And on the kid front

The girl neither is nor isn't an aspie. The diagnosis is neither given nor ruled out at this time. She's doing well in school. She's also skipping more of her lunch. Her dad is not a worrier. Her mother is. I think I'll buy some whole milk yogurt and serve guacamole more often.

The boy is suddenly talking a lot more, and it's a trend I hope continues.

He's using "more ___ please" sign phrases to ask for things. Sometimes he vocalizes with it. Sometime not. Not sure how the school will feel about this total mishmash of talker and sign language and verbal language thing, but it's what has worked for us so far.

Old MacDonald had a farm, and apparently he keeps it very well stocked with cows. They're moo mooing her, there, and everywhere. And it's awesome to hear.

Got back his test results, too. Last year he scored as approximately 25 months old. This year he scores as approximately 25 months old. Er... In all fairness, I think the test missed skills he actually had just from being in a strange testing environment. Still, I'd hoped for some awesome improvements.

Still busy

Or else I'd be having a field day. Wakefield gets crucified for his saintly ethical violations motivated by profit by the evil evil pharmaceutical industry he'd hoped to employ with that vaccine he patented. It's ok when Wakefield patents a vaccine but not when Offit does it, most likely because Wakefield didn't make millions from his vaccine. Instead he just makes piles of cash by recommending that kids have unnecessary cameras stuck up their ass for the treatment of imaginary measles that don't cause a neurological condition. Poor, poor needlessly persecuted Wakefield. 


I'd also be having fun with politically-correct-but-only-when-it's-a-Democrat Sarah Palin and her call for Rahm Emanuel but not Rush Limbaugh's resignation over use of the same R word she's alleged to have lobbed about herself a time or two in reference to her little campaign prop. What horrible thing in a past life did we do to deserve either her or McCarthy as spokespeople?
  

Attention, Attention

So, it turns out (much to our not surprise), that we're a family full of neurological variation. Took the girl to a neurologist, and she's been diagnosed with ADHD and a reading disability.  We're not at all surprised with the news, since both of these things have been something we've suspected for a while.

We decided that we'd go ahead and give medication a try. Right now we're trying Daytrana. We gave it a weekend trial, and it went as we had hoped. She was the same girl, same personality, just a bit better focused. We don't want a zombie. We don't want an anxious worry wart. We want just a bit more focus in school, and when we've got the reading issues more under control, we'll give it a shot without the meds.

Another bright spot - she didn't have any problems eating, and she went to bed on time.  

Here's to hoping this will work for us.

Good morning 2010

I've got a busy year planned. Hopefully I'll have a chance to keep up with the latest rantings and ravings, but if I don't, there's a good reason for it. I've got a contract in the mail for a project that will eat up most of my time from now until June. So it doesn't mean I've fallen off the planet. It means I'm working on paying projects for a bit.

Things that take money are also underway. We're scheduling a tentative potty party for the boy in February. It's a bit odd to pay $70 an hour to have someone come out and feed him juice and clap when he pees, but we're just stuck at this point. It would really really really be nice if he could not be in diapers in Kindergarten. Really nice. He's never going to be a neurotypical kid, but man, his chances of any sort of positive social interaction in school will be so much better if he doesn't start the year by earning the nickname "Poopypants."

Adventures in Christmas Programs

And audiologist exams, and vision screenings, and potty training, and....

Let's just say the boy's not been much in a cooperative mood lately.  He's been sick recently, which doesn't help matters, but he's been a royal uncooperative crank in the last month or so.

This is actually good news in some ways. I mean, it's a royal PITA in a lot of ways, but it's good news because he's no longer the passive, "good baby" that he used to be. He doesn't sit in the shopping cart or stroller and watch as the world goes by. He won't stare dully at you when you try to get him to make a choice.

He's decided he should be part of the world and interact with it, and express opinions. That opinion is usually "no." That's very typical for preschoolers. It's the first and easiest opinion to express.

But as I resign myself to caring for his Christmas program meltdown, and get frustrated that he won't wear headphones for a hearing screening or tell the nice clinician what's on the card on the room is full of all sorts of other things to see, I remind myself that this is a positive step. A frustrating and annoying step at times, but a positive step.

In other, somewhat related news, teaching to the test begins early. The preschool teacher and we agreed that we should start teaching him to point at specific objects when asked and to find the difference between a series of objects when asked. Why? Those are two skills commonly used in IQ tests. We're trying to give his baseline assessment for kindergarten as much of a boost as possible. We all agree that he belongs in a regular classroom, not in a resource room.

Chicago Tribune - Getting It Right

Alternative therapies are uncontrolled experiments. And uncontrolled experiments do nobody any good. 

It's a long article, but it's worth the read. Also see Science hijacked to support alternative therapies.