Staying Calm

I've been looking into ways to try to help Little Prince stay calm and focused enough during the evenings and weekends that he is able to complete his homework properly.  I've come across lots of research saying that sensory equipment can help children with similar difficulties to Little Prince.  The things that seem to come most highly recommended are weighted blankets to aid sleep and weighted vests for children to wear when they need to try and stay calm/focused, the trouble is that these cost an awful lot of money, which we don't have at the moment.  

After more research I found a number of charities that support children like Little Prince who's families can't afford the equipment the children need.  We have already successfully applied to one charity for a laptop for Little Prince to use at home, I cried my eyes out when I opened the letter saying that they would fund this request. It is going to make such a difference to all of us.  Little Prince has been using an old desk top computer (which Mr Messy cobbled together from old bits and pieces), however it is painfully slow and has started to randomly switch itself off when in use!  Mr Messy investigated this and found it is due to Little Prince kicking his legs against the tower unit so much that he has broken the fan, so the computer overheats and turns off.  This has been making homework time even more stressful, as Little Prince gets part way through his work and then loses the whole thing!  I have been letting him use my laptop, but again that is an old and slow machine and I'm also worried that he will mess about and end up deleting something important (photos, documents etc) off it!!  Hopefully having his own personal (reliable) laptop will enable him to get his homework done with a lot less stress.  And being a laptop it means we can take it with us when we go away for weekends, and that he can work in different rooms of the house enabling me to supervise him while getting on with jobs, rather than being stuck in one place all the time.  

The next application I am filling in is for a sensory equipment pack, that includes a weighted blanket, a "dark den," a light tower and some other sensory lighting.  When I started reading about what was in this pack I realised that Little Prince has "self medicated" and provided himself with similar things for quite a while now!  He has always insisted on using a heavy Winter quilt along with quite a few blankets too, no matter what the weather - is he instinctively trying to make a weighted blanket?!  The other thing that struck me is that he makes himself a den in the bottom of his wardrobe, he stuffs it full of cushions and when he is feeling overwhelmed he hides in there.  The "dark den" is a metre square cube shaped tent, made of light blocking material for the child to chill out in when they feel overwhelmed - similar or what?!?!  I am hoping that if our application is accepted then the items provided will work even better for Little Prince than his own, intuitively made solutions.