Hello All,
I'm so sorry everyone (but especially to the grandparents) that this is late but I must confess it completely slipped my mind. I have news about things like that though which I'll write about later. Not an excuse but it is interesting to know.
Anyways, things here are busy. Very busy actually which is overwhelming to me at times. I have continued to date Tyson and he and I see each other almost day. He is a wonderful person and treats me so well. He would like to have been at family gatherings but he is very busy on weekends with dog activities so I promise you all haven't scared him off. :) I'm sure he'll be at one soon.
ORL decided earlier in 2016 that they wanted to look at getting a professional therapy dog to work in The Early Learning Center they are opening in June and also for various duties around the church. They hired me to help them find a dog and then train the dog and handlers. Orginally, it was going to be an adult dog but I happened to find a puppy that needed a home and had a wonderful temperament. I'm a bit ashamed to say it's a goldendoodle as I swore I would never work willingly with a goldendoodle (doodles are known for being extremely air-headed and a failed breeding experiment) but Barnabas is an exception. He's level headed, very smart and loves people - especially children.
Barnabas was supposed to go to a home in the church (primary caregiver) and then I would train him at set times but so far no one in the church has stepped up to do that. It is beginning to appear like he will remain with me. This was not in my plans and honestly I would much prefer that Barnabas goes to a different home but it appears like this will not be happening. There will be people though that take him for times during the week and maybe on weekends. I think if he was an adult people would be clamoring to have him but no one wants a puppy even a very well behaved one. At a year old people may take him but if I live through the puppy stage I am going to reap the rewards of a well behaved adult dog and he will have to stay with me. I will have grown attached by then.
I also adopted Clifford in November (I can't remember if I've written about him). He is a black lab that came from a prison program meaning that he came with some basic obedience already. Sadly, a few weeks ago Cliff had a seizure which terrified me and of course made me think of Benny. They think the seizure was due to anxiety and so far he has not had another but I am anxious about that and quite honestly very sad. I'm not sure I'm ready to have another epileptic dog. It may very well be that he never has another one but we just won't know. Besides that Cliff is a wonderful dog who loves to snuggle and enjoys looking out the window.
Now as I mentioned above we have recently found out why I struggle so much with my memory, basic household chores, being on time and things like that. We knew it involved executive functioning and someone at some point had mentioned autism but we have come to think this was very unlikely. A few weeks ago I had my brain mapped. What this means is that I was hooked up to an EKG and I did a few simple tasks that tracked my brain waves. They compared the results to a "normal" brain (this was determined from many clinical studies) and could see where my brain deviated from a clinically healthy brain. Of course it showed I had anxiety. It showed that my anti-depressionants aren't working which I had begun to suspect. It also showed that I have a lot of negative self-talk (which is very true) but it also shows that I have ADHD.
This makes a lot of sense and if you read about adult ADHD I have all of the symptoms (it appears differently in adults than children) and explains the executive functioning symptoms much better than autism. ADHD is also a common co-morbid with eating disorders.
The good news is that through Neurofeedback my ADHD can be virtually corrected. My anxiety can also be significantly lessened. How this works (as best as I can understand it) is that my brain waves are basically reprogrammed. I have gone twice now and what I do is watch a movie I pick out (they have mostly pixer films. Currently I am watching Inside Out) and when my brain does something that is undesirable (such as my attention wonders or my anxiety climbs) stars start to flow up from the bottom of the screen and block out the picture. My brain learns that I can correct this by focusing back on the movie, lessening my anxiety etc. The brain automatically wants to see the picture so your brain is being "trained" while I watch the movie. All I do is sit there hooked up to a computer and watch the movie. They said I should see a difference in my anxiety in about 10 sessions. We'll see. I don't know yet if it will work but I'm hopeful.
Anyways, sorry for the long blog post. I hope everyone is doing well. If you'd like to see pictures of Barnabas you can find him on Facebook at Barnabas The Church Dog. I apologize again for the late post.
Love,
Kate and the Pack
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