We met with a neurologist and someone who works in speech who administered an ADOS evaluation for Acroboy. They determined that yes, Acroboy meets the criteria for being on the spectrum. He is overly formal in his communications at times, blurts out random phrases like, “Thank you for shopping at Wal-mart” and had a hard time participating in the imaginary play they tried to engage him in. The official diagnosis is PDD-NOS (Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified). He would probably qualify as Aspergers, except that he had language development issues (would say a word and then lose it), and now he speaks well.
It is my same sweet little boy, but I still cried when I got the diagnosis.
He also has ADHD. It’s not terribly surprising given how impulsive, and active he is, and how much he is like his brothers.
Our little babies are such miracles. The first thing you do is count those little toes and fingers and you know that your baby is perfect.
As Acroboy has grown I’ve been paying more and more attention to things he has had a hard time with. When he was almost two I got him on the waiting list for a speech evaluation because he wouldn’t talk. Our friend and her daughter (who was his favorite babysitter ever) came to visit us in our new home almost two years ago and through their help, coaching and encouragement, Trainboy finally started talking. At that point we really worked on colors, alphabet and more. Every day we practiced what animals said, labeling trees, cars and any object we could see. By the time we had Acroboy’s evaluation, he was no longer considered speech delayed enough to warrant any services. He knew his colors and alphabet too well.
Talk about a Catch-22. I worked with my child because he needed help, and because I worked with him, he didn’t qualify for help. What am I supposed to do, let him fail just so I can get him the additional resources we need?
This time, in 2011 I took his diagnosis to the school district–I was hoping we could establish an IEP going into school and get him into a preschool setting so he could start having more than Sunday interactions with kids his own age. I was hoping we could work on some of his issues, and I also was looking for something more structured than just a playgroup.
The school shut me down. They basically wrote off the ADOS evaluation scores because of who administered it.
They did offer some speech help based upon the other speech evaluation. It’s a small step, and not nearly as much as I wanted, but hopefully this will be the first step in getting him more services. We’ll see how the speech help goes.