First week of school!

The night before the first day of school, we decided to go out and have a little last minute fun. We hit a mini golf spot near our house. I was surprised at how well Ethan did! We might have a little golfer on our hands someday. :) At least that's a sport he'll be allowed to do! He was even able to pay attention and play the entire course -- something he never was able to do before his ADHD meds started!

The kids definitely enjoyed this hole!

School has started! Callie started 5th grade and Ethan started kindergarten! So far they are loving it!

We spent multiple meetings going over everything Ethan would need for a successful school year. I dropped off a bunch of necessary medical equipment for him - pulse ox monitor, oxygen, meds, etc. Hopefully he won't need it this year, but at least it's there just in case.

Since he's not allowed to participate in gym class this year, we had arranged for him to have speech therapy during one class and hopefully occupational therapy during the second. He's still going through the approval process for OT at the school, but that will hopefully only take a couple weeks. The school claimed they did not want Ethan to be excluded from gym entirely, so they wanted to see about figuring out a way for him to do some kind of gym class on the sidelines during the regular one. I don't know what they're talking about with that, but hopefully OT will come through quickly and he'll be preoccupied during gym class each week.

He's also not riding the school bus this year after all. He was supposed to, but the school district got a little too nervous with that idea. They were afraid that something would happen and the bus driver wouldn't have any help in taking care of him. They also worried since there's no oxygen or medical supplies on the regular bus. Instead, he has a school transportation van picking him up. He was pretty disappointed when we found that out, but it's going really well. The van pulls into our driveway so we don't even have to wait down by the street. And instead of an hour-long bus ride in the mornings, he only has to ride about 10 minutes! :) That's so much better!

I know they're being pretty conservative with him so far. He hasn't been outside for recess yet since it's been pretty warm here. Instead of going outside, he hangs out and colors in the school clinic. So far he is having fun and enjoying kindergarten, so that's such a blessing!

I know he was struggling a bit at lunchtime since he just is not outgoing enough. The first day of school Ethan brought his lunchbox home almost completely full. He was obviously hungry when he came home, so I asked him why he didn't eat at lunch. He said he couldn't open his food. I know there are lots of teachers and aides in the cafeteria that will help open snacks and stuff if he asked them. He just wouldn't ask, so instead he went hungry! I'm trying to give him as easy to open snacks as possible and still working on convincing him to get up and ask for help if he needs it! Hopefully he'll get used to it and do better!

Unfortunately, getting information out of him is difficult to say the least. I keep trying to convince him to tell me what he did each day, but I still have no idea what he's up to at school! LOL! I can't wait to talk to the teachers and find out how he's really doing!

Ethan received a package in the mail this past week. It was a "Heart Hero Cape" from Heart Heroes! It's a group that sends out hero capes to heart kids. Ethan loves it and was so excited when he opened the package! I need to get some better pictures of him in it, but at least you can see what it looks like.

As for the medical side of things, we've struggled a little bit this past week. Ethan has had multiple headaches since the night before school started. I don't know if it's stress, sleep, weather changes, or something else that's causing it. This weekend was pretty bad though. Friday after school Ethan complained about a headache. That night and two rounds of Tylenol later Ethan was still miserable. He kept saying his heart was hurting, but I think it was his stomach. The headache was so bad he couldn't sleep, was slightly feverish, couldn't get comfortable, and was nauseous. I'm wondering if it was a full-blown migraine for him. :( Hopefully the headaches calm down, but we'll definitely be discussing the new medicine at the cardiology appointment on the 11th. He's also doing terribly with his eating (he's lost almost 5 pounds this summer!) so maybe that medicine's side effects will be a major blessing for him! It apparently increases appetite and weight gain.

We have a pretty busy week coming up, so please keep us in your prayers - especially for Ethan to be healthy! I'll let you know how things progress with school and if anything happens before our next appointment.