Flying Solo

Brian is away for 10 days, so I'm going to pull the obligatory late night and write a little bit about the week. I just talked to him and he's doing fine, by the way--about to have the official book launch for his finally-published PhD thesis tomorrow evening. Funny how 15 years can seem like not such a big deal when you finally get to standing around with a glass of wine handing out signed copies, but then again I was only an observer!

So Adam's birthday was a good day--Sunday it was, and I still haven't downloaded the pictures (but I will)! We took a cake to church which was completely demolished. Either the Provost spoke extra long or it might have been a good cake after all. I say that because it was still a bit warm when I took the outer ring away and the whole thing sunk and splooged out in a very non-cake like form, but people still liked it which was good for me, bad for leftovers! Then we had lunch and took the boys swimming. A trip to the pool would not be complete for us without two things: Adam poops and we have to go change him in the middle of the swim, and Adam pushes a few kids off the jumping area who aren't expecting it and end up crying on their parents' shoulders. Both of these things happened. At least he usually picks the kids with very understanding parents--though someday I imagine I will end up with a black eye because of his "quirks." The boys were good enough to let me go sing with the choir in the evening, and had a nice "boy evening" themselves, so it was a great day all around.

The other major event of the week was Adam's trip to the dentist on Monday. I knew it would be bad, and having it immediately after school was not the best timing either. But that boy knew as soon as we walked in that he was going to have to do something he didn't want to do, and it was very nearly an ugly scene. I tried talking, cajoling, pleading, laughing, demonstrating and reprimanding: in the end I had to lay back in the chair with arms and legs enveloping my very strong now-7 year old and hold him down. The dentist helped, and after he realised that having a mirror in Adam's mouth was not a good idea, he carefully used his fingers and eyes to inspect Adam's teeth. He had 4.5 seconds to do this, while Adam was howling and before he broke out of my grasp. But not before he gave me another hernia and left the dentist and me sweating! I am pleased that our dentist is both young enough to manage the energy that Adam has/takes and nice enough not to curse us until we've left the building.

Luckily all looks well for now, but I know the dentist was thinking the same thing as me: what happens when he has to do some work?? Funny thing is, apparently Down's kids don't get decay as much but do get gum disease. Our only defence of course is brushing his teeth. A lot. At least Adam is a pro at brushing his teeth, something we (amazingly) have never had to fight over. Hopefully that will stave off problems for a long time. I guess we can add future dental work to the growing list of things that might require anaesthetic to carry out, but I plan to cross that bridge...later.

That's all for now--more (and more pictures) soon.