Jesse has a new medieval torture device in his mouth, courtesy of a Monday afternoon visit to the orthodontist. Until he gets used to it, eating is very difficult. For instance, yesterday he had a cup of yogurt for lunch and last night he sucked the ricotta cheese out of the pasta shells he had for dinner. I supplemented that with a vanilla milkshake. We packed him a lunch of two yogurt cups and a miracle whip sandwich for lunch. Obviously calories are more important than nutrition for the time being.

I actually had to take him back to the orthodontist this morning. Third day of school and he already has a tardy. He called me at work from Lindenwood yesterday to tell me that one of the rubber bands in the device had popped off. We were in and out of there pretty quickly, and the doctor was nice enough to take a few minutes to tell Jesse that it's normal for the device to wiggle a little bit, and he does need to be careful about eating hard, sticky, chewy stuff. But the doctor told Jesse not to worry about it too much and that he needs to eat.

I'm already afraid that his new teacher has labeled me as the high-maintenance parent. I had to meet with the teacher the week before school got started so that we could file a 504 plan for Jesse (it allows for more testing time for him and other special concessions that he needs for the ADHD). And then when I dropped him off on Tuesday, I walked in to explain about the new device in his mouth and to make him aware that Jesse wasn't eating because of it and was having a little trouble talking. And then yesterday I e-mailed the teacher late in the day to give him a heads up that Jesse was going to be late this morning because of the emergency appointment at the orthodontist. I am going to try my best to lay low for at least a week after all that.