Timing Life

Angela does much better dealing with life when it is her decision to move along with tasks than when it is an adult telling her to get going. I think a lot of kids are that way. Sometimes when she's told it's time to be done with something and move on to the next, she gets stuck. We call this "stalling out". She'll end up sitting there talking to invisible people for up to 1/2 hr sometimes, just to avoid whatever it is you told her to do. Trying to physically move her is asking to have the issue escalate into a mess. This used to be a much bigger problem, one that we haven't seen for awhile, but once in awhile it sneaks up on us and catches us by surprise. Interestingly, if we pay attention the calendar there is a distinctive pattern! >insert PMS wink here<

So today, after the shower scene gone wrong, I went on a quest for a shower timer. I'm done dealing with the shower. I found this cool one on Amazon. This is just the kind of visual indicator Angela needs to see her time is running out!

 I also found this very cool timer, called the On Task Timer designed by a mom with triplets who needed a way to keep everyone moving in the morning. It has 52 different task stickers, and you can put your child's entire morning on a disk so they are kind of moved along through their morning routine without you (me!) constantly hounding them to "Hurry up!" and "You better get moving, you're going to miss the bus!". With this they can see how much time is left. For Angela this might be helpful since she sometimes gets lost in her room when the invisible parties start and she doesn't want to miss out, which makes her late getting upstairs for breakfast. It doesn't happen very often anymore, but when it does, it can throw her whole day off. 

For the kid who likes lights and sounds, there is the Time Tracker Pro. 

There were some other really fun ones on Amazon as well, and I'm sure if a person spent some time on Adaptivemall or any of the other accessibility websites there are a lot more to be found as well. 

Angela is really very independent. I bet I could set her whole life up to be run by timers and the only time I'd see her is when she'd come upstairs for meals. Unless, of course,  I put "Come give mom a hug!" on her schedule, then she'd oblige me for a minute or two. Although I think she would be thrilled to be "on her own", I would miss her far too much! Besides, she's only 14!!!