Yesterday Nixon had his OT (Occupational Therapy) evaluation. It was....rough. He went into full-on sensory overload and had a resulting sensory overload meltdown when it was time to leave. Thankfully, Mac was with me and was able to pick him up and carry him out of the office. Nixon was doing his ear-splitting screeching and no one needs to hear that for any longer than absolutely necessary.
On the way out, I was talking to the therapist who had evaluated Nixon and there was a woman in the waiting room. She was very kind about Nixon's behavior and remarked about how calmly I was handling his outburst. I thanked her and just responded with a comment of "It is what it is, if I'm not calm he feeds off my emotional response and that doesn't help any of us" and gave a uncomfortable chuckle. She smile kindly and said "You're doing better than you realize. You're smiling and already using coping skills to handle the cards you're dealt. You're going to do just fine, Hun. Even if you don't believe it right now. You're special family will be just fine."
I thanked her again and left. I left before she could see the tears her kind words had caused to well up in my eyes. I choked them down as I headed down the stairs to join Mac, who was struggling with Nixon at the car. I handed everything in my hands to Mac and I gave him a break, because I saw that he was reaching his max and needed one. I went after Nixon, who was resisting getting into the car. I chased him down the sidewalk and saw his smile replace the scream. I picked him up and carried him to the car, the screaming returned. I buckled him in and when he was quiet, I made a deal with him: 2 minutes of quiet and he'd be able to play on my phone.
After 5 minutes of silence, I handed him my phone.
Mac and I spoke about the morning on the 25-minute drive home, because until then Mac had really only heard about these meltdowns but never really witnessed one from beginning to end. I explained that when the screeching starts, rationalizing with Nixon ends. At that moment, removing is the only option but it has to be done without emotion and mostly silently. It's hard, because during those moments I've had Nixon tell me I'm awful, I'm not his mom and it's his worst day ever. Those things are hard to hear but I know he doesn't really mean them, he's saying things to get a reaction from me, which I've learned to not give him.
I don't feel like I'm doing anything extraordinary as a mother. I'm living life as best I can and learning to accept what our life will be like. It's not like everyone else's but sometimes I feel bad that everyone else won't know how awesome our life is!
In other news: Next Tuesday morning, the 16th, we have our Central IEP board meeting. I'm very anxious about this meeting. There will only be one representative from the school present and I'm hoping to be given a chance to address some recent issues that Nixon has mentioned at home.
The most upsetting happened last week. Nixon was having a bad day, and in the middle of him recovering and deescalating his behavior, he was laying on the floor face down, he said "I'm sorry I'm being such a brat, Mom". I was completely taken aback because I call him a lot of things ("booger", "punk", "tushie", to name a few) but never "brat". I asked him why he'd say that and he said "Well, sometimes [aide's name] tells me that when I'm being difficult". Now I have an issue with an adult name calling a child in her care who is obviously having a hard time. He's not a bad kid, he's having a difficult time! Mac was standing right there when Nixon said this and I thank gods he was because I nearly lost my mind! But, I can't do that because Nixon will misinterpret my reaction as something he did and react defensively.
I haven't even been able to bring this to the school because I already know it'll be brushed off as "Nixon misunderstood" or something like that. They simply don't understand that he doesn't lie. He is incapable of lying because he doesn't understand the concept. He tattles on himself for things he does wrong!
The other issue, is apparently, someone at the school has taken upon themselves to tell Nixon he's not returning to the school next year because "you are a bad kid who made a lot of bad choices and will be going to a new school next year." He won't tell me who told him this, but he's told both Mac and myself that he was told this at school. It was no one at the school's place to tell him this! It's as if they stopped caring about his emotions and just want to hurt him and see him lash out!
Only a few more days of school and he's out of there. It's taken a lot of willpower not to start cussing every one of these adults out for the pain and negative self-esteem issues they're causing my son to have! He's 6, he's a gentle soul and he cares about them so much he tries protecting them even after they've said hurtful things to him!
Showing posts with label OT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label OT. Show all posts
Friday, June 12, 2015
Wednesday, May 27, 2015
Official medical diagnosis means more acronyms entering our lives
Yesterday was Nixon's big appointment for a second opinion by our insurance company. This has been a long time coming and I really pushed to get this appointment. The original diagnosis was only ADHD by our insurance company, which was met with a quick push for medication.
This appointment was a meeting with a board of 6 people who were going to evaluate Nixon's behaviors/speech/motor skills/school reports plus his GARS and other questionnaires I was asked to complete and bring to the appointment.
We arrived 30 minutes later, in spite of leaving more than 90 minutes before our scheduled appointment time. Traffic in our area sucks! There were at least 3 different traffic accidents and backups that led to our late arrival. Thankfully, I called and gave the office a head's up so they were aware and prepared when we arrived. Nixon was pretty good even when he got bored, we did some math questions in the car.
Without going into the long almost 2 hours of the evaluation and results process, the gist is: these medical professionals agreed with the school's findings that Nixon does have ASD/ADHD and SPD. He is highly hyper active and it's making any other disability hard to address. At one point, in a 2 minute period, Nixon got up/fidgeted/changed the subject over 15 times. While being asked questions about emotions, he was asked if he's ever sad. Nixon said "Well, sometimes I'm sad when no one plays with me at center time" (Center time is learning-based play centers in his classroom, he's never told me before that he's sometimes left without a partner or team during center time. That was difficult to hear and kind of put everything in perspective for me.)
With the official medical diagnosis Nixon is now eligible for: OT (occupational therapy), ST (speech therapy) and ABA (applied behavioral analysis), all which will be covered by our insurance company! Plus we have a doctor's recommendation for a choice in schools when we meet with the County Central IEP Board in a couple weeks.
You'd think that would be the end of the "good news" but it's not.
This afternoon, Mac and I had a meeting with the Vice Principal regarding the recess incident from last week. I had requested to view video footage from the playground area, as the entire situation felt odd.
Turns out, my gut feeling wasn't wrong.
Mac asked to see a few minutes before the actual incident, which was cued up and didn't give any possible clue for Nixon's actions. As we watched the grainy, jumpy, tiny figures on the screen, Mac and I started noticing things. The biggest one was Nixon was giving off non-verbal signals to the other child that he wanted to be left alone and the other child didn't respect those signals. Nixon put his arm out, straight at the child and the boy came at him. Nixon then dropped to the ground and basically turtled up (for lack of a better word),the boy then continued to stand over Nixon a few seconds before walking away. There's some discrepancy because to me it looked like Nixon may have been kicked by the boy, but neither Mac nor the Vice Principal could seem to see what I was looking at and said it may have been the boy turning to walk away. Either way, the next frame Nixon got up and went after the boy. The rest is history.
After viewing this a few more times to be sure we all saw the same thing, the Vice Principal asked us to explain the non-verbal body language Mac and I were seeing Nixon displaying. She said she was going to show the other boy's mother (a teacher at the school) the video and explain the body language as we had explained to her, so she knows Nixon did not attack her son unprovoked. It's nice, but Mac's offer to sit down and speak with the other parent as well (prior to learning she was a teacher at the school) was rebuffed as "unnecessary" because this teacher "has worked with disabled children before and I'm sure she'll understand Nixon's particular case when I explain the video as you have", mind you all this took place with 3 adults less than 5 feet away and not one of them was aware of Nixon's nonverbal signals making me wonder how many of his other "major incidents" with other students had situations like this happening.
I'm glad he wasn't suspended, because I'd have been more pissed off than I already was leaving that meeting room today. It seems, and thankfully today Mac was there to actually witness the bias, the school is so quick to paint Nixon as this bad, out-of-control child that no one even thinks to check to see if there was a valid reason for his actions. If I hadn't have followed my gut and asked to view the footage and Mac hadn't have asked to view more than the 15 seconds that was cued up for us, we wouldn't have the answers we have tonight.
This appointment was a meeting with a board of 6 people who were going to evaluate Nixon's behaviors/speech/motor skills/school reports plus his GARS and other questionnaires I was asked to complete and bring to the appointment.
We arrived 30 minutes later, in spite of leaving more than 90 minutes before our scheduled appointment time. Traffic in our area sucks! There were at least 3 different traffic accidents and backups that led to our late arrival. Thankfully, I called and gave the office a head's up so they were aware and prepared when we arrived. Nixon was pretty good even when he got bored, we did some math questions in the car.
Without going into the long almost 2 hours of the evaluation and results process, the gist is: these medical professionals agreed with the school's findings that Nixon does have ASD/ADHD and SPD. He is highly hyper active and it's making any other disability hard to address. At one point, in a 2 minute period, Nixon got up/fidgeted/changed the subject over 15 times. While being asked questions about emotions, he was asked if he's ever sad. Nixon said "Well, sometimes I'm sad when no one plays with me at center time" (Center time is learning-based play centers in his classroom, he's never told me before that he's sometimes left without a partner or team during center time. That was difficult to hear and kind of put everything in perspective for me.)
With the official medical diagnosis Nixon is now eligible for: OT (occupational therapy), ST (speech therapy) and ABA (applied behavioral analysis), all which will be covered by our insurance company! Plus we have a doctor's recommendation for a choice in schools when we meet with the County Central IEP Board in a couple weeks.
You'd think that would be the end of the "good news" but it's not.
This afternoon, Mac and I had a meeting with the Vice Principal regarding the recess incident from last week. I had requested to view video footage from the playground area, as the entire situation felt odd.
Turns out, my gut feeling wasn't wrong.
Mac asked to see a few minutes before the actual incident, which was cued up and didn't give any possible clue for Nixon's actions. As we watched the grainy, jumpy, tiny figures on the screen, Mac and I started noticing things. The biggest one was Nixon was giving off non-verbal signals to the other child that he wanted to be left alone and the other child didn't respect those signals. Nixon put his arm out, straight at the child and the boy came at him. Nixon then dropped to the ground and basically turtled up (for lack of a better word),the boy then continued to stand over Nixon a few seconds before walking away. There's some discrepancy because to me it looked like Nixon may have been kicked by the boy, but neither Mac nor the Vice Principal could seem to see what I was looking at and said it may have been the boy turning to walk away. Either way, the next frame Nixon got up and went after the boy. The rest is history.
After viewing this a few more times to be sure we all saw the same thing, the Vice Principal asked us to explain the non-verbal body language Mac and I were seeing Nixon displaying. She said she was going to show the other boy's mother (a teacher at the school) the video and explain the body language as we had explained to her, so she knows Nixon did not attack her son unprovoked. It's nice, but Mac's offer to sit down and speak with the other parent as well (prior to learning she was a teacher at the school) was rebuffed as "unnecessary" because this teacher "has worked with disabled children before and I'm sure she'll understand Nixon's particular case when I explain the video as you have", mind you all this took place with 3 adults less than 5 feet away and not one of them was aware of Nixon's nonverbal signals making me wonder how many of his other "major incidents" with other students had situations like this happening.
I'm glad he wasn't suspended, because I'd have been more pissed off than I already was leaving that meeting room today. It seems, and thankfully today Mac was there to actually witness the bias, the school is so quick to paint Nixon as this bad, out-of-control child that no one even thinks to check to see if there was a valid reason for his actions. If I hadn't have followed my gut and asked to view the footage and Mac hadn't have asked to view more than the 15 seconds that was cued up for us, we wouldn't have the answers we have tonight.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)