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walkitoutThe horse was canceled due to rain. I took both kids to track. A. lasted to 10:15; T. a few minutes longer (ends at 10:30, so almost the whole way through). I’m really happy to have an activity that both of them really like. This is not the one I would have expected, but R.’s whole family runs, so maybe I should have.
T. and I went to Julie’s Place for lunch. We also did some decluttering in the playroom, and ran the results of that and some earlier efforts over to Savers. We stopped at Donelan’s for groceries on the way home.
I _really_ thought that we were in the clear for the vomiting on weekends trend, but no. Around 6 p.m., once again, T. in the bathroom and definitely not going to school on Monday. This time, I saw blue in the bucket and asked him just how much gum was he chewing and did he swallow it all. It is Peppermint Cobalt gum, and has 2 sugar alcohols per stick. He is apparently going through more than one 15 stick pack per weekend day, but generally has no more than two sticks of sugar free gum (variable types) on weekdays. 30 g of sugar alcohol strikes me as a lot. It certainly would leave me in the bathroom in a lot of pain (and yes, both ends, if you were wondering. Which you were trying really hard not to do, I feel sure).
So we discussed not swallowing gum, but rather spitting it out, and I made sure he had a pack of tissue because he was worried about what if he wasn’t near a trash can. (He _used_ to spit out gum; it got stuck to all kinds of things and I’m wondering if R. complaining about gum stuck to things led to the swallowing). But ultimately, I took the package to research the ingredients and concluded that a week of no gum at all was called for. If that takes care of the vomiting and diarrhea, then we can discuss whether and how much he can have going forward. I suspect that there’s some kind of negative lactose intolerance / sugar alcohol thing going on, because his lactose intolerance has gotten worse, too. We’d already had him stop using the petroleum jelly around his mouth (he was definitely ingesting some of that, which can also cause problems) and cut way back on dairy over the weekend, thinking those were the problem. Fingers crossed I finally have found the real problem. (I’m sure the combination was worse than each individually — he had problems on Saturday last week, and this weekend it wasn’t until Sunday evening).
I handed him a fidget spinner that he already had and told him to start spinning it. He wanted to know why. I told him it was supposed to help with anxiety, so he gave it a try. When I asked him later, he said it was as good as chewing gum. I also got out some other sensory toys for him (the ramps toy and the bead roller coaster — I find those really calming), and a cloth napkin to chew on since all his chew toys were decluttered (not my idea) a while ago. Seriously, this is why I don’t like to displace anxiety activities — they get replaced, and sometimes the replacements are worse. In this case, I think the first stick of gum (or two) was boredom driven, caused gas, and then the rest was a cycle of chew gum to reduce gas driven anxiety, causes more gas, causes more anxiety, chew more gum, etc.
I got some of the blank, off white easel paper out that had already been scrawled on on one side and set up a neutral background to take a picture of a drink in front of. I have been working on drink recipe pages for my cookbook for my Year of Mixology, and wanted a consistent photographic style for these where I didn’t have to groom the kitchen before taking the picture. I did the Vanderbilt, and am really happy with how it turned out. I’ll try to get one of the Rosy Drink variations today, and do others over the next few days. I’m going to look around for a large-ish shoe box and see if I can use that for the picture taking, so I don’t have to set up and take down the background.
T. and I went to Julie’s Place for lunch. We also did some decluttering in the playroom, and ran the results of that and some earlier efforts over to Savers. We stopped at Donelan’s for groceries on the way home.
I _really_ thought that we were in the clear for the vomiting on weekends trend, but no. Around 6 p.m., once again, T. in the bathroom and definitely not going to school on Monday. This time, I saw blue in the bucket and asked him just how much gum was he chewing and did he swallow it all. It is Peppermint Cobalt gum, and has 2 sugar alcohols per stick. He is apparently going through more than one 15 stick pack per weekend day, but generally has no more than two sticks of sugar free gum (variable types) on weekdays. 30 g of sugar alcohol strikes me as a lot. It certainly would leave me in the bathroom in a lot of pain (and yes, both ends, if you were wondering. Which you were trying really hard not to do, I feel sure).
So we discussed not swallowing gum, but rather spitting it out, and I made sure he had a pack of tissue because he was worried about what if he wasn’t near a trash can. (He _used_ to spit out gum; it got stuck to all kinds of things and I’m wondering if R. complaining about gum stuck to things led to the swallowing). But ultimately, I took the package to research the ingredients and concluded that a week of no gum at all was called for. If that takes care of the vomiting and diarrhea, then we can discuss whether and how much he can have going forward. I suspect that there’s some kind of negative lactose intolerance / sugar alcohol thing going on, because his lactose intolerance has gotten worse, too. We’d already had him stop using the petroleum jelly around his mouth (he was definitely ingesting some of that, which can also cause problems) and cut way back on dairy over the weekend, thinking those were the problem. Fingers crossed I finally have found the real problem. (I’m sure the combination was worse than each individually — he had problems on Saturday last week, and this weekend it wasn’t until Sunday evening).
I handed him a fidget spinner that he already had and told him to start spinning it. He wanted to know why. I told him it was supposed to help with anxiety, so he gave it a try. When I asked him later, he said it was as good as chewing gum. I also got out some other sensory toys for him (the ramps toy and the bead roller coaster — I find those really calming), and a cloth napkin to chew on since all his chew toys were decluttered (not my idea) a while ago. Seriously, this is why I don’t like to displace anxiety activities — they get replaced, and sometimes the replacements are worse. In this case, I think the first stick of gum (or two) was boredom driven, caused gas, and then the rest was a cycle of chew gum to reduce gas driven anxiety, causes more gas, causes more anxiety, chew more gum, etc.
I got some of the blank, off white easel paper out that had already been scrawled on on one side and set up a neutral background to take a picture of a drink in front of. I have been working on drink recipe pages for my cookbook for my Year of Mixology, and wanted a consistent photographic style for these where I didn’t have to groom the kitchen before taking the picture. I did the Vanderbilt, and am really happy with how it turned out. I’ll try to get one of the Rosy Drink variations today, and do others over the next few days. I’m going to look around for a large-ish shoe box and see if I can use that for the picture taking, so I don’t have to set up and take down the background.