Thursday, December 30, 2010

Going to the dentist

I took Frank to the dentist Tuesday morning. This is only the third time he's gone, and it went no better than the forst two times. Actually, it was somewhat worse this time, because he's getting to be too strong for me to hold down! I laid down on the chair, with him on top of me, both my legs crossed, locking his legs into place, my left arm across his chest, like a straitjacket, and my right hand on his forehead, holding his head back. Even so, he managed to wiggle away from my grip several times, screaming his head off the whole time.

I have to say, none of the people at this practice ever blink an eyelash at his behavior. Either screaming bloody murder during a cleaning is par for the course for his age, or they have so many special needs patients (I know they have a lot of autistic kids and kids who have Down Syndrome in their practice) that Frank is easy in comparison. I do know that, after our first visit, the hygenist told me, "Hey, he didn't bite, kick, or punch me, so he was a pretty good patient. As long as he was screaming, his mouth was wide open, so I could do what I had to do!" Better her than me- I'm really quite glad I did not go into pediatric dentistry!

The good news is, we apparently are doing an excellent job with brushing his teeth- no cavities, no spots even close to needing to worry about. The kid's teeth should be pristine- he doesn't eat anything with sugar in it!

Frank, of course, each time behaves as if he's the conquering hero, showing off the new toothbrush and the prizes he got. He also, of course, spends much of that day reminding me that, "We don't need to go back to the dentist for a long time, right Mommy?"

Oh, and with food? Tonight, he took a bite of carrot, chewed, and swallowed. And he only gagged on it once.

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Been a while...

Frank is now using the toilet at school to urinate. The catch is, he uses the adult toilet because the kids' toilets don't have doors, and therefore no privacy. But he's quite content to use the adult toilet, and his teachers seem to be fine with having to escort him down the hall to the bathroom, and he hasn't had an accident yet at school since he started using the adult bathroom, so I'll take it.

The catch is, he still refuses to use the toilet at all anywhere to defacate. So, at the suggestion of someone at school, he now tells us when he has to poop, we put a pullup on him, he hides in the closet (yes, I'm serious) for about five minutes, we clean him up and then put the underwear back on.

It's better than cleaning crap out of underwear.

He actually asks for mac and cheese for dinner a few times a week now.

There's a website that you can use to make a video from Santa for your child. You go and answer a bunch of questions about your kid, and they send you the video on email. I played it for him Christmas Eve morning. He seemed a little freaked out to find that Santa knows so much about him! His eyes got huge, too, when Santa said that he knows Frank's been working very hard, but he needs to work a little harder at trying new foods. It was hard for me not to laugh. A little while later he told me he was going to try a lot harder with carrots because, "Santa wants me to."

So, in the last couple of days, we have gotten from zero to 60, really. Yesterday he took two bites (that I let him spit out immediately) of a raw carrot, and today he actually took a bite and chewed it twice before spitting it out.

Bless you, Santa.