Family Night Message

I (Wendy) got a job recently at Spectrum Academy as the lunch lady. Hopefully this will only be for a couple of months until the REAL lunch lady, miss Carol, is recovered from her stay at the hospital.

When I get home from being on my feet in the kitchen at 3:45 p.m., the last thing I feel like doing is being in the kitchen some more and cooking a big dinner. I am resolved that my family needs a home cooked dinner so I do it anyway. Last night I made these things where you put biscuits in a muffin pan and fill them with BBQ meat and top with cheese. They come out this little pie looking thing filled with meat. Jason and I liked it. The boys wouldn't even touch it to try it. The whining and complaining was phenomenal.

So when it came time for family home evening and it was Jason's turn for the lesson, is it any mystery why he chose the story of the ten lepers? He had each of the boys bring out five star wars action figures. (These guys are used frequently in our acting out scripture stories especially the battle scenes.)

He told them the story of the lepers being healed and only one returning to say thank you to Jesus. He explained how mom worked hard on her dinner and that they didn't even say "thank you." The next part I have to quote exactly because it's better that way.

Jason: So what do we learn from this story boys?
Hyrum and Porter: That if you don't say thank you to mom, you'll get leprosy!
Jason: That's right. So tomorrow are you going to thank her for dinner even if you don't like it?
Hyrum and Porter: Yes!

The boys ran off to go play and I was sitting stunned looking for the lightning bolt that would surely come and strike Jason for his liberal interpretation of the scriptures. I bet we don't get complaints about dinner for at least a week.

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Family Rocks!

Looks like a bunch of rocks on the outside but inside they are beautiful sparkley!

We spent Saturday in the desert by the Dugway proving grounds hunting for geodes and lizards with my brother, Aaron, his boys and Papa Buddy. It was my one last farewell to summer and the heat. We saw wild horses, antelope herds and lots of cool rocks!

Porter and Jacob at the Pony Express stop at Silver Springs.

If you can't say something nice......

You've heard that saying from Thumper's mom, "If you can't say something nice don't say anything at all." Well, that applies to this summer. We've really struggled with Hyrum being home.

Since school starting especially we've had a hard time with the transition from home to school. My sweet neighbors have had the chance to witness Hyrum tantrums and it doesn't make me feel better that he is only 8 and on the radar of the Bountiful Police. (no record just notes on him in case)

He's attending Spectrum Academy the premier charter school for children with autism spectrum disorders. It has been a life saver! If you talk to Hyrum, he doen't think that he belongs there but a visit to the class would tell any observer differently. He's in good company with the sweetest, cutest kids!

We're hanging in there a day at a time.

"Tomorrow is a new day, with no mistakes in it."
-from the T.V. show Annie

Apparently I'm just full of T.V. wisdom today.

Feelin' Great and Sailin into Summer

Hey the recovery from the surgery was great! I was only down essentially four days. I was just a little tired for the week after. I don't consider myself and amazing healer or really in shape or anything so I consider this a miracle.

I have so many fun pics to share but I'm having trouble with the memory card downloading to my computer.

We had Hyrum's school field day today at the South Davis Rec center and Porter's is tomorrow at Rocket Park. Life is just a party lately and my house looks like it. We had 7 boys over this afternoon and I loved every play dough, dress up, wild minute of it.

Historectomy is finally happening.

We've known the day would come for 4 years now and on Monday, April 10th it's happening. I'm cautiously optimistic that this will take care of the hemorrhaging. I'm also nervous as heck that my home will fall apart. And no, I don't mean that the dishes won't get done or that beds won't be made, that is a given. I mean that the kids and dad may not survive without mom to intervene in the fighting. They have a terrible time when mom is just sick for a day. I'm going to be out for at least a week. Oh well, better now while the kids are still in school than in the summer when they are home all day. At least I hope they both get to school. Hyrum is still fighting it.

Today he had a dentist appointment because he had a pain in a tooth. Good thing that I saw the x-ray showing the abcess or I would have thought that he was just making up pain to get out of school. On the way back from the appointment, Hyrum informs me that he is not going back to school today. I went through the begging and pleading and ordering and threatening him to go to school when we reached the parking lot but to no avail. So I take a break and go sign him into school in the office. I can see him doing push ups and sit ups on the lawn outside while I'm doing so. The secretary pointed out cheerfully that at least he wasn't wasting time. I sarcastically thanked her for her optimism. Then I went out and attempted to bodily bring him into the school. I'm sure we would have been comedy gold for anyone watching. Finally someone had pity on me and called the principal. He is wonderful and together we were able to get Hyrum to march down to class with very little resistance and only two escape attempts. Someday we'll laugh at this right?

Jason and I replaced the breaks on our car after the kids were asleep at 9:30p.m. It was perfect temperature outside and it was nice to have some just Jason and Wendy time. It doesn't get more romantic than that folks!

Don't Worry "Bee" Happy

We have received our bees! 15,000 new pets for us to love! Hyrum and Porter are dancing the day we introduced them into the hive. Nana got some too. They are thriving so far and are already making honey and having babies. :)

Hyrum is HOME!!!

I'm happy to announce that Hyrum has been released from the Utah State Hospital and is home full time now. Boy is he giving his mom and dad a run for their money!

He is challenging any and every limit he can. Tuesday he decided to be done with school. He informs me in a cheerful voice that he is not going to school anymore "it's boring." I pull out the usual parent rhetoric and he just smiles and sits there on his bed. So I take a deep breath and relax, I'm not going to make this fun for him. I take all of his toys and close the door telling him that he is only allowed out to use the bathroom.

I call Jason with my initial idea of taking all the toys from his room and making him grounded to his room. Jason says something like, "heck no that kid is going to school even if I have to drag his lifeless body." He says he is on his way home to help deal with this. Hmmmm..... I can see a confrontation coming. Next I call our guy from the Families First program of the Utah Youth Village.

His name is David. So if you hear me spouting about the wisdom of David that's who I mean. The state and county want to reduce the likelihood of having Hyrum back at the State Hospital. We were lucky or blessed enough to qualify for the Families First Program where a therapist comes to our home and observes and helps us come up with solutions specifically developed for Hyrum. They stay on call for your family anytime 24-7 for a full 18 months. This is usually a $5,000 program but it is covered for us thank heavens!

So, I have never met this David guy but I call the number he gave us in case of emergency. He immediately told me that Jason and I need to be a united front before confronting Hyrum. Also that he has had kids decide to quit school and so he told them that they needed some vocational training. And since the only kind of job you can get if you quit school is manual labor, that's what they do if they are not in school.

I called Jason and since he had time to cool off he decided that forcing Hyrum to school physically wasn't a good idea. So we went for the vocational training. We just happen to have a lot of manual labor to do around our house. We had Hyrum dig a ditch in the back yard.

Jason sat out with him telling him to keep digging and no, he couldn't use the bathroom until his break at 10am. Pretty soon we decided that Hyrum was liking all the adult attention. So Jason came in where we could see him from the window. Then Hyrum decided not to work at all and just lay on the ground. This was about lunch time and so Jason offered to take Hyrum on a ride. Hyrum got in the car and asked where we were going. Jason told him that they were going to the police station since not going to school is against the law and that the police would be happy to tell him what happens to people who don't obey the law. He decided that he would like to go to school after all.

This was not the end of the school fight and I don't think that it will be over for many years but at least he won't catch us unaware again. We've got rewards and punishments in place now. Hoo boy yeah I love having him home but that boy will be the death of us.

-Wendy

Proud of Papa Buddy

Congratulations to Lynn Arbuckle, Dave Blair, and Marc Walker for receiving another patent. This one is for the Apex Audio router. http://www.grassvalley.com/products/routers/apex/ Even though it takes a half hour for him to explain to me what this does and the schematics cover pages, I am so proud of his accomplishments!

Here is some bits of wisdom that I've learned from dad regarding his work.

• When you have a problem that seems unsurmountable sleep on it and give it a little time. Many times the answer will pop into your head after a good night's sleep.
• He's a team player. You never see just his name on a patent. He's not in it for the glory. (whatever glory there is in router patents etc.) He's even turned down opportunities for management because that's not what he does best.
• Balance. He works hard from 9 to 5 but then comes home and switches gears.

Porter Update

I'm always doing updates of Hyrum and Porter probably sounds like a scared, pathetic afterthought in our family. Really he's a mostly normal happy little kid who loves animals, is thrilled to learn new things, is not thrilled to do chores and loves to play with friends.

We had a great time at his Halloween party at school. (I'm the head room parent.) He dressed up at Luigi for Halloween and got lots of candy trick or treating.

After family therapy on Friday, we got to go out to Pizza at the new Pizza Pie Cafe in Provo. Our friends Melanie and Cory manage it. It was so fun to see them and their little one Jayden. Porter has even nicknamed him "Jayders." Pizza is one of Porter's favorite foods. It's all you can eat and Porter can pack away a surprising amount for a 5 year old!

We've been trying to encourage reverence during prayers for Porter. We got some gormet jelly beans and if he is reverent through the whole prayer, he gets one. If he says the prayer, he gets two. After church Jason asked him if he got a jelly bean or not. Porter said "yes." Jason said "Were your eyes closed the during the whole prayer?" (knowing they weren't) Porter said that even if we saw his eyes open, his spirit's eyes were closed the whole time. What can you say to that?

Our weekend

Jason sent this update to Tom, Hyrum's therapist, down at the state hospital in an email. I thought maybe our families and friends might be interested in how the weekend was too.

"Hyrum's yellow behavior on Saturday stemmed from an argument between he and his brother over the Nintendo. Hyrum recently has wanted to play the Nintendo alone and we told him that he needed to share with his brother. He got upset about this and stomped up to his room. It took him nearly 1/2 hour to calm down.

On Sunday, he started acting up just before church. He had been out front playing and when we told him it was time to come in and get ready for church he said that he was too tired to do so. He eventually got into church clothes and went to church, although he was a bit hyper during church, it was not terrible. After church we went to Wendy's parents for dinner (right in the neighborhood) and he was very non-compliant there. After this Wendy took him to my brother's house (also in the neighborhood) to play for about 1/2 an hour with his cousins. When the time came to leave he threw a fit and jumped up on top of the car and made it very hard for Wendy to get him in the car. Wendy then took him back to her Mom's for Grandma to take him back to Provo. When he found out that was where he was going he grabbed Wendy by the neck from the back seat of the car. Wendy had to send Porter in to Grandma's to get some help getting him off of her and into Grandma's car (I was still at the church counting the receipts.) Wendy said at this point it became one of the worst fits she has seen him throw, getting him into Grandma's car to head back to the unit.

So, in summary, Friday and Saturday were not too bad but from about 11:00 Sunday he was very difficult. It could have been Halloween, but whatever it was he was very wound up and difficult."

This is what I added to Jason's email.

"I just wanted to add one thing to the story. We had homemade chili and bread at my mom's house. Hyrum chose not to eat more than 3 bites of chili and no bread. This was his decision in spite of being warned that this was dinner. We briefly stopped at home between grandma's house and aunt Rachel's. At home he wanted me to prepare him more food because he was hungry. It wasn't just him, his brother said the same thing. I told them that dinner was at grandmas and that if they wanted a snack, they could have anything in the kitchen that they could make themselves. Hyrum got some cold cereal and porter made himself a ham sandwich.

Aunt Rachel was just getting ready for a dinner party and Hyrum was trying to get food from her too. I told him that we had already had dinner and that it was time for us to leave. (I had previously given a 5 minute warning) Aunt Rachel said that her kids had the same rule about eating dinner.

He was enraged when he ran up the car and sat on top. He pulled off his wristband and threw it along with his shoes. (speaking with all the body language he could of how angry he was) His brother was too scared to get into the car with an upset Hyrum on top. I told him that this was damaging property (dents in our car) and that this was level 2 behavior. (he responded by trying to tell me that there were no dents - trying to distract me from the real issue - his behavior) He was reluctant to get into the car and after instructing him to do so multiple times, I told him that my patience was at an end and that it was time to go back to Provo. (I'm not sure that he heard me through the tantrum because he was surprised when I pulled up to my parents house for grandma to take him back to Provo.)

Grabbing my neck was more a terror-hug thing. He was crying and saying how scared he was and that he just wanted to talk to me. Regardless, it took my father physically putting him in the car; me threatening that if he wasn't safe on the car ride, he wouldn't be allowed to come back next week-end to get him to go.

We're left with a sense of failure and questions about what we could have done differently. Also, we have a traumatized Porter who wouldn't leave my side the rest of the night, is having nightmares and coming into sleep with mom and dad almost every night.

The neighborhood kids frequently report being scared of Hyrum. I think that it's because he violates their personal space and gets right up in their face and yells. He's loud and unpredictable. He thinks that it's funny and laughs but it's not making him popular with the kids. They are often reluctant to play with Porter if Hyrum is home. "

We meet with a Neuropsycologist on Wednesday about some responses she's had from Hyrum on some very specific therapies. We're hoping that she can nail down some of the diagnosis. I think that she is thinking Autism but we've been down that road before. I wish they had some concrete way to diagnose Autism or a mental illness. I'm a numbers kind of gal and like black and white. Too bad that the world of mental illness is all about shades of gray.

Porter-isms

It is red ribbon week at school this week. Monday, Porter comes home from Kindergarten and excitedly tells me "mom, we're doing free drugs at school." I think he meant to say something about being drug free but it is so much more interesting the way he said it.

Other words Porter has coined for us are:
"Snackrament" for Sacrament
"Bathtism" for Baptism
and mom is dad's "life" for wife

So glad I married him!

Do you ever look back on your life and have regrets? One thing that I never regret is having married Jason. He is wonderful. I've had the stomach flu over the weekend and he took care of me and the boys too. We think alike. I don't know if it's a "time being married" thing or just us but often I will pick up the phone to call him and it rings in my hand and he's there.

He's working so hard to keep our family solvent while Hyrum is getting the treatment he needs. I'm so proud of him. While he is teaching two classes at LDS business college at night, he prepares for taking additional sections of the CPA exam in November. He also teaches an adult education class at the local high school. He's doing so well at his full time IRS job too. He's been selected to write next year's continuing education materials for the IRS agents in the western region. (he wouldn't like me telling that so pretend that you don't know, he never reads the blog anyway) He runs full speed all week long and then on the week-ends runs right into the train wreck that is our home life. His regret is that he can't spend more time with us and he vows that he will never again teach so many classes in one semester. He's a good man who still finds time to study the scriptures and pray. I married someone up to the challenge of life and I'm ever grateful that I did.

Update on Hyrum's Treatment

Prozac seemed to be working and even cautiously upping the dose, he was doing so well that we were getting close to setting a date for release. Then we started noticing that he was having unpredictable moods and extreme hyperactivity. Something as simple as "pass the salt" could mean an explosion from him or a tearful accusation. Dr. Burris offered us the option of adding a mood stable-izer on top of the Prozac but we've done that before and it hasn't helped. So it seems that if we treat the anxiety, his moods de-stabelize. And if we don't treat the anxiety, he has no quality of life. What to do? For now, we are lowering the dose of Prozac with the goal of removing it altogether and trying another medication instead. That means more time at the State Hospital.

We go through times when I'm doing better and times when I don't think that I can take it anymore. Maybe because my hopes were up, I'm having trouble lately. I wonder what his day was like. What did he have for dinner? Did he play outside? Who is his favorite friend to play with? Did one of the techs read him a story and tuck him in tonight? Will he hate us forever because of our putting him there? Did we do the right thing? Questions Questions

Cabin Trip

The weather was beautiful for our retreat to the mountains this week-end. It's funny how we stay busy without the TV and telephone. Here some of what we did.

• Provo River Falls
  

• Hiked around Mirror lake and saw a Bald Eagle up close! (Porter's idea of heaven, the bird not the hike)
• Built Jason's beehive boxes
• Made dart guns out of PVC pipe and old magazines

• Rode in the back of a pickup truck
• Talked to the ranger
• Went to Walmart in Evanston, WY

• Wendy and the boys paddled a canoe around. See the dog in the middle? Porter and I did an animal rescue (just like Diego). As we went along, our dog, Denali, bounded along on the bank. Just after the beaver house we heard a "yip" and she was gone. After calling and getting no response, we paddled to the side and disembarked to save her from one of tunnel holes that the beaver had dug and then had collapsed. We loaded a wet dog on to the canoe and she got to ride in style back to the cabin.




• General craziness and hijinks

We are so lucky and blessed to have a cabin to go to but more importantly to have this precious time together!

Porter's First Day of School

Porter is in Kindergarten! He picked out a satchel book bag "just like Indiana Jones" he informs me. Oak Hills is hiring another teacher so Porter will have whoever that is. The beauty of a new teacher is that there is only slated to be 14 kids in his class. I love it.

We had orientation today and there is pre-testing all week so next week will start the first real days in school.

Hey! Be nice to yourself!

Friday afternoon I got some results from a blood test showing that I am "early stage diabetic." I was devastated. I know that it means some big changes in the way that I live and I didn't feel ready to cope with it.

The rest of Friday and Saturday I had a headache. It didn't respond to medication or sleep or anything. I knew it was somehow related to the diabetic news. At 5am on Sunday, still suffering from the headache I figured out what it was. I completely blame myself for becoming diabetic.

I should have exercised more, and watched what I ate better. Diabetes is prevalent in my family and I can't recall how many times my mom told me to be careful and not get overweight or I will become diabetic. In her family, diabetes can mean death. How could I completely ignore her warnings and become diabetic at age 35? It's like the beginning of the end.

Not forgiving myself was what was wrong!

It's better now. I realize that the Savior's atonement can apply even to forgiving ourselves. I couldn't do it by myself. We all make mistakes and beating ourselves up about it isn't part of the plan. So.........be nice to yourself. There is only one you and you are important to me. (and probably a whole lot of other people too) Wendy

4th of July

Becca, Misty, and Kim at the BBQ


Hryum and Jason listening to the choir sing at the ward breakfast.
Don't look so excited Hyrum!



Mike F. & Jason and Hryum




The kids getting ready for the ward "parade"


Any of you who know Mike Mayfield, our neighbor, know that he is a born story-teller. Before our annual "street of fire" BBQ he told the kids his version of the reason we celebrate Independence Day. Here is a bit of what he told the kids before we ate..........



"All right kids ... the 4th of July is a pretty big deal. Why? Because back in 1776, England started pushing us around. They made us pay taxes, they made us wear funny wigs, they made us drink crazy tea, and finally America said, 'Dudes! We're not going to do this anymore.' So on the 4th of July in 1776, we wrote 'em a pretty nasty little letter. It was called the Declaration of Independence. It said, 'Dear England, thanks for Harry Potter in the future but we don't want your stinkin' taxes, your funny wigs or your bad tea. We don't even want to be part of your country any more. So take that. Kiss off. Love, America.' And then they signed it. Some of our founding fathers weren't as brave as the others. They signed it pretty small. But John Hancock signed it in big ol' letters so King George wouldn't have to use his glasses to read his name.



"When King George got the letter, he was so mad that he sent the largest army in the world to come fight our guys. Their army had big guns and matching red coats. Our guys had little guns and no shoes, but they loved America and they were ready to take on that big army so we could be free. Fortunately, we were smarter than the British so we got 'em surrounded and then we said, 'Take your red coats and bad teeth back to England and don't come back until 1812.' And that is how America started kicking butt. "


Thanks to Misty for preserving a bit of Mike wisdom for posterity. I bet the kids will remember better than learing this stuff in a dry old text book. Next holiday I'll send the kids over for more history lessons. What do you think he might tell them for Halloween?

Porter is Five!

August 10th, 2009. Porter had his first friend birthday party. It was an animal theme of course. He’s been playing Leapster and checking out tons of books from the library on animals. He is a self proclaimed “animal genius.”

I remember 5 years ago traveling to Spokane, WA to pick him up at Deaconess hospital and how HOT it was there. (in the 100’s every day) It was so beautiful with all the pine trees and lakes and streams.

When Melanie put Porter in my arms and Jason left to go get Hyrum I had a minute with this precious little one. Porter smiled at me. I know you’ll say that newborns can’t smile at that age but I swear he did! He was born knowing how to smile and that is a hallmark of his life so far. He’s a laid back, happy kid who likes to tease and have fun. He is such a blessing in our lives. I know we couldn’t do without him. We love you Porter.

Family Reunion at Bear Lake

Papa Buddy rented this really cool lodge (www.laketownlodge.com) for the week-end and all the Arbuckle siblings and their kids came for a get together. Wendy’s cousin, Gina Baker and her husband, Shane also came and took family photos and had a blast.


Porter and Ashlynn playing in the sand and water

Hyrum

Lindsay and Jason and Noah came all the way from Conneticut

I think Porter and Hyrum really loved the theatre room downstairs. I loved when the kids went to bed and I had people to play games with and just talk and hang out.