he wore the blue with aeroplanes and today a red one with dragons.

For the rest of the week, we have a trip to the airport to pick up my mum tomorrow and then a playdate with a friend at the new soft play centre that has opened up in my town.  I'm also looking forward to our predicted warm day on Sunday and will hopefully manage to get out again then.

I hope you are having just as much fun as we are this Easter holiday!

Jackie. x

Keep CAMHS and carry on...

For the last few months I have noticed my eldest PJ has become depressed.  He would come home from school looking all down and say how he's feeling really depressed.  When asked why, he would say he doesn't know.  PJ does have a tendency to over exaggerate things, such as if he was to knock his ankle he would tell everyone that he's twisted it.  Because of this, I palmed it off as teenage angst and attention seeking until a few weeks ago when things got worse.  

About a year ago he deleted his dad and me from his facebook friends list and therefore, although I will log into his account every so often to check all is as it should be; most of what he puts up is between him and his friends.  About 3 weeks ago while I was at work my husband got a call from his sister asking him what PJ's status was about as she was worried.  I logged into PJ's account and he had put up a status about how he was hearing voices in his head telling him he wasn't worth it and how down he was feeling.  I read through some of the comments and the majority of people who commented were worried about him, but he did have one 'friend' tell him how he looks like he's attention seeking and if it's all a load of crap then PJ will get a beating.

After seeing this status I decided to deactivate his Facebook account.  I wasn't sure if he was just attention seeking, but even so, how far would he go to get the attention he was craving.  I explained to him that although it is best to talk to someone, putting a status up on Facebook was not the way to go.

I made an appointment to see the doctor, which PJ agreed to.  When PJ first started coming home saying he was depressed, I offered to take him to the doctors, but he always said he wasn't that bad, so the fact that he agreed to it this time was quite a big step.

We went to the doctors and PJ told him how he was feeling.  From what he told the doctor, the 'voices' that he's hearing seems to be his thoughts.  I don't know about you, but when I think, it's in my own voice, which is what PJ was hearing.  The doctor decided the best course of action would be to refer him to CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services).

We went to the CAMHS appointment on Tuesday and saw a lovely lady, who is a Family Psychotherapist  She carried out the assessment for PJ to find out the best way forward.  She spoke to us both together to build a bit of background information and then spoke with PJ alone.  We were there for about an hour.  At the end of the session she told us what she thought was the cause and how she would like to treat him.  Her diagnoses shocked me and I was so annoyed with myself for not realising it.  She has put PJ's behaviour and  his current mental state down to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Back in May PJ had been mugged for his mobile phone, which had knocked his confidence for a while.  As it was so long ago, and PJ appeared to have regained his confidence, it didn't even occur to me that this could be a factor.  How wrong was I?!

Going forward, PJ is now being referred to the Anxiety and Depression Care team and they will start him off with Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.  I think being able to just get it out of his system has been a huge relief for PJ and already he seems happier.  It's going to be a tough few months for all of us I think, but hopefully, at the end of it, I will have the old PJ back.

Jackie. x