Post by dl on Jul 22, 2014 22:40:42 GMT -5
We gutted his room. It has been too frustrating, trying to clean and organize it. There was too much stuff in it and it would just go back to being the way it was. One of the things they always say for kids with his kind of processing and executive functioning disorder is to make everything neat and organized because they can't handle the distraction. So, while Jacob was at boy scout camp, I started taking everything out and storing it in the aviary. I got most of it done before he got back, but not all of it. I knew that involving him in the process would be more frustrating than I could handle. I knew there would be tears and breakdowns and I wanted to avoid that as much as possible. When he got home, we still had a few hours work to get done on it and even that brought tears and frustration. But we got through it. Everything is clean and orderly. He has some of his favorite things displayed, but most of his stuff is stored. I figure that when he gets used to keeping his room clean this way, then we can add more stuff. It's not like he has time to play with it anyway because the summer has been so busy.
So I wasn't sure if he would be sad and hate me or if he would feel like there was a weight off his shoulders. Turns out that by the next day he was over the mad and sad feelings and seems to definitely be on the "weight off the shoulders" side. He has been vacuuming when stuff gets on the floor and putting his pairs of socks together when they are clean. He's been making his bed. He's been taking care of stuff right away instead of shoving it in his room to put away later. He's been a lot less moody. I'm hoping that we can keep this going long enough to make a bit of a habit out of it. I'm excited about it and he seems much happier. I've tossed around the thought of doing that for a while, but never have. It seemed like maybe that would be going too far. But it's worked out really well, so I'm glad I finally did.
We finished this on Saturday. Today we went through two of the bags of stuff I stored and threw almost everything away. There is a BIG difference between taking something out of the room and putting something in. The first is a "letting go" thing, which is hard. The second is a "possibly messing up my great place over some trinkets" thing.
So I wasn't sure if he would be sad and hate me or if he would feel like there was a weight off his shoulders. Turns out that by the next day he was over the mad and sad feelings and seems to definitely be on the "weight off the shoulders" side. He has been vacuuming when stuff gets on the floor and putting his pairs of socks together when they are clean. He's been making his bed. He's been taking care of stuff right away instead of shoving it in his room to put away later. He's been a lot less moody. I'm hoping that we can keep this going long enough to make a bit of a habit out of it. I'm excited about it and he seems much happier. I've tossed around the thought of doing that for a while, but never have. It seemed like maybe that would be going too far. But it's worked out really well, so I'm glad I finally did.
We finished this on Saturday. Today we went through two of the bags of stuff I stored and threw almost everything away. There is a BIG difference between taking something out of the room and putting something in. The first is a "letting go" thing, which is hard. The second is a "possibly messing up my great place over some trinkets" thing.