Tuesday, June 3, 2008

For those following the saga.....

We decided to go ahead with a second opinion on Ryan.

I know something is "off" with him and I just don't feel like it is just sensory issues. He flips out at anything new especially people & places. He flips out when someone comes too close to him. We actually had to leave a birthday party at a park because a little kid got too close to him and he reached his "point of no return" as I like to call it. His language is developing but he is still not putting two words together on his own. Some kids hand flap. Ryan does this thing with his hands when he gets nervous. Greg and I call it the Mr. Burns (from The Simpsons) look. And his new favorite thing is to line up his cars on the table. He screamed today when I moved one, picked it back up and put it back where it was.

The "not on spectrum" diagnosis has never set well with me and this weekend I really realized it. I had to take him to urgent care for what I thought was strep (test came back negative so we are thinking hand, foot & mouth). The doctor was great with him but Ry screamed the whole time. New person, new place, screaming ensues. I expected it and explained everything to the nurses. The doctor was examining him and asked if I had any other concerns. I knew he was referring to Autism and told him about our experience. He was very receptive. That was the push I needed. I needed someone else to say hey, this isn't a typical reaction without really saying it, kwim?

So I called another place and they told me they work closely with the doctor's at Children's and told me to wait until he is three. Why on earth would they tell me that? Everything says, don't wait but they are telling me to wait and see if "he comes out of it". We have been in OT & Speech and he hasn't come out of it.

One of my friends recommended a private psychologist who diagnosed her daughter and I called her and got an appointment for July 9. She has come highly recommended by several parents so I already see a good fit with her.

I was looking through our paperwork from our original Autism eval and going through some of the numbers and how they scored him. When they went through the forms that I filled out, he scored "average". Not average, typical 2 year old average but on the spectrum, middle of the spectrum, average. They scored Ryan a 4. Anything over a 6 is on the spectrum. The doctor made it seem like Ryan was as far from the spectrum as a typical 2 year old with a speech delay could be.

This is hard. Some days, I really wish there were a manual on parenting. I have never doubted my decisions as a parent until Ryan came around. I guess he is just keeping me on my toes. :)

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