Day 16-The First Five Years

I decided today that two weeks into this I might need to start giving you a background into how we figured out what was going on.

When he was little he was an extreme behavior problem. He started out getting 'kicked out' of two different day cares. He was kicking, hitting, biting the little kids at an early age. We had moderate control over him at home and didn't see the same behavior they saw, so we simply had no answers.

He was, however, developmentally on track. He rolled over, crawled, walked and talked at appropriate ages. There was never any cause for concern. The child had more vocabulary than his brother at an early age and was very inquisitive. The only developmental problem we had was potty training. He was extremely stubborn as boys tend to be, so we didn't worry about it to much.

When he was three we placed him in a Montessori school. Hoping that they would have the structure that he needed. We knew he was a routine child who thrived on knowing what was going to happen everyday. For the first few months he was ok. Not to many problems. But spring of his first year is when we started seeing problems again.

We kept thinking changes in his life were causing this. Mom's job changed, change in houses. We weren't real sure. We tried different methods of discipline. Spanking didn't work, time outs didn't work, taking privileges away from him didn't work. He simply didn't care that we were doing all of this?

We spent two years in Montessori trying different reward systems and different punishments. The school worked hard with us trying different systems that we asked, suggesting things to do. Although he was excelling academically, he simply was having behavioral issues that were uncontrollable.

The second year of Montessori, I became pregnant with our third child. During that pregnancy I became extremely ill. I spent several weeks on bed rest. This sent him over the edge. What we thought had been rock bottom was no where near. He was being sent home two to three times a week for throwing chairs, kicking teachers, running away from teachers. We were at our end. Had no idea what to do!

We had several things going on at that time, so we were simply trying to get through one day at a time, not thinking that there is anything wrong. He was just having a difficult time with the upcoming birth of a baby in the family, his great-grandmother that he loved and adored dearly was sick and he couldn't understand what was going on. That's all. He will be fine once we get through all of this. We kept telling ourselves over and over again. He would be fine.

July of 2008 his little life changed forever. His great-grandmother passed away after a short but grueling illness. He lost his weekends away from Dad and Mom. To this day, I am not sure exactly what all he got to do when he was at her house. She always told him to keep it a secret, but I get bits and pieces and they include, staying up as late as he wanted, getting up and going to get doughnuts in his pajamas, eating the exact kind of pizza he wanted, going to McDonald's to get happy meals, coloring all day long, watching what movies he wanted. The list goes on and on. He looked forward to going to her house because he knew she loved him no matter what and would give him whatever he wanted. This was a safe place for him to go and have the time of his life.

Ten days after he attended her funeral, his life changed again. He was now no longer 'the baby' of the family. His little brother came into this world whether he was ready for him or not.

This child had a rough first part of 2008.

His life had changed in ways that no one could imagine.

And in August 2008 it changed once more.

He started Kindergarten.....