The beautiful Katie
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“Katie put your pj’s on please.”
Hello,
Sorry its has taken so long to write another entry. I have had a lovely break away in Spain. Just myself, Emma, my partner and his eldest son. It was lovely. My mum agreed to have Katie for the week.
We decided not to take her because of the cost and because of the stress the flying and trip would cause her and me.
Everyone needs a break sometimes – I know I did!
Well such a lot has happened. Katie’s holiday with my mum went really well, and she has sent me a list with her experience with Katie, I have spoken to a lot more people with children with PDA, I have approached my GP about getting a diagnosis about PDA, (she had never heard of it before), I have spoken to the school about it again as well, with a lot more luck this time. Read More
The PDA diagnostic criteria.
This is taken from the PDA contact group webpage. A link can be found on my blog. I have edited a bit. Those of you who have visited the PDA contact group will know that next to this on the web page is a comparison to Autistic/Asperger children
| PDA CHILDREN | Katie | |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Passive Early History in first year | ||
| Often doesn’t reach, drops toys, ‘just watches’; often delayed milestones. As more is expected of him/her, child becomes ‘actively passive’, ie strongly objects to normal demands, resists. A few actively resist from the start, everything is on own terms. Parents tend to adapt so completely that they are unprepared for the extent of failure once child is subjected to ordinary group demands of nursery or school; they realise child needs ‘velvet gloves’ but don’t perceive as abnormal. Professionals too see child as puzzling but normal at first. | Katie – She resisted from the start, she was a little slower with her milestones compared to Emma.
Potty training was a nightmare, she didn’t talk properly till she was about 3. |
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| 2. Continues to resist and avoid ordinary demands of life | ||
Seems to feel under intolerable pressure from normal expectations of young children; devotes self to actively avoiding these. Demand avoidance may seem the greatest social and cognitive skill, and most obsessional preoccupation. As language develops, strategies of avoidance are essentially socially manipulative, often adapted to adult involved; they may include:
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Well Katie went from Screeching and screaming about things to the stage she is at now, Her conversation technic and distracting adults is something many politicians would admire. She can turn a conversation around and talk non stop until you have forgotten what it is that she was supposed to be doing. If you don’t listen she gets very cross. Recently she has told me “mummy your been very very very very naughty” after she misbehaved. She often pulls the “my legs don’t work” My arms are broken. routine and I’m too tired is her favourite sentence. The other day whilst visiting my step dad to give him his Birthday present, when asked to give him his present Katie placed it on the floor, got on her hands and knees crawled round the house chanting I’m a squeaky mouse eek eek eek. Then the tantrums, they are amazing. I did take to recording them but that made Katie more mad. |
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| 3. Surface sociability, but apparent lack of sense of social identity, pride or shame | ||
| At first sight normally sociable (has enough empathy to manipulate adults as shown in 2); but ambiguous (see 4) and without depth. No negotiation with other children, doesn’t identify with children as a category: the question ‘Does she know she’s a child?’ makes sense to parents, who recognise this as a major problem. Wants other children to admire, but usually shocks them by complete lack of boundaries. No sense of responsibility, not concerned with what is ‘fitting to her age’ (might pick fight with toddler). Despite social awareness, behaviour is uninhibited, eg unprovoked aggression, extreme giggling/inappropriate laughter or kicking/screaming in shop or classroom. Prefers adults but doesn’t recognise their status. Seems very naughty, but parents say ‘not naughty but confused’ and ‘it’s not that she can’t or won’t, but she can’t help won’t’ – parents at a loss, as are others. Praise, reward, reproof and punishment ineffective; behavioural approaches fail. | Katie always likes to play the teacher, She loves it when everyone will do as she tells her. She will flip when it doesn’t go her way.
Ahhh the giggling and insane manic laughing. Katies favourite. At the most inappropriate of times. Adults and children are all the same to Katie. Have tried star charts sweets rewards and punishment, no go. She would spend half her life on the naughty step and still do exactly the same thing 2 minutes later. One of my favourite Katie moments was telling her NOT to touch the wall that had just been painted, we made her repeat back what we had just said. 10 seconds passed and then big Katie hand print on the wall. |
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| 4. Lability of Mood, impulsive, led by need to control | ||
| Switches from cuddling to thumping for no obvious reason; or both at once (‘I hate you’ while hugging, nipping while handholding). Very impetuous, has to follow impulse. Switching of mood may be response to perceived pressure; goes ‘over the top’ in protest or in fear reaction, or even in affection; emotions may seem like an ‘act’. Activity must be on child’s terms; can change mind in an instant if suspects someone else is exerting control. May apologise but re-offend at once, or totally deny the obvious. Teachers need great variety of strategies, not rule-based: novelty helps. | Katie is often very impulsive. She doesn’t think about what we have just said ie don’t go past the end of the road. She then walks up the road to knock on her friends door. She explained that she hadn’t gone past where we said she had gone to knock the door. Even if it was 3 times as far as we said she could go.
Katie does get upset by perceived pressure. It normally can turn her into a very clingy mummy’s girl. Also when out in social situations you are much more likely to suffer a Katie Melt Down |
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| 5. Comfortable in role play and pretending | ||
| Some appear to lose touch with reality. May take over second-hand roles as a convenient ‘way of being’, ie coping strategy. Many behave to other children like the teacher (thus seem bossy); may mimic and extend styles to suit mood, or to control events or people. Parents often confused about ‘who he really is’. May take charge of assessment in role of psychologist, or using puppets, which helps co-operation; may adopt style of baby, or of video character. Role play of ‘good person’ may help in school, but may divert attention from underachievement. Enjoys dolls/toy animals/domestic play. Copes with normal conventions of shared pretending. Indirect instruction helps. | As mentioned before We have Katie the dog, Katie the cat, Katie the squeaky mouse eekk eeek, Katie the one legged flamingo (which is a new one) Katie snake, Also Katie talks in code for example, If my teddy shakes like this its Yes ? I spend my life waiting to hear if its yes or no. Also if I knock twice its yes, or it begins with y. | |
| 6. Language delay, seems result of passivity | ||
| Good degree of catch-up, often sudden. Pragmatics not deeply disordered, good eye-contact (sometimes over-strong); social timing fair except when interrupted by avoidance; facial expression usually normal or over-vivacious. However, speech content usually odd or bizarre, even discounting demand-avoidant speech. Social mimicry more common than video mimicry; brief echoing in some. Repetitive questions used for distraction, but may signal panic. | 3 years old when she started talking then BAM she was off.
We do have odd noises and when you ask her a question she will find a hundred different questions to ask about it, for example – Katie pick up that bit of paper, Katie – which bit of paper? Me – that one there the only bit there is. Katie – The yellow one? Me – Yes . Katie – what this one? Me – yes. Katie – that one by the door? Me – Yes (She is still looking at it ) – Katie – you want me to pick this one up. That is it Snap goes my sense of humour YES that one. It would of been easier and quicker to do it myself. |
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| 7. Obsessive behaviour | ||
| Much or most of the behaviour described is carried out in an obsessive way, especially demand avoidance: as a result, most children show very low level achievement in school because motivation to avoid demands is so sustained, and because the child knows no boundaries to avoidance. Other obsessions tend to be social, ie to do with people and their characteristics; some obsessionally blame or harass people they don’t like, or are overpowering in their liking for certain people; children may target other individual children. | Katie tends to swamp people with love. The only thing at school I have heard her say is – That is XX he is really naughty he does this and that and this. This was while we were stood next to him and his mother at the school gate. | |
| 8. Neurological Involvement | ||
| Soft neurological signs are seen in the form of clumsiness and physical awkwardness; crawling late or absent in more than half. Some have absences, fits or episodic dyscontrol. Not enough hard evidence as yet. | ERM |
The play park battlefield
Day 1 – Thursday:
We have had my partners boys staying with us for a few days, Katie has been home and her sister is away for 2 weeks.
I have discovered that boys are very different from girls. They are constantly set to high-speed and can turn most things into a war. Combine that with my delightful daughter and things can quickly go from normal to hysterical very quickly.
Having said that, things have actually been quite average. Katie has helped to try to teach the 2-year-old to use his potty and shown him how to do lots of other things. This is not always a good thing. She enjoys pretending to be his teacher and loves him to the point where it gets a little bit obsessive.
On Thursday in Hampshire we had torrential rain, any parents nightmare. Summer holidays with three children aged six and under trapped in a small house with our own two very muddy dogs and third, extra muddy, dog that we are looking after at the moment. Like most parents we were looking for some entertainment so we decided to visit our local indoor play area. It seemed like everyone else had had the same idea.
Katie loves these places as there are very few rules or demands. It was simple…we told her to go and play and we didn’t really see her again until an hour or so later. Katie had great fun, I could hear her enjoying telling everyone what game they should play, and luckily for her (and me) it seemed like everyone was happy to play what ever game Katie liked. I had time to sit, drink my coffee and relax. A lovely day was had by everyone.
Day 2 – Friday:
Sun is shinning, potty training is in progress so we spent the morning at home; up at 7.30 as the boys like to get up early, It was a great start to the day and I even felt kind and relaxed enough to leave my partner in bed for an extra two hours.
Once we were all up the very leisurely start to the day continued. As per normal the question about how to entertain our brood for the remainder of the day was raised? Petersfield Pond was what we decided upon. We would go out on a rowing boat for the afternoon. Good plan.
I must admit I was slightly nervous as to how we would control a 2-year-old a 6-year-old and Katie aged 5, in a wobbly rowing boat. I needn’t of worried as my very capable partner soon had us all life jacketed up and on board. All three children loved it and I even manged to relax and enjoy it.
Once we got back to shore, we decided to go and play in the park. By this point Katie is still, unexpectedly, being well-behaved, as she has been for most of the day and I am impressed.
Then we got to time to go home. We called all three children and told them all its time to go. The two boys were instantly ready but Katie did the normal “can I have one more turn on….”. Bearing in mind she had been told five minutes before hand that we will be leaving soon I decided that she should come and get ready to go with the boys. It also seemed a little unfair to let her have one more turn when the boys had been told it was time to go and were doing as they were told.
I saw the melt-down coming and tried with distraction tactics to avert the coming storm. I tried explaining why we were leaving and told her what else we were going to do. All I got in return was
I WANT ONE MORE TURN ON SOMETHING!!
I went to take her hand, but she stomped away. I decided to try something that I have tried before and have seen other parents attempt successfully. I said “Right. I will go without you” I got no response from Katie so I started to walk off…still not a word from her.
I carried on walking. Now, when I have seen other parents do this, there kids soon come running after them. When I have tried this before it has been difficult to get a reaction. My partner offered to carry her, but I said “No”, let’s try this.
We have a big stretch of grass to walk across and know we will still be able to see her the whole way. She is quite safe. We walked………. Then we walked some more………..The boys started asking if we were really going to leave her behind. Katie walked ten steps down the hill and sat on the grass. By this point we were far enough away that she was becoming a little speck in the distance. Thank goodness she was wearing a pink T-shirt!
We decided to carry on walking and finally she got up. I thought “Great I have won” but no; she is heading to a nearby tree where there are several bins. This was not toward us. She then hid behind a rubbish-bin where she thought we couldn’t see her.
We continued walking and went just round the corner, hiding out of her sight behind a hedge – we could still see her clearly.
At this point there was now a 5-year-old appearing to be alone, and two adults and two further children hiding behind a hedge. Grrrreat!
About 2 minutes passed and then suddenly there was a scream, we could just about hear it. “MUUUUUUUMMMMMMIIIIEEEEEEEEE”. Scream scream scream. Katie then proceeded to run full pelt across the grass to where she last saw us. We decided that I would go to the car with the boys and leave my partner, who had bravely volunteered to deal with her when she got there, in place.
He tried to calm her down and explain that what she had done was not good before bringing her to the car.
1:0 to us!
There was a look on her face. Maybe I was imagining it but i felt it was a look of “You may have tricked me this time but it won’t work next time”. This look also had a hint of “You may have won the battle but you certainly haven’t won the war” about it. Sure enough, within two seconds of the car door closing, a fight about Katie snatching a toy. There was no point trying to drive anywhere, she was still too worked up. Travelling with Katie in this state can get dangerous, especially for the boys sat next to her. She won’t do anything anyone asks. It was time for mummy to step in….I removed her from the car and calmed her down again. She got back into the car and said “Sorry” yet again. All was finally calm.
I have to say I think we handled it well enough, but the fall out from the above was an argument about everything from that point on for the rest of the evening. Katie continuously tried to get her own way, with no negotiation. Normal things that hadn’t recently been too much of a problem flared back up, from going upstairs to get changed to simply being asked to pass something to someone.
In fact every simple task has been a challenge since then. Was it worth it? We shall see next time Katie doesn’t want to go home. I suspect, by then, she will have worked out that we would never really leave her, and will just stay on her own or go back to the park.
Time for a new strategy when it comes to going home.
Indigo Children ? ?
This Post is dedicated to my mother.
My mum is amazing in a very odd way. Let me explain a little about her. She is, and excuse the way I put this, into spiritualist mumbo jumbo
As far as I can work out this involves looking at pictures on cards, reading ribbons and I suspect chanting and speaking in tongues. Not that I’m a sceptic! Its her life and I’m very proud of what she does. In fact it makes great conversation at work, particularly during a recent “lost wallet” incident when I asked my mother to ask her friends where it was. They came back with the response that it was in the glove box.
Unfortunately I was pretty stressed and my reply was a little short, about not having been near any f***ing glove box. Needless to say I checked every vehicle I had been in and even decided to try to decode it, deciding it could have meant that my wallet was where I keep the gloves. It wasn’t.
I think those psychics were just having a good laugh at me running around. As it turned out the dog had taken it outside.
My description of what my mother does is, she chants around a cauldron, complete with a pointy hat a black cat, a couple of eyeballs and frogs legs, or my personal favorite, (because people’s reactions are great) is to whisper to them “my mum hears voices, she knows everything about you.”
Its great fun.
Perhaps Katie managing to wind me up so perfectly is some form of spiritualists revenge – apparently what mum does is actually none of the above.
Anyway, my mother is well credited by many people and has a lot of followers, for want of a better word. She is popular in the psychic world….apparently with the dead as well as the living.
Getting to the point….My mother was there when Katie was born and was the first person to hold her. They have an amazing connection and get on very well together. I broached the issue of PDA with her and told her that I thought Katie is a little different. It was, and still is, a difficult thing to talk about with her, and has led to family disagreements.
To my mother Katie is a very spiritually enlightened child and my mum believes that when behaving the way she does, Katie is simply channeling other energy’s though herself and picking up on many other things from the universe. This is all very well, but to me doesn’t change the fact that when in a restaurant, she should perhaps be able to manage sitting on a seat and not behave the way she does. Nor does it change the fact that when Katie is refusing to leave a shop, and on the edge of destroying an entire display, that I can excuse it as her simply being spiritual. That is, of course, unless spiritual voices are making her demand I buy her a brand new cabin bed now, or that she be allowed to crawl under the shelves.
This will always be my mother’s opinion and that’s fine, but it has caused frictions, until a break-though the other day. Calmly talking it though with the mother, she admits Katie is different but she does not want her labelled as an enlightened, spiritual child or as a child with PDA. After a long chat I managed to get across the reasons that acknowledging her PDA would actually help Katie. I reassured her that I don’t just want to drug her up, and listened to my mum’s point of view about how she inherited her gift from her great-gran.
After discussing everything and talking about diagnostic criteria, my mother brought a book round called theIndigo Children. From what I can gather it covers symptoms like PDA, ADD and ADHD. Whilst chatting I told my mother its fine for her, or anyone who wants to, to think of Katie as an indigo child, but asked that if I go to the health professionals or the School, she shouldn’t leap though the doors and proclaim that Katie is an Indigo Child, that she behaves the way she does because she is a prophet and spiritually enlightened and that we should listen to her because she is channelling energy’s though the cosmos. If she did that, I might find myself with a one way ticket to the hospital with some lovely tablets and a white jacket. I suggested that perhaps it would be much better to go for PDA as a diagnosis?
I don’t think the Indigo Children book is for me, but may help others out there. The book has different strategies for coping and other techniques. I haven’t read it all, just skim read, but will read a little more, just to have explored everything. Actually, I have to admit that some of it is pretty interesting, and seems to talk about ADD and ADHD. If anyone else has read the book and has any opinions on it, or Indigo children, let me know.
Further info…
My Mothers contact number (in case anyone is interested) is 07564286205
I will wait for the phone call when she reads this post! <Gulp> lol
Right. Enough of cauldrons, cards, ribbons and people hearing voices, better get on. Back to Katie on my next blog. She has been away for a few days with my mum, so some house work has been completed in between working 12 hour shifts.
Thanks for having Katie, mum. You’re the best.
Jess x
Bribery at the Supermarket
Well, where to start,
I normally try to make my super market dashes when I am child free. On the odd occasion I do make them with the girls I end up leaving with plenty of stuff I don’t need and forgetting the important stuff. That is just normal for me.
It was Thursday evening at 6pm when I realised I had nothing for tea and no milk or bread. Katie was with me but her older sister was away in Worcester for 2 weeks, for a break. It shouldn’t have been hard and we were progressing well. Keeping away from the toy aisle. Katie trying her hardest to behave, me trying my hardest to avoid a supermarket meltdown. I had promised Katie that if she behaved then she could get some sweets when we had got everything else.
Drama at Dance Class
Well,
I have a busy few days ahead, but first a bit about my weekend. On a normal Saturday Katie, Emma and my partners eldest child will attend their Street Dance club. This Saturday had to be slightly different.
The Reason? Katie. Last week she decided she didn’t want to join in with some of the dancing. She does this most weeks. She loves to dance but can’t seem to stick to the same plan the teachers have. She will dance for a bit then go a little crazy and end up distracting a teacher, this normally leads to Katie having great fun taking this teacher on a walk around the building and messing around.
It appears that last week the teachers had another idea to combat this. They decided that if Katie didn’t want to join in that was fine, but she was to go sit on a chair and watch the rest of them. Katie, being Katie, she was unimpressed by this idea, and upon been asked to go and sit out-of-the-way, threw one of her amazing temper tantrums. This is a first for my poor children’s street dance teachers. Unfortunately this being a first for them, they decided it was best to try to talk sense to her, but still with the same instruction of go sit on the chair.
Katie aged 3 to 5
This should hopefully catch you up to where we are with Katie now.
Katie at 3 was very demanding and, as I was single, it was mainly me who took the brunt of it. I had a partner for a while but as he was younger than me and not ready for the commitment of kids. This was doomed to fail from the start. We tried, but eventually it fell apart. Katie didn’t help; she would demand 100% of my time and attention, often leaving anyone else pushed out to the side. This includes her long-suffering older sister Emma.
Potty training Katie was, what can I say, an experience. She would wet herself rather than use the potty and often would not even care. Eventually we got there when she was 3 and a half. Every ordinary day-to-day task was a battle. Katie go brush your teeth, 30 minutes later we might have managed it with a few temper tantrums. As for getting dressed especially the dreaded SOCKS. It was and still is a nightmare. SOCKS have become a sore point in our household – I will dedicate an entry to the joys of getting dressed.
Hello world!
Hello,
Welcome to my new first ever blog.
I am new to this and have been inspired by the many bloggers before me and would like to share mine and my families journey.
A bit about my family I am mother to two beautiful girls, I live in the beautiful south of England in a little 3 bedroom house with my girls, two dogs and not to forget my devoted, loving partner and his two boys that come to stay a few nights every week. We both work full-time jobs which also require we work a shift pattern .We have Emma who is 7 and Katie who is 5, then the boys aged 6 and 2.
I had Emma when I was 19 years old and was separated from her father. Emma was a lovely baby and a lovely toddler. She was everything I expected life was good and after Emma turned 1, I met Katie’s dad. I will say our relationship was reasonably brief and yes I became pregnant with Katie. I was in general excited by this. A sister for Emma someone to play with and I never wanted Emma to be an only child. Life was good and I was excited.
Just something about Katie 