O.K. the bad news is Sarah qualified for more services . . . and the good news is she qualified for more services. I have had that motherly instinct for a long time now that something just isn't right with my baby. At least we will be able to start getting some more answers. Once again, she regressed significantly since 3 months ago in all areas: Gross/Fine Motor Skills, Self-Help/Adaptive Skills, Social/Emotional, Academic/Cognitive, and Expressive and Receptive Communication. Her major areas of concern are: behavior and expressive communication. There is a definite developmental delay in the area of social/emotional skills.
She will continue with once a week hourly sessions with the behavior therapist. She also qualified for one hour/week of Speech/Language therapy and 45 minutes a week of Occupational Therapy. She also qualified for the special needs preschool. We are still waiting to find out if she will go 2 days a week (minimum time) or the entire 5 days per week. And yes, thanks to Mom University . . . or perhaps my background in education . . . I called it on the sensory processing. The results that I received by doing a screening on the internet for anything on the autism spectrum or PDD came out right on with the specialists' screening today. On the Chat-M, there are 25 items. In order to be recommended for further evaluation she needed to score positive on 2 critical items. She scored on 3 critical items in addition to having an additional 6 "red flag" items on the screening. Although today she was only screened and did not receive an in depth evaluation, she definitely shows many characteristics and behaviors of children that have PDD or autism. She will be seen in 3 weeks to get the full evaluation. At least now we will start to get some answers. I've been bawling my eyes out the last couple hours. I know there was something wrong with Sarah and that there has been something wrong . . . so I didn't expect to have this reaction. What's up with all the tears? I have no idea where that came from. I guess it's just hearing the words come from someone else that make it a little more real.
Friday, September 21, 2007
And she . . . . QUALIFIED!!!!!
Posted by heidiram at 12:47 PM
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6 comments:
OT's are the GREATEST!!! I know that you'll get a lot of much needed and helpful support from the Early Intervention program. HAL already qualifies for it- so you'll be able to tell me all about your experiences. I love you!!!
Make sure to fill us in on every detail with her evaluations. Be brave little Sarah! Big hugs to you Heidi!
Hey Cuz -
First, I would have bawled too, just because it is almost a release to have some sort of answer to my frustrations - so I completely understand that reaction. Secondly, since I was working on my child psychology degree at University of WAshington for the last three years, I was totally up on the terminology you cited in your post. In fact, I wrote a 12 page paper on the CHAT-M evaulation along with the CARS evaluation so I know what you are dealing with here. I am SO GLAD that you are able to qualify for some help now because as you know, the earlier you can get intervention, the better!! And luckily because PDDs are spectrum disorders, there is much room to move on the scale and it sounds like Sarah is on the less severe end of the spectrum, so that is good as a starting point. Email anytime and best of luck in your upcoming adventures with this.
Hey, I didn't know your blog worked. Last time I checked it was out of service.
So sorry to hear about your little girl. What is a PPD, anyway? And why do you want to be permanently off Prozac? Prozac rules. I try to force it on everyone.
Oops, sorry for all the acronyms and education lingo. PDD or Pervasive Developmental Disorder is a condition in which some features of autism are identified such as impairment of social interaction, communication, and/or stereotyped behavior patterns or interest.
Sarah didn't get the nick name "sweet Sarah" by accident. I'm sure that she is as frustrated as you are. She is so blessed to have you as her Mom. Hang in there darling daughter the Lord is aware of your heartache.
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