The Violin Man

Vince and I also went to the grocery store yesterday. As usual he managed to squeeze a drink out of me (or from the store) while shopping, got a free slice of bologna at the meat counter, and did behave WONDERFUL at the toy isle and the check out. In the elevator down to the car garage, my cell rang, and I juggled cart, kid, and phone at once. In the mean time, Vince was so fast he managed to push the alarm button in the elevator, which made this loud sound go off. The older gentleman we were sharing the elevator with did not appreciate this one bit. Somewhat rushed I hung up. Áll this happened within 10s. The man was really sour and ridiculous about it. Not that Vince noticed, he still blew him a kiss as we walked away.

Then outside the elevator, there is usually this (I guess homeless?) man playing the violin. Vince loves him, and we always give him our change as we walk by. I would not say we know him now, but yesterday the man pointed out (correctly) that it was nice that mom goes shopping too sometimes… B does most of our grocery shopping. The man also let Vince play his violin for a bit and V-man was in heaven. He (V) kept asking me for more money by reaching out his hand and pointing to my purse, so a few € later I finally got us in the car.

The whole way home, Vince was waving and saying Bye Bye. He really loves that violin man.

Lalalala

Vince and I went to speech this morning. Despite road work we got there with 10 minutes to go before his appointment. FYI 10 minutes is like an eternity in that waiting hallway with only very boring toys and a very interesting cleaning cart driven by a very unhappy cleaning lady. Vince tried to put his hands in the dirty water about five hundred times.

We did not have time to go pee before we left home, so I knew we needed to before his session started. So into the loo we go, and Vince refuses (rightly so I guess) to go in the women’s so we head into the men’s. It is a room with lock, so no urinals or so at least and we were alone in there. Vince did NOT want to go, so he started his toilet trick, where he basically makes himself totally stiff, and impossible to place on a toilet. The trick for me, is to kind of tickle him, so he looses his leg stiffness and sits down. At this point he usually falls INTO the toilet. Anyways, no tickling worked and Vince got mad. At me. So stiff as a branch in his whole body he is getting furious. And pees. Straight forward. All over me. Good stuff. Then he laughed till he started coughing so much he almost threw up. At least he peed. And then he went into ST and had a very good and concentrated 45 minutes, while I sat outside drenched…

Kind of Moved In

One million boxes to go, and new places to find for everything. But we are at least sleeping n our new place now. No clue where the silver ware is, but I am sure we will find that too.

Vince loves running up and down the stairs and he loves the new big bath tub. Sleeping in his new much bigger room – not a hit yet. He went to bed at 10 (w us) and then I carried him to his own bed around mid night. then he woke up a few hours later and would not sleep alone in his bed, so I went in and slept there with him till 6 this morning. Tired to say the least, but happy we are moved in. kind of at least. Pictures will come when I find the camera…

Moving Day

We are moving today and tomorrow. Hopefully we get it all set up within that time…
Anyways, I will be back when the internet is.

Pst. same phone number, but it will not work before the 14th.

Happy Birthday B

Happy Birthday Mr B! We hope you have a great day. Vince slept till 5.40 this morning. He had also made the bed for his doll next to a milk carton and his Bosch tool-set.

He also took over your side of the bed and slept relatively peacefully through most of the night. Despite the pic, he does NOT have his hand in his pants, it just looks like that.

Oh Man…

Sometimes you get lucky and hit the jack pot. I got extra lucky this weekend and got myself a double jack pot. A nutcase (in the store) was crazy enough to get himself in both a criminal and a civil lawsuit; one filed on Saturday by me, the second one cleared up today and filed by me today. It is interesting how some people are truly amazing and pull an army in for you and get things to simply JUST work out in between. Especially with the fact that Mr. B left on a plane to the States this morning and I had a crap load of papers to go through. But with a lot of help from a few friends, and some surprise mini-Santas things are looking pretty good. Or as my lawyer told me,  I am definitely the one with all the bonus cards in my hand.

Cryptic I know, I just needed to get it out of my system for tonight. If you have my phone number, remember it is waaaaaaaaaaaaaay past my bedtime.

Change of Plans

The plan was to pack, pack, pack and pack this weekend so we could move into our new apartment on Wednesday. We were pretty much all prepared, when B told me he declined to go on a business trip due to the move. Yes, you are not going to Korea when we are moving, was my answer.
But the business trip was to the US, somewhere in Indiana. I told him to immediately call work and tell them he is available. If he is going to the US for 4 days (flying out Monday at noon, returning Thursday at noon, so basically going for 2 meetings) Vince and I can live with movinga  few days later.

I am creating a  long list of everything that I can not live without Mainly magazines that they charge you an arm and a leg for over here. I sooooooo wish I could go with him on this trip, maybe next time. At least the guy has enough sky miles…

Surprise

B called this morning to the same place I called yesterday, and wouldn’t you know it, he got connected to the highest boss who explained how a few things work. Down syndrome is definitely a qualifying diagnose for IZB and we have the right to that. We may be called into an evaluation of what needs Vincent has, but most likely not as it usually is clear what therapies are needed at 3 years of age with Down syndrome.

Not even two hours later he gets a call BACK from them and they explain and offer this service that can help us interpret the law and what rights Vincent has as a ‘disabled’ person.

We will have an official decision in 2-3 weeks.

A few hours later

I got a call from somebody, who referred me to somebody, who asked me to call somebody who put me in contact with this lawyer who works for kids with disabilities. He will call me within one or two weeks. In the mean time we are to gather up all the documentation we have and send it to him. Poor man will be drenched in documentation. He seems like a very nice and most of all KNOWLEDGEABLE person. Things could be good…

WTF (again)

Disclaimer: I like Austria, I am just royally pissed at the system today. So skip reading if you do not want to hear me rant and ramble. I would fight equally for my son, regardless of what country we lived in, OK?

We got our decision regarding day care last week. Remember, I wrote about it here and here? Vince is not allowed to stay where he is now. But we DO have an other day care space (which is a victory in itself as hundreds of kids will not have a space in Graz in fall due to the ‘great’ political decision of making free for everyone – therefore thousands of kids more that usual have been applying, but that is a different story). Anyways, the place is a good place. A new kinder garten that will open in September. It is kind of small, only one group there, which totals 25 kids. With 2 adults.

Yep. 2 adults at all times. 25 kids. Where Vince is now there are 3-4 adults on 12 kids. I am REALLY terrified that Vince, who is actually not that social (bummer, beats that DS myth about how social all people with DS are), will not like it as it gets too loud and will go and hide out in a corner while playing on his own.He is really good at that, playing on his own.

So I did a lot of research on what his possibilities are. Research is not that easy. You see, you have to call a lot of bureacracies, and a lot of times I get dissed immediately due to my accent. If I don’t add a ‘I am sorry, I am from Sweden, and I do not know how it works in Austria‘ thing right away, I get sent to the bottom of the pile immediately. It is annoying as I am capable of doing things for myself, but over the telephone I am just another foreigner. B and I have split what we are trying to do for Vince, and I want to be part of this. He does all the written stuff and the actual applications (which are about a million of too to feed the bureacracy). We also split taking turns going to the different therapies Vince participates in. And somewhere in between we both get about 50 hours a week at work…

I did find that Kinder garten Assistent, it is called 1:1 Assistant and it does exist in some areas in Austria. However, not in Graz. I just found that out. There is something called IZB, which we have applied for, and today is the decision day. IZB is basically a team of therapists etc that comes to the kinder garten and spend x hours with the kid with special needs. But go figure, no new IZBs have been added this year, eventhough there are A LOT more applicants, so there are just a few free spaces. Rumour has it that we can call in tomorrow or Wednesday to see if we got one assigned to Vince. We just faxed in our application last week, which is VERY late, but what the heck, we had no decision before that.

IZB would help some, that would mean that a ST, EI, OT would be with him 3-4 days a week for a few hours. But I do not know if that is enough? I do not think he needs someone 1:1 100% of the time, but he is definitely not at the same level as the majoprity of his 3 year old peers.

I just called DS Austria, and the lady there is always really helpful. I am waiting to hear back from her. I have also heard of something called a ‘Shadow person’, and maybe she can tell me more about this. From what I understand, this is someone who at least kids with autism can get, and I do not know whay they woul separate based on diagnose, to help in kinder garten/school. However, with this type of ’support’ Vince looses some of his other benefits.Tit for tat I guess…

Ok, feel a tiny bit better now. Let’s see what it all brings…