Just increase your meds

This past week I had a bit of a dip again. Part of it was due to the frustration of not being able to seek expert advice on Ira and his autism and then for his speech impediment and partly I think it was also premenstrual. In any case it resulted in one day not being able to get myself out of bed to school. I did let them know. On Thursday I managed to go to the ministry training on following the correspondence school for grade one. Most of it was in the manual and a lot was in Shona so I didn't find it particularly useful. We were given a letter when we handed in work on Tuesday saying we needed to give $5 towards snacks for the bring and share! On the day they demanded instead a $5 registration fee.

When I went back to teaching Ira on Friday I was told that if I miss another day of school I lose the job. I was asked what was wrong with me and I said I get depression. I don't think the person understood the severity as she said oh she gets it too but can force herself to carry on. I told her I was bipolar and she said oh, well couldn't I just increase my medication when I felt low? Not only am I not allowed to miss a single day of school I have to pay out of my salary for the person who replaced me. The only consoling thing was that apparently Ira missed me and on Friday when it was someone's birthday in the nursery school he apparently had a plate for me and said he needed a slice for his teacher.

See you in a month Runbo!

Well Runbo will be on his way to China now and soon will meet his baby brother. Our planned picnic didn't quite go to plan as he was a bit upset about saying goodbye to his cat Chilli who is going to stay at his dad's factory while they are away. We did semi play dinosaur snap with the cards I made and munched ginger nougat biscuits. Runbo told me his "soupcase" was all packed and ready to go. We somehow got onto talk about his milk teeth and I told him they would start falling out when he was six and he would get new ones. With glee Runbo told me his new ones would be just like T. rex's. I did point out that T. rex had ones the size of bananas but this didn't faze Runbo. I am going to miss him while he's away and just hope meeting baby brother goes well.

Feeling frustrated with what to do with Ira. Am going to keep reading up on autism and what I can do. It is thwarting that his parents and my supervisor won't even consent to him seeing a speech therapist. I met with another friend who is helping design a syllabus and curriculum for Cross Over and she reckons the reading syllabus I'm using should have more phonics in it. She's going to pass on some materials to me. On Thursday I'm supposed to go to a workshop on the government correspondence course. Hoping it doesn't go on all day as I have two other students later in the day. I have to submit the first set of work done by Ira to the ministry on Tuesday.

I had my form 3 student this morning and we looked at the introduction to Macbeth and why Shakespeare uses the witches. I had my grade 3 student yesterday and had forgotten how much I enjoy teaching him. He has severe dyslexia and has forgotten his times tables over the holidays when he went to his mum in Mozambique.

After teaching this morning I went to the depression support group get together and we sat and coloured in mindfulness pages. Sadly my friend hosting's father died this afternoon. It's now bucketing with rain. The Save River has been in full flood which is amazing.

Runbo's Secretary

Yesterday and today were not great with Ira. We went back to him not looking at any of the words for reading and having to make a deal for him to colour in. Apparently he did get diagnosed by the psychiatrist I suggested as being autistic but his parents feel it was too quick a diagnosis and don't believe it. His parents and my supervisor are also not interested in him seeing a speech therapist. This does make my job hard. I am particularly struggling with reading and sounds. At times he can speak but at other times he clams up.

Runbo came running up to my car today when I arrived to say his puppy had been sent to a home as Runbo needs to go to China. He is beginning to get excited about going to China and seeing his mum. We read the big brother book and the one on Chinese New Year again and then Runbo put me to work. He had a whole lot of people he wanted to make cards for. He cut out different sized and shaped pieces of paper and I was instructed what to write and draw. He wanted a card to his nursery school teacher Pippa saying Pippa he must go to China. Then one to his best friend at nursery school called Mindi asking him to still play with him. There were happy new year cards for his mum, dad and granny and then I got a card. I was to write to myself "Thank you for teach me" (I tried to correct it to teaching) and draw a secret picture to myself. I told Runbo I am going to miss him while he's away and sweet boy, he immediately replied he was going to miss me too.

I gave Runbo the choice of what we're going to do for his last lesson tomorrow before he goes. We agreed on a picnic in a den with his dinosaurs. I have some dinosaur snap cards to play with him. I'll take some biscuits - his favourites are Oreos and then Wedgewood nougat ones. Yesterday and today I had some new Chinese sweets. I think some might be for new year. One was called a sugar coated haw which is like a toffee coated hawthorn with sesame seeds. Then I've had fulingjiabing which is a sort of agar jelly coated in rice paper. Today Runbo had what was like a crystallised carrot and I think mine was either pear or apple. At first I thought mine was ginger but it didn't have much taste. It would help if I could read Chinese.

Toffee coated hawthorns.

fuling jibing rice paper jelly cakes - traditionally for Chinese New Year

Five stars to Ira today

So pleased to say that today Ira outdid himself. He read some of his words (a first), he coloured in, enjoyed using the sand tray for writing AND he finally did his news picture for me and did it willingly. There were other moments where he was not such a happy camper and I had to resort back to bargaining. A friend of his from last year who is a year younger than him has come back to nursery school and is now Ira's playmate again. I can say doesn't Ira want to be able to go play with Jayden? If he does such and such and then this then he can go. It does work when he is crouched in the corner and won't budge. Definitely needed this as was beginning to lose heart as it felt like I was pushing an elephant uphill with one hand all the time. When I drove out at the end of the morning Ira leaned over the picket fence and said bye bye and he'd see me tomorrow.

I came home over lunch and looked up on how to do binding for a quilt. Found the video below and going to try finish the overdue baby shower quilt for my to-be-godson. Once I've finished the quilt my next project will be to try do a quiet book for another friend's baby girl.

Discovered Runbo is a little scared of dragons. Although I pointed out that the Gruffle in the Puddle Lane story I was reading him looks a bit like T. rex, Runbo said no T. rex doesn't breathe fire and Runbo doesn't like the idea of fire blowing. OK, will need to change to some different books. Runbo asked for more T. rex stories but I think we need to go with something different to increase his vocabulary. Runbo did like the book on Chinese New Year. We sort of made a Chinese lantern today but need a stapler as the glue we had wasn't very strong. Since we couldn't continue with it without the stapler Runbo asked me to draw different dinosaurs for him on pieces of card. The T. rex was for him and his daddy and then the pterodactyl was for his mum. I asked him if he was now a big brothersaurus but he said no, he's a T. rex. He said he could take his card dinosaurs to China on the aeroplane on Saturday but not his plastic ones. I quite fancy drawing Runbo sitting on an aeroplane with his various dinosaurs peaking round at him from different places like the overhead locker and seats behind. Will try work on this idea.

SaveSave

Runbo has a baby brother

Kicked off the morning with Ira today and it required a lot of patience and encouraging. Even to the point of putting the stumpy crayon in his hand and trying to get him to draw circles. Numbers wasn't so great with separating red from green objects into sets. It was mission to get him to draw the red set. For reading I'm not sure if anything went in as Ira wouldn't look at the new words. The most success was in the patterns work for writing. Tomorrow we'll be using a sand tray for practising writing.

I spoke to my supervisor and she's going to speak to Ira's parents about going to speech therapy clinics at Parirenyatwa and going to possibly get assessed for autism. To diagnose autism you seem to need to do a lot of observations.

Went from teaching to coffee with a friend and she introduced me to a cool website called Canva that you can use for graphic design. She also suggested trying to sell photos online. We talked about the ideas of postponing one's Christmas to when all the January sales are on and possibly going up Dombonshawa or Ngomokurira this weekend. The weekend of the 28th I've been invited to go to Hippo Pools which I'm looking forward to.

When I got to Runbo's this afternoon he ran up and grabbed my hand and said I must come see. His dad had set up a new generator as they had a power cut and don't usually have them. Runbo was ecstatic that this produced electricity. After we read the story on Chinese New Year Runbo announced he didn't feel like making a lantern today as I'd planned but we could make it tomorrow. Instead he went and got his dinosaurs and we had a long conversation about who was related to who. Through this Runbo told me he had a baby brother. I wasn't sure if it was true as he then said the name was a secret and it was his best friend. Turns out from his dad he does indeed now have a brother. I asked Runbo if he was excited to go on an aeroplane on Saturday and if he was going to take his dinosaurs with him. He looked at me and said he didn't think the aeroplane would allow him to bring them - oh! I told Runbo's dad that Runbo thought the new baby was the size of his little finger. Runbo chirped in, no he was the size of a peanut. I think Runbo is in for a surprise.

I saw my psychiatrist this afternoon and overall he thinks I'm doing well. He weighed me again though and has decided to decrease my olanzapine in an effort to try bring my weight down. Hopefully I won't become paranoid or overly anxious. He said though that if I do I can always up the dose again.

Hope

Hope
As elusive as a dandelion seed.
When you look at a field of dandelions
do you see dreams or weeds?
Try to grasp hold of it,
where will you keep it stored?
Will you keep it close
or will it simply be ignored?
Hope is everlasting
so close your eyes and make a wish.

Slow internet Sunday

Went to church this morning for the first time in ages. I have gone to help with kids' church but otherwise not really for over a year. Am grateful that friends from church have not brought it up when I've met them for coffee and have just been supportive. I don't think I would be able to go back if they had been judgemental and pressed me on why I wasn't going. One friend in particular really showed God's heart when she made the dress I wore to my sister's wedding. I had been having a dress made by an outreach project for women who have been abused in Epworth. Unfortunately the measurements didn't fit and the dress I was supposed to have didn't work out. This was the day before we left for England. My friend met me for coffee that day and said if the dress didn't work out to not hesitate in contacting her, she made me promise to. I did and she miraculously made a beautiful dress in just 3 hours that fitted perfectly. She offered it as a gift even though we'd used her fabric and time. It really helped me in going over to England as I was not wanting to at the time.

After church I managed to speak to three speech therapists. Apparently there is a clinic offered at Parirenyatwa Hospital every Monday. It might be useful for Ira to go to this. I have looked up what the symptoms of autism are and I am a bit concerned that he displays these. I will need to speak to my supervisor and his parents and see if we can get him tested. Hope he doesn't have it.

Watched the film of The Girl on the Train. I don't particularly like that it is set in the Hudson Valley instead of the line from Ashbury to Euston. For thrillers it is sometimes not so great to have read the book before watching the film as you know exactly what's going to happen if the film follows the plot. I've been watching youtube clips of Glee covers when the internet allows it and really wish there was a fun choir to join in Harare that does feel good music. At church I was asked to be in a dance group for a Variety Show to raise funds for the less privileged. I think it will be line dancing. A friend sent the link for a free online photography course through Harvard and I've started watching the lecture videos. Is similar so far to a photography online course I was given for Christmas but it is helpful to watch rather than just read the information.

Glee

Reconnected with some friends at church which was nice as I've been feeling a bit cut off from people. Have coffee dates with some friends this week in between teaching. One friend wants me to paint a picture on a sub-station building. I've got an appointment with my psychiatrist tomorrow. Hoping I won't have to wait too long as I have Runbo after.