Update

We start school in just 16 days and surprisingly I am not too nervous. Dominic will have a Para sitting with him half a day to keep his attention focused on school. Damien will hopefully be learning different ways to speak other than "mamma, dadda, and dis." He seems to really like playing charades and anymore it's how we speak to each other. Heck, any way to get him to communicate what he wants/needs so we don't end up into meltdowns is great.

Being frugal as always, I told the kids the other day they had to use a backpack we already had in the basement. We have about 12 of different characters through the years. Dominic chose to reuse his Transformer bag, Alex a Jansport pink Camo that I picked up at Target last year for $3, and Damien given a choice between Spongebob, Superman, and Thomas chose Spongebob by saying....."ba-bab." I'm sure he saw my eyes get big with a happy smile. I immediately praised him telling him (like I'm supposed to) I love it when you talk and use your words! Since then, no more "ba-bab." But I'm taking it in because he has continued to say "blue" day in and day out.

Dominic has really done awesome this summer. His outbursts have been mild (for the most part), we haven't had too many sensory issues. The biggest thing lately is that his bed wetting has pretty much been solved. We discovered that by picking Dominic up and carrying him to the toilet at 10:30 pm, having him go pee, he stays dry all night. We can both handle doing this task nightly just to keep him dry and away from surgery. I hope that eventually we can wean him of this nightly ritual but for now it's saved me so much laundry.

Overall both are doing really well. I hope to see some improvements when they are throw back into their school routine. This will be Damien's first year of school and he will be going 8-12 M-F! Much different than the 1 hour once a week home visit. He is so excited though when we talk about it though and riding the bus. It'll be harder on me than him I'm sure.

Amazing!

In one week Damien has said 2 new words. "bubble" and "blue" which is more like bwoo.

Here's a list of his words now. He turns 3 in just a few days!

bubble, blue, cheese, mamma, dadda, mom, uh-oh, uh-uh, yes, dis, boo, moo, yay, yeah, please, and peek-a-boo(pee-bo!)

Damien Speech Update

I wish I was posting to identify new sounds or words Damien is making but that's not the case. Since talking to Early Intervention about the speech therapy program the hospital has to offer, a few things came about. They want to try sticking Damien with a different SLP at the center for 1 hour a week. This will be from 9-10 AM. After that at 10 am he has speech playgroup with Linda (his first SLP) and other kids till 10:45 am. I want to be positive that having nearly 2 hours of speech therapy a week is going to help some but I know it's probably not. We all realize that with Apraxia, no matter what, it takes some serious time to get the mouth a going.

I still am interested in getting him in the hospital program just because it's also 1 on 1 and extensive therapy. The problem is towing all the kids around twice a week, keeping them busy for 45 minutes, etc. I think I'll get burnt out. I think I'm already burnt out as it is but I know eventually he will talk, whether with words, sign language, gestures. I can get some gestures out of him (finger on mouth making mmm.. sound for more) but most of the time he will bring whatever he wants or needs to me to figure out what he's wanting. For example if he wants a drink he'll bring me a cup.

Here's a video from the other day of him telling me exactly how he feels about giving up his bed to Mia so the new baby can sleep in the crib. He thinks Mia should stay in the crib. This is the gesture speech I am also talking about. He does say yes, no, mamma, lots of tongue thrust and spitting. Usually active speech where he is excited or mad there is lots of spitting and tongue thrust.

Ready To Fight....I Guess

Since both boys have had speech issues, I've heard for awhile that I should contact our local hospital to get them in their intensive speech therapy program. This summer Damien will have playgroup once a week for 1 hour, no real speech services though except through play. Most of the people I talk to say that their insurance has paid for the hospital program. I called Blue Cross Blue Shield and asked if we had coverage on our plan for this and she told me it's a gray area. Great. She basically told me that I needed to jump hoops for BCBS before they will agree to cover speech. They definitely do not cover articulation which I can understand that but she thinks with enough paperwork they would approve us for therapy. So I called the hospital to ask what they thought of my situation. I told the woman Damien has Speech Apraxia, tongue thrust, and a constant slobber. She is 100% positive they will have to cover therapy for him. He'd have two 30 minute sessions a week. I am so worried with no REAL services focusing on speech for 3 months he's going to fall further behind. He'll be 3 in just a month and a half and still speaks at a 9-12 month level. Mia saying Bailey now clear as day and Damien saying "dis!" to everything is just heartbreaking day after day after day.

Crazy Talk

Dominic scares me sometimes. He came up to me today with obvious bite marks on his wrists and hands. He said "take them off." I asked, "what your hands??" He replied, "yes, I don't want them on anymore." I told him we need hands to grab things so we need to keep them on. He starts trying to pull off his hand and says, "I want them off. I want to see my bones. Take them off so I can see my bones!!"

Now I would worry too much but I always catch him obsessively doing things. I catch him all the time biting his toenails off and well the other day he had bit one down to where it had began to bleed because it was so short. Anyways- hopefully he'll stop and I won't have to take him in to the Dr with weird bite marks on himself and then have to explain it all to his Ped at his Kinder shot appt in 2 weeks.

Ohhhhh.....not good.

Damien is nearing 3 now so he can really understand most things like...... how to get under his brother skin. When playing with his stim box (mouth helpers as I call them) the other day, he pulled out one of the whistles he likes that is a bit on the loud side. He took it straight over by Dominic and began blowing as hard as he could. Poor Dom jumped about a foot in the air followed by screams and grabbing his ears yelling for him to stop. Since Damien understands that Dom can't handle loud sounds he continued to toot it and run around the front room in circles. I finally ended up taking the stupid thing away and putting it in time out.

Poor Kid

Today is Kindergarten Round up! Thing is we won't be going. Dominic puked a few times Saturday morning and then Monday morning before the bus came he came down with the Hershey Squirts. It was a very long morning of him running to the toilet. Thought he'd be ok to go today but again right before the bus came he said, "uh oh, mommy I think I pooped my pants!" So sure enough his tummy is still not good. I went out again and told the bus he wouldn't be going.

So sadly he'll miss out on seeing his future classmates and the classroom visit they are doing but good thing is he already goes to the school for preschool, we know his teacher and I can get him in for alittle tour of the classroom later.

"Pee Boo!"

Damien has really opened up to playing Peek-a-boo with us all. He can actually think to say it now when he puts his hands to eyes. Other times though he just puts his hands to his eyes and laughs.

Dry For One Whole Week!

Dominic has been completely dry in the morning for a whole week. This is the first time this has ever happened and he's 5 yrs 2 months. We've been told for years that because of his severe snoring he's not getting a good nights rest and we needed to take his tonsils and adnoids out so he could wake himself to go. It's always been a complete surprise to Dominic when he has woke up wet. He has no idea. We started using cloth pull ups that look like underwear (Bummis) because he was to that age where peeing the bed is kind of embarrassing for him.

We've told him if he continues to do so well, we will go to Target (his favorite store) and he can find a new bionicle. He's excited so every morning he wakes, checks himself and screams, "mommy! I didn't pee the bed!!! I get Bionicle now??"

Dominic's Re-Eval for his IEP

First off I was really impressed how the meeting went. A bit overwhelming but I made it through. A summary to all this below is Dominic will have a Para working with him daily 2.5 hrs in the morning. He will not be taken out of class for special ed services which is AWESOME so he will be just like the other kids (except for the para)

Dave and I were there along with the following staff.

• Mr. George Principal of Elementary school
• Mrs. K- Dominic's current teacher
• Kris- Dom's EI Special Ed teacher who comes to work with him
• Lena- School Psychologist for Elementary school
• Susie- EI Speech Pathologist
• Barb- the Elementary Special Ed Teacher
• Mrs. B- Dominic's assigned Kindergarten Teacher
• Susan- Elementary Speech Pathologist
• (missing) Robbie- Occupational Therapist

As far as academic achievement and performance, they found that he is still cognitively delayed and will need some help to keep up with his peers. On Communication he is at a 55 mth level (he's 63 months old) for expressive language. He is at 50 mth level for Receptive. So basically he communicates awesome now but when you ask him to do something he doesn't quite understand. He made some improvements on completing tasks but still not up to par. Because of this he has a hard time following directions and answering questions in a classroom.

Socially he has improved quite a bit but is still delayed. He needs to learn to share, follow rules, play with peers. They described him quite abit as a loner which makes me sad. Here is what exactly is wrote on his IEP from the teacher's standpoint.

Dominic s active in the classroom often touching other students, getting in their space, or moving around in his set. His attention to task varies. Sometimes he is very engaged in the activity while other times he is completely turned around looking away from the source of instruction. he has difficulty understanding personal boundaries as well as classroom expectations At times it appears as though he acts on impulse without realizing he is breaking a class rule, such as when he takes objects out of the center areas around the classroom. It doesn't appear as though he is doing this deliberately to be defiant but rather he is playing and just wrapped up in what he is doing. There are tims when he is defiant and resists adult instruction especially when it is a table time activity that is little interest to him.

When he was 4, his EI teacher had me have him tested for ADHD which he scored borderline ADHD/more oppositional. I don't believe she ever put it in his folder though. It seemed to me they were trying not to just slap the title on him so I went ahead and told them that we expected this as he had been tested for ADHD and did score that he did indeed have ADHD but we chose not to medicate.

The Sensory Processing testing we did a few months back did identify him as a SID child/student (THANK THE LORD!! ANSWERS! OMG!) Just hearing that finally made me just about start crying right there at the table as they read it. I had my head looking down just shaking my head in agreement. Based on classroom observation by EI, testing his Teacher and I both took they will be giving him OT to work with this and fine motor skills since he still can't hold a pencil right.

So here's his accommodations this year

• classroom visual schedule
• seating close to teacher
• removing extra materials from work area
• clear explanation of behavior explained in a way he can understand
• prepare for changes n chdule but maintain consistet schedule as much as possible
• allow additional time for responding to tasks
• demonstrate activities or directions that need to be completed
• frequent prompting and redirection
• small group instruction as much as possible
• frequent repetition of new concepts
• use of visual cues and hands on learning
• teacher will use behavioral charts for rewarding
• Special ed teacher will check in twice a month for updates

On District and State Assessment testing he will be given additional time, a small group environment, demonstration o directions, and use of visual cues as allowed.

We made a Behavior Intervention Plan with strategies, consequences, and crisis management (lets hope that never is needed!) Dominic has always had a very hard time controlling anger. At Early Intervention, he hit, kicked, screamed, slapped teachers and bus drivers. They would have to restrain him, rock him, put him in a quiet place to settle down. Now he hasn't been hitting much but he won't move to where he needs to go, runs away, screams, cries, etc.

So anyways that is a summary of the meeting. In all it was a hour and a half long! We had a book of papers to take home and go through. It went very well though, I'm pleased, alittle worried about no summer services but we'll try homeschooling as much as possible this summer to see if we can keep him on task and caught up.

Today Is The Day

Dominic's IEP review is today. Why is today's meeting any different than the last 2 year reviews? Well, this is the big one. Transitioning him to Kindergarten. Dave is coming with me so we will see how this goes down. The School Psychologist, School Speech Path, Kindergarten teachers, and Special Ed Teacher and of course Kris his Special Ed teacher from EI will be there. This will be the most overwhelming meeting I've had to endure so far. I know only good will come of it but it's where we have 1 agency letting us go and now we'll deal directly with the School District with Dominic. To me it's scary but maybe I'm scared of nothing, I don't know. lol I still have no clue what his review scores have been except that social did not change at all from the previous year. Wish us luck.

Mad as HELL!!!

I am so mad right now at Dominic's School. Tell me what you think we should do. Ok so Dominic is in Head Start, not because of income, but because of the fact he is at risk and on an IEP through Early Intervention due to his delays. I was not happy that he would be in Head Start in the first place because of how ANAL they are, BUT unless I wanted him shipped to a different town to school (same district) because of the IEP, he had to go there and I wanted him at the same school as his sister.

So here's the deal. First, the Stupid moronic women running the program know nothing about special needs. I should have found out more before deciding to pull him out of Early Intervention. If he gags, throws up, it's stomach flu and they send him home. He has Sensory Intergration Disorder so certain foods, smells, etc will send his senses into overdrive. So we started having phone calls at lunch saying he would gag looking at the food or when he tried eating it. I told them about this at the beginning of the year he had this and he might do these things. Well they started asking me to pick him up a few times because they didn't want to take a chance he might puke on the bus BUT they also said he would have to stay home the next day. Most days he never touched his food and would just look around the lunch room which was one of the reasons they had also called. Finally I said, look. I'll pack lunches for him, things I know he can eat, he likes and won't get sick on. For about a month we've been fine. Till yesterday.

I get a note saying this
my nutrition coordinator at Head Start, ------, asked me to request a doctors note from you about bringing his own lunch. She said due to the lunch program that head start uses, they will require a note of explanation. If you have any questions about this you can call.......

I pack him healthy lunches, not crap. Believe me since I used to do daycare i should know what's healthy!! Should I just let him starve to death? Sit at school at eat nothing and ride the bus home for a hour? This is another stupid hoop they want me to jump through and I'm freakin tired of it. So this time my dh is calling the nutrition coordinator. Early Intervention has also said because of the SID incidents in the past to call them if we needed help with anything so I may be calling them today to about this.

I will never put my kids in some stupid state funded program again. If you have a child on an IEP and they offer a spot in Head Start, DON'T DO IT!!! They call me all the time about this and that. They need proof of this, they need to talk to me about that or I'm breaking some stupid rule. I told Early Intervention I made a huge mistake trying to put him at the school he'll be in Kindergarten at next year and Damien will be there at the EI center ALL of his preschool years because I am not dealing with this again.

Worst part is now I have this IEP meeting with the principal, Headstart teachers, EI special ed teacher, and the Kinder teachers trying to figure out who's class he gets next year. I am already stressed out completely about it and having the Headstart teachers in there I may just explode and say GET OUT because I don't want to deal with them anymore. I just want May to come and to deal with the school district from then on out NOT Headstart.

Oh and before I noticed this note, I packed Dom a PBJ, Strawberries, Apple Juice, Gogurt. I was NOT going to take that away from him so I sent it. He saw me pack it. If they don't allow him to eat it I will be PEEVED!! He will not eat Chicken Noodles over mashed potatoes.

Jordan

My cousin Jordan is severely autistic. Ever since having my own set of problems with Dominic my aunt has always been there if I had any questions, especially when finding out some of the "traits" he has had. Dominic however is nothing like Jordan.

Jordan is 17 now. My Aunt's son but my Grandmother's baby. She puts on his socks and shoes, fixes his hair, she takes him to the park to play. He gets excited being with kids, flapping his arms and hopping in place. When he was a baby he seemed pretty normal except for a rather large head which runs in the family. However by the time he was 1 ish, it was apparent there were other things going on. He would space out, not talk or notice you were there. As he grew older, his behavior, ticks, flapping, etc were so extremely hard on them both that it was enough that my Aunt and Uncle decided that Jordan would be an only child because he would require so much work. He was enrolled in Early Intervention by the time he was 2 and started meds by the time he was 4. When my uncle would come to family events with my aunt and Jordan the visit would always be short. I felt terrible for my uncle, you could tell he was always embarrassed by his behavior where ever they were to go. I remember when my uncle moved to a new home about 6 yrs ago, it just so happened the boy next door was special needs as well and he and Jordan hit it off becoming great friends the first day they moved in! We were all thrilled watching them. That was Jordan's first "real" friend.

Jordan is doing so well now. Almost ready to graduate, participating in the Special Olympics. His parents have come so far in the past 17 years. So scared, overwhelmed with him as a child to wow, what a blessing he is.

IEP Review Appointments

Dominic- April 10th

Damien- April 30th

Why oh why do I always get so nervous for these??? Ugh.

"My Head"

You can imagine the the look Dave and I gave to each other after Damien responded "my head" to Dave asking "what hurts?" Can't imagine? Well our eyeballs nearly popped out of our head with our mouths opened as wide as they would go with our hands going up quickly to our mouths to cover them. UNBELIEVABLE!!!! We asked (or shall I say begged and pleaded) again however and he couldn't say it. I was so so crushed. I wanted to crawl in a hole and cry. I keep trying to believe Linda that he's making progress but when all you hear is mama, dadda, dis all day....how can you believe it? Is Apraxia really reverseable? I just want this to all end. Will he speak more than a few words by the time he's 3? Odds are in this game, probably not.

Cross Eyed

I am being asked by the school to get Dominic into a Pediatric Eye Dr because when he's focusing on things his one eye is crossing over to his nose. I've noticed it for a long time but have hoped it would resolve on it's own. Guess not.

Long Time No Update!

Ok so I really should update here. Still no real new progress with Damien. Hopefully he'll have some kind of a language explosion this summer but I doubt it. His Apraxia and tongue thrust are so severe. We are however getting him to make more sound for his needs. If he wants a drink, he puts a finger on his lips and says "mmmmmm" Most of the time he brings me cups and whines or says "ya ya ya" He is about to be lapped by Mia on speech we can already tell. She is so smart too which is sorta sad to see. She's only 14 months and comprehends so much. Daddy asked her if she pooped the other day while sitting down for dinner and she put her hand by her butt sitting in her highchair, looking at him and said "uh-oh!" Then laughed about it. Damien has learned "please" but it only works if he can bring me an object. Please is easy since it is like "cheese" which he can say too. He puts his backside of his hand near his mouth when attempting P sounds so he can feel that he is blowing the air for the P. He's working on Alex which comes out (Al-eh) Speech is so spontaeous, he can not speak on command for the most part except momma and dadda. We just continue intensive therapy and hope for more to come. I have his switch meeting from an ISFP to an IEP at the end of the month. Next year he will attend early intervention preschool. This summer he will either have 1 hour playgroup a week or 1 hour with a SLP.

Dominic is doing so well right now. He is definitely ready for Kindergarten except for his social interacting. He has completed his IEP Goals and we will be having his IEP meeting soon deciding whether a Para is necessary or not. I think as long as he has a good teacher, then they will be able to work with his quirks. I am fairly confident of that. I still have no idea how he ranked on his SID testing. I know when they ranked him on his social last year, not much had changed.

It's great to see one boy of mine finally moving up and out (hopefully) of developmental delays. Now we just need to get Damien fixed up. We know that his tongue sits forward which is why he spits and has so much tongue thrust. Lately he's been biting his tongue quite a bit on accident when he's running around. So those are my updates.

Dominic's Parent Teacher Conference

Yesterday we had our 2nd parent teacher conference with Dominic's teacher this year. She told us that Dominic is really doing pretty well on his school work. He's recognizing letters, counting to 20 easier, overall he's improving on everything. She said his social skills have really improved from how he was at the beginning of the year.

She said behaviorally they have good weeks and bad weeks with Dominic. They'll have several good weeks and then be stuck in a bad one which is how it is here at home. She started telling me of a few situations which I will tell EI about because I know she hasn't. She mentioned how if he's zoned out of what they are doing or when frustrated he will sit with his head on his knees and rock back and forth which she "knew" was an Autistic trait but she didn't see him as Autistic. People she has NO CLUE about Disabilities. I think that's what frustrating me the most with the school is the lack of knowledge. After that remark I told her that at Early Intervention I was told when he was 3, he resembles a child with PDD's of Autism. I explained to her how it was a branch (so to speak) of Autism but a child appears more "normal" if you want to call it that. We talked about the SID testing that she had filled out and how she thought some of the questions really pertained to him. I told her I had been researching SID for awhile so I was confident that was what was going on too but I had no idea that Aspergers or PDD's (highly functioning Autism) children usually had SID.

She said that when he is upset he will still run off and hide or sit in a corner. At the beginning of the year he would only sit on the dinosaur at circle time but now he is willing to let other kids sit there. If upset, sometimes he will roll all around the room instead of walking. He will have a bad day when she is gone so they have to be careful on those days. If she tells him their schedule has changed, he will blow up at her for example no show and tell. He talks about hotwheels all day at school but does his work. He is still not able to hold a pencil right but hopefully the OT coming from EI will be able to work with him on that.

Overall it went well. I think she knows that he's got some problems that we need to get solved with him before Kindergarten. I am so scared for next year. I know we'll be having most likely some sort of transition conference to discuss Kindergarten with the principal and 3 teachers. I want someone next year who can tolerate his behavior yet help him when his Para isn't around. I want him to succeed instead of being labeled a bad kid and failing because some stupid teacher can't help figure him out.

Daddy's Had It and Mommy has too.

Friday night was so much fun. Damien who usually loves mashed potatoes and gravy puked them up all over in a bowl at the table. I pushed Dominic down under the table so he wouldn't see and be set off. Dave had to help since I was on the other side but afterwards stood up and announced, "I'm so sick of this!!!!! This is such bullshit!!!!" Oh like I'm not sick of it!?!?!?!

Saturday I put a shirt on Dominic. "ITCHY!!! It's ITCHY! I don't want to wear this!" I had to walk off. This is draining us. I put a cotton long sleeve T on him and he was fine for about a hour. Then we started tearing at his back again saying it hurt. I told him to have Daddy change it but Dominic needed to find a shirt he could wear the rest of the day. It worked I guess because we didn't have to switch again.

Dominic has been an emotional mess again. He's cried alot today about Damien bugging him playing with his toys or bugging him while playing the Xbox. He cries so much over stupid things. I just don't even know how to handle it anymore. What a fun weekend this was! lol

Dominic Playing XBox on Break From School.....

"Awwww man! Momma! I've been Served!!"

I can't even believe that 2 years ago we couldn't get 2 words pieced together out his mouth and now look at him.