Part 84 ~ The Adventures of King Ben & Zeus the Big Dumb Dog

If you missed the start of this series, you can find it here. A lot of things will be the same or very similar.

First, the sunset, because I love it so…

Asleep by 11:30-12-00 and Bounced at 3:00. Yep! Another Casa Cuckoo morning. Even the two minutes of cuddle was the same. “Gramma come living room.” – same. I guess that’s good in a way, no one wants surprises at 3am.

We settled on the couch. He dumped his words all over the place. I tried to get my eyes to stay open and focus. I’m pretty sure I failed and dozed.

Daughter came out at 5:30 and after trying unsuccessfully to get Ben to go to her room with her, got her stuff and came to take over living room duty. I went to lay back down but wasn’t able to go back to sleep. Ben followed me.

He Bounced me several times. Jumping not only onto the bed, but onto me. After he made me yell out in surprise and pain a few times, laughing maniacally each time, he decided to do some “drumming” on my bed. Daughter tried to get him to go back to the living room with her, but he wasn’t having any of it. I yelled out to forget it, I was awake. Just FORGET IT!!

Ben continued his SpazmaTaz act of noise, chaos and destruction. At 6:15 Daughter brought his meds in. It was fifteen minutes early but he needed some help to chill out. He did calm down for about twenty minutes and then he started messing with stuff again. Stabbing Spree on the boxes. Not great but, it’s a way for him to burn off energy in a semi-acceptable way. But then he started going after the piece of cardboard in the window over the AC unit. Daughter asked him not to, she even said please, showed him at least ten other boxes in various sizes to use instead. Not good enough for Ben. He wanted that one piece he couldn’t have. I don’t think it was about the cardboard… he and Daughter were pushing each others buttons and it was only 7:30am.

I stayed on my bed and stayed out of it. Daughter and Ben need to figure it out. I can’t be a referee between them forever. I don’t want to be. I never wanted to be primary in this anyway. I gladly accepted the duty of co-parenting Ben, but I’d prefer to be the backup, not the primary.

I got Ben to come in the house and settle down around 8:45-9:00. He was still edgy but he wasn’t irritating Daughter or destroying anything. I went to get another cup of coffee and he followed me. I guess he wanted to keep me in sight. Him and Zeus both. Anyway, I took a peek at Mr Sven… he had eaten. Hurray! Now he was in the Judgey Corner, staring at Daughter.

• 

• 

Ben hung out with me in my room until after his 10:30 meds. Daughter had gotten messages and emails about her new job. Ben picked the time that she was trying to sort through everything to start acting crazy again. Suddenly he wanted to open and close my bedroom door a bunch of times. The problem is my door is only hanging on one hinge and screws are missing. Another casualty of a meltdown. He was NOT listening today. I tried to tell him the door could be open or it could be closed, but it was going to break completely if he kept messing with it. “Closed” he said. Then after I closed it and told him to leave it alone, he tried to slam it open. It got stuck part way, he went out, Zeus saw me get up and tried to go out the door before me cuz he HAS to be with me, knocking the door until it was hanging on by one screw. Wonderful! Meanwhile I heard Daughter telling Ben “just go away… just go away…” I had no idea what that was about. It was only 10:45 but this day already felt way too long!

I got my screwdriver and scrounged a couple screws from other doors and semi-fixed my door. I don’t think it will close all the way but I don’t think it will fall off either.

Ben had gone outside and rubbed reddish chalk on the concrete until it was powder and painted his face with it. Whatever…

Daughter has an eight hour computer orientation on Monday, then is working 8am to 4:30pm on Tuesday and Wednesday. She’s not happy about that. I figured she’d like to sleep a couple more full nights before she has to start her 7pm-7am shifts. And the way Ben follows me, I haven’t gotten too much of a break anyway, so she shouldn’t feel guilty about working all day.

He settled down in my room a little bit. He watched the tablet for a while. At noon Daughter brought his half Adderall and that seemed to help him calm further. He went out to the living room a little while later and Daughter presented him with the new tablet we’d ordered to replace the one with the broken earbuds plug thingy in it.

He immediately tried to put it in the old case, but apparently the 2020 model is slightly thicker and shorter. It still has the same screen size, just a different body. So a new case was ordered, in purple instead of light blue because purple can be here tomorrow. He didn’t get upset when I told him the new one would be purple, so that’s good. He sat on the couch with the new tablet and finally, at 1:00pm PDT there was peace at Casa Cuckoo. There had been tension since 3:15am or so… whenever it was that he first commanded me to the living room.

I had mentioned the tension to Daughter and she said she was going to try to let go of some of hers. That probably helped too. She’s a “broadcaster” (don’t know if that’s a real term or not… my blog, my words), her emotional, mental, even physical state seems to radiate from her and permeates the entire house. Turning her stressed vibe down a few notches was like having a breeze blow smoke or a bad smell away.

At 2:00 the med alarm startled me out of a doze. I played around on my phone, trying to keep myself awake. It’s a good thing I did because at 2:45 Daughter asked me to take over in the living room… “just for an hour” she said. I thought, yeah… just an hour… Guido don’t believe you

Off to the couch I went. Ben was doing the chalk thang. He said “Welcome to the living room, Gramma.” It made me smile. He did the chalk thang until 3:45 then decided it was break time. He got up on the couch with me and grabbed his new tablet and his Blue Ramen. I got him a juice before he could ask. Dry ramen is salty, the seasoning is anyway and he always drinks a lot of juice when he eats it. It keeps him hydrated and the ramen seems to help keep him… um… regular.

Like many kids on the Spectrum (maybe adults too, I haven’t asked), Ben has G.I. issues. He gets constipated a lot. I know, TMI, but education about Autism is part of what I try to do. Sometimes when he’s having a “bad” day it’s because he needs to poop. We don’t feel so great when we’ve got those issues either. We can explain it though, he can’t.

Okay, Educational Tangent over, back on track… at 4:45 Daughter came back out to take over and put Ben’s pizza in the toaster oven. (See… I knew it wouldn’t be an hour) Ben was still just chillin and hangin out on the couch. I guess all the chaos this morning cancelled the ADHD “Crack O’ Clock” Boogie. I’m not complaining… in fact, I feel like dancing or singing or maybe just playing a song (see what I did there?)

Thanks for staying through the morning tense chaos. The afternoon was much better. Hopefully we’ll all have a good night and be well rested for tomorrow’s adventures. Every day something different happens, even if it’s the same old thing. It’s supposed to be cooler tomorrow so that’s good, right? And the purple tablet case thingy is coming tomorrow, you don’t wanna miss that, right? I’ll save you a spot on the couch.

.

.

HUGS!!