No Pics, No Fancy Title

I debated whether or not to even make a post about this, because I don't want to seem dramatic or seem like I am trying to exploit my son in any way. And I don't think I want to include this in the yearly blog book that we publish... But, that being said, it feels weird to ignore it altogether. So I won't. I will just try to state the facts as I know them. I am still learning, so something I say might not make sense...

At Corbin's 3 year appointment last November, I told his pediatrician that I had some concerns about his social development. We had recently been to a birthday party that ended in me leaving in tears. All of the other kids were mad at him for disrupting the soccer drills. He just wanted to do his own thing- not listen to the instruction... He wanted to line up all of the cones and count them. And try as I might, I could not convince him to follow any direction. Whatsoever. I apologized to the hostess and we left.

Likewise, we enrolled him in the 3 & 4 year olds' gymnastics class at the Y. All of the other children were able to follow the instruction, but he was not. He wanted to run all about the gym and do his own thing.

At any rate, his ped put in a recommendation for a psychologist's appointment through Children's Hospital. This is like a screening process to see if he even needs to be evaluated at all. They played with him, observed him & asked us questions. At the end of the appointment, it was recommended that we go through an interdisciplinary assessment to test for developmental disorders.

Last Tuesday, he was seen by a speech therapist, a psychologist, nurse, psychometrician and a behavioral developmental pediatrician. It is there that he met the criteria for a PDD NOS diagnosis. Here are a couple of helpful links to understand the diagnosis better: Autism Speaks & PDD Briefing Paper

He has been referred to Occupational Therapy for an eval for fine motor. I don't really see many deficits there, but he does use a palmar grasp to write. He has also been referred to Physical Therapy because he drags his right foot slightly when he walks. Neither Jon or I ever noticed it, nor our playgroup friends or the grandparents, but now that they've pointed it out, I can see what they are talking about. He will get speech therapy services for his echolalia/ expressive language.

We are trying to get him enrolled in the special needs preschool through the school system. There, he would receive therapies. It's 4 days a week for a half day & it would be free to us (with the exception of the taxes that we already all pay).

We have also contacted the Franklin County Board of Developmental Disabilities to get a service coordinator assigned to us. S/he will help us find the resources to fund all of these treatments, as autism treatments are not covered by our insurance.

On top of all of that, we are responsible for finding our own ABA aide. ABA is Applied Behavior Analysis Services- "a method of teaching skills to children, in particular those with autism, that relies on managing rewards to reinforce the use of language, social behaviors, and the decrease of repetitive or inappropriate behaviors. Often skills are broken down into discrete steps and taught in such a way that each step triggers the next, so that the child becomes independent in the use of the skills. Ongoing analysis of the acquisition of the skills or management of the behaviors is a hallmark of ABA, allowing for teaching methods and rewards to be modified as needed by the individual child." I got that from this website (although we are not going to that clinic)http://www.ccbtcolumbus.com/pages/services/Types_of_Services/autism_spectrum.shtml

Anyway, so we find our own aide, get them trained through the autism center & pay them whatever we arrange.

We probably won't get him into the preschool until fall, so we will probably start all of the other therapies & continue them until he gets into the preschool.

Our next appointment at the Autism Center is on April 4th, where we get all of the quantitative data. He had an IQ test and language comprehension test at the last assessment, but he was only able to complete about 80% of the testing because he was having meltdown over the letter T, which was apparently in the room being used as a reward.

The psychologist did recommend to get rid of any isolative activities that Corbin would otherwise engage in. So, we removed most of the alphabet toys from the house. He doesn't need any further reinforcement in that area. He knows all of the letters. He knows whether they are vowels or consonants. He knows the basic phonics rules... it's the language part of it that he needs encouraged in. Anything that will draw him into interactions with other people.

The past couple of days have been really tiring. My mom and I have gone shopping at OUAC & bought some toys that encourage imagination or interaction. He was really digging his new-to-him soccer net this afternoon.

It feels like we've seen a lot of improvement already, but there's just so much to do.

It can be quite overwhelming at times- all of the different disciplines involved, all of the suggestions from the professionals that have been told to us... I have a huge amount of information that the autism center gave to us that we still need to sift through. It's a lot.

Corbin has tried two new foods in the past week, which is a huge milestone. He hasn't tried a new food in a couple of years, I think. Anyway, it's little things like that that are actually huge to us. One step at a time...

I love that boy. I went to a conference a couple of weeks ago that really helped prepare my heart for this. One thing that really stuck with me is how in unconditional love, there is nothing that the person can do to make you love them less and there is nothing that they can do that will make me love them more. So no matter if he improves in his weak areas or not (which I am very encouraged that he will), I will love him no more and no less. I will just love him forever. And ever.