We’re back from holidays!

We’ve done the unthinkable. We’ve had a family holiday (well, family minus the older two children) and we survived it. The last time we had a family holiday, BuddyBoy was a blur of a toddler, and SuperBoy was in utero.

Our trip consisted of a drive to see BuddyBoy’s biomedical practitioner – a mere 1700 kilometres (1056 miles) away. And as we can’t take the boy on a plane, we drove. Yep, we drove, you read that correctly. We hired an RV for a few reasons – one being that our car was not up to the challenge, and the other that by having the same daily accommodation, we hoped it would lessen the anxiety. Which it apparently did, because not only did we make it back home in one piece, but we actually had a good time. 🙂

Our biggest challenge was trying to get BuddyBoy OUT of the car. He was very happy to go driving every day, as long as the snacks, iPad, TV, and various toys were available at his command. Which of course, they were. He only absconded once, and after that we were more careful and he stayed with us. We re-discovered his love of small trains, which also led to the biggest meltdown he’s ever had in his entire life. My apologies to all those people at Currumbin Sanctuary who were upset by all the screaming and thought we were cruel parents.

While in the very rainy and humid land of “Beautiful one day, Perfect the next” we managed to catch up with relatives and friends, some of whom had never met half our kids. The doctors’ appointments (we booked everyone in while we were there), were… interesting. We now have a barrage of tests to get on with, and a king’s ransom worth of supplements to afford. Donations welcome!

For our return trip we changed our plans – we knew there was no way that BuddyBoy would happily cooperate with our original idea of going home via Canberra and the Snowy Mountains, so we decided to go home via Dubbo to see the Western Plains Zoo. Everyone had a great time, and BuddyBoy discovered the joys of a Flying Fox. He also practiced taking

turns on the Flying Fox – something that’s a very new concept for him, and he did exceptionally well.

By then we were pretty sleep deprived, as our darling boy doesn’t go to sleep quickly or quietly, and when you’re all in the one van, you get the full benefit of that. So we decided to drive the eight hours home in one day – which wouldn’t have been so bad if the trailer had made it home too.

Nevertheless, we got home safe and sound and so did our trailer the next day. Unfortunately we also ran out of one of BuddyBoy’s supplements once we got home, and the PANDAS monster has returned full fledged. I guess to look on the positive side, we now know that this is a key supplement and it really has been working well. Until another bottle arrives, we are once again hanging on for dear life and trying as best we can to ride out the storm that has become our life.