so, i think taz is finally realizing something big is going on. we're starting to see some of his stress indicators: crying when he's overloaded, some tantrumming and uncontrolled behavior, staying awake at night far later than he should, and so on. nothing's too bad yet, except maybe the stimming. that seems to have gone into overdrive. i really was wondering when our routine oriented son would finally notice that something big was happening. his oldest sister hasn't been here for 2 weeks now and her room is full of packed boxes while the rest of the house is getting emptier and emptier. kinda hard to miss, but taz isn't necessarily observant either. and most of this is no big deal, just a parent awareness thing.

however, the up late nights is a problem. i won't go to bed until he's asleep. he's not a bad kid, but we can't guarantee he won't get up and get into things, maybe even get hurt (he had a fascination with razors for awhile - never got hurt, but the yellow schicks were just amazing to him or something). since i'm the night owl, it's just more reasonable that i stay up when he's awake. most nights this is not a problem - he's out by 11 at the latest. there have been times in the past when's he's stayed up till 2 or 3, but, again, that's not usually a big deal for me. on rare occasions he's been awake till 4 or 5 am, but it's very rare for that to happen.

last night i was looking at getting my schedule back into some semblance of normal, well, normal for me at least. for the last week or so, i've been up till 5 or 6, sometimes even 8 am. i'm finding it harder to go to sleep, which has to do with the move and all, i'm sure. so, when i crashed at a fairly normal time friday night, i was hoping that saturday night would help reestablish the pattern. i don't have a problem with being a night owl except it can interfere with my family involvement and it tends to decrease my productivity over time - a lot of which has to do with the level of "controlled distractions" i need to actually get things done (don't try to fathom that - it's a part of my adhd thing). at night i have none, so i tend to get off track quickly and stay off track longer.

at any rate, so my plan was to log off and go to bed about 2 or 2:30 am - which is a good time for me to consider a "normal" bed time. just a little before 2, taz came downstairs and told me he couldn't sleep. now, this is a first. taz usually just stays awake upstairs, quietly occupying himself (he's gotten very good at keep the humming down to very low levels at night - quite an accomplishment for him, and i'm sure he self-stims by spinning a toy or something). night time is the one time we allow his "autistic" behavior since it's his way of dealing with the day and he seems to need it. the point being, he's never come down late at night and expressed that he can't get to sleep. i did send him back up to bed, but settled myself in for the long haul since i knew it would take at least an hour or two for him to finally pass out if he felt the need to come downstairs. and i was right. i think he fell asleep somewhere around 4 or 4:30 this morning. which also means my schedule went back to being screwed up. i tried going to bed about 8 or 8:30, but gave up when i hadn't fallen asleep by 10.

i guess it's a good thing i'm naturally a night person. all it takes is one little boy to get my schedule messed up and i'm about the only one in the house who can really live that way. and i'm sure it's only going to get worse for the both of us from here on out. we've only got about 5 weeks, then we're outta here. i'm sending a note to taz's teacher to warn him about the resurgence of his "disturbance" behaviors, as mild as they've been at home they're likely to be worse at school (always, always the case with him), and i've asked him if he could discuss moving as part of the classroom stuff - to let taz know it's going to be good, but it's okay to be sad. and i've asked he pass the info on to taz's speech therapist and asked that he help taz find ways to express his emotions appropriately. it seems as good a time as any to work on that with him.

and who knows, taz is a very smart kid, so maybe it will help.