Fridays...

Most people LOVE Fridays. It means thier last day of work for the week and a lovely weekend ahead of them. Me...Friday means my last day off and I head into work just before midnight. I don't dread that it is Friday as it means that I get to enter a different stressful environment than being with my son and it gives me a break from him so that by the end of my shift I am ready to return to the trenches of parenting for anther week. :) Not that he is ALL bad...he is just very trying and testing these last couple of weeks. I know it is probably associated with the fact that Grandpa was in and out of the hospital and is still recovering and because he had to double check where he fits in the world now that J is around and that we have not spent much time in our own house due to the bathroom reno so his routine is all mixed up. My CO has returned to the kicking, hitting and screaming stage of life...oh joy! Some days I SO want to ship him to Dr. James Dobson. One particularly trying day I looked at him and wondered if we were having such a bad day because he is three...or because his biomom took something while pregnant and this is just him....the second option scared the crap out of me as I just don't know if I have the energy to always be battling with him over every single thing. He is already over 50lbs at 3...I can't imagine how hard it would be to lug him to his bedroom at 10 with him having a full blown temper tantrum! PLEASE Jesus let this be a phase!
ANYWAY back to Fridays...well every other Friday J is picked up by a CAS driver and taken for a 2 hour visit with some of his family. Since moving in with me, he has had three of these visits. Each time they have sent him home in a size 6 diaper (he wears a size 3 and there are a minimum of 3 sent each time in his diaper bag).  Each of these visits he comes home so wired that he doesn't nap all day (which is odd as most days he is still napping twice). The last two visits we fought diarrhea for the rest of the day.  I am not sure WHAT they are feeding him or if the visits are just stressful for him...but I dread Friday afternoons! Because I am usually fighting with a tired little boy trying to get him to sleep or am up to my elbows in soiled laundry. Yesterday they sent him home in a size 6 diaper ON BACKWARDS!!! let me tell you that a diaper that is three sizes too big and on backwards holds NOTHING in. There was a mess everywhere. I am SO frustrated with his family because I get so little accomplished after he visits them and J is SO 'off' the rest of the day.
The one good thing about the visits is that CO and I get to spend a few hours together just the two of us. We went to the library and the park today. It was nice. In the future I need to make sure I am really on the ball so that we are heading out or starting our fun time right away when J is picked up by the driver.  Speaking of the driver...the one who brought J home this time put some of her iced tea in a sippy cup for him to drink on the drive home. ICED TEA!!! you know the beverage full of sugar and caffine...the perfect thing to feed a 16 month old!!! I pointed out that there was a bottle in the side pocket of his bag...so I dont' know if J's upset stomach today was from the ice tea, the visit or something else. I just hope that after a good night's sleep tonight he is feeling much better...I'd feel SO bad if he was sick at the respite's home.