Dakota

We have been having a lot of issues with Dakota - peeing/pooping in his pants, not listening, crying about everything (having complete meltdowns), and basically just acting like a baby. We have tried everything and don't know what to do. I'm sure a lot of it has to do with me babysitting my nephew, who is a baby...but I just have a feeling there's more to it than that.

We had a meeting today with Dakota's teacher, speech teacher, and the vice principal. Dakota is not meeting the expectations that he should be, and he seems to be struggling with everything. They want to do a bunch of different tests on him to check his social, behavioral, motor, and academic skills. His teacher also said that Dakota isn't really interacting with the other kids. I feel really bad for him. His doctor was supposed to have someone come to school and observe Dakota, but that never happened. His teacher and I have left several messages with no luck. I finally just made another appointment for Monday to talk with his doctor in person to see what the heck is going on.

In general, I feel that Dakota gets pushed to the side a lot and doesn't get a lot of attention from other people. His sister gets tons of attention, and I know that Dakota notices that. The other day he told me that nobody likes him and he said that nobody likes to talk to him. I try to give him extra attention, I know he really needs it right now. He's not really the type who will go up and hug someone or start a conversation. His way of trying to get attention is to pretend to shoot somebody (John Wayne is his hero). He constantly loves to pretend that he's shooting bad guys. But when he does that around people, others just get annoyed or ignore him. If someone would play back, that would just make his day. I don't know why people get so uptight when it comes to kids playing with toy guns or pretending their hand is a gun. These are the same people who probably played cowboys and indians when they were kids. These days I feel like kids can't act like kids. When we go somewhere I feel like my kids have to sit down, be quiet, and act like perfect angels. I don't even like to go places, I'd rather stay home so my kids can run around and play and have fun. Ok, I think I'm done with my ranting now. I will update if we ever get anything figured out with Dakota.