Hey folks, we’ve had a really busy stretch here so I haven’t been able to really think about what to post. I guess a roundup post is in order!
Last Monday we took Monkey to his pediatrician because his toe was starting to look infected. We had x-rays done (oh, THAT was a good time, let me tell you!) which came back clear…no break. He is on antibiotics for 10 days to clear up the soft tissue infection and he needs to soak his foot and keep it elevated as much as possible. Ahem, right. So he hasn’t had it elevated at ALL (duh, he’s TWO!) but he has been soaking it in the tub…that’s no hardship for him. The toenail is just about to fall off now (eww) but we’re trying to keep it on a little longer so his toe underneath heals as much as possible.
Also on Monday one of his new therapists from Building Blocks (autism specialists) came for her first visit. I had stayed home for all the festivities so I was able to witness this, otherwise I wouldn’t have believed it. When she first arrived Monkey was eating lunch and he was not pleased when she came into the kitchen. I think he felt too confined in his chair. We went out into the living room to settle in a bit and within 10 minutes he decided she was cool. Duhdee, B and I hung out in the living room while the two of them got to know each other. He even crawled on her! OMG. We had told them he would need a couple of weeks to warm up so he decided to make us look like liars I guess.
On Tuesday Duhdee and I went to a “Basic Rights” special education workshop. We picked up a LOT of great information. We’ve got a better idea of what is going to be happening in this whole IEP process now. In some ways that makes it less scary since it’s not quite so mysterious but in other ways it makes it even more scary. The whole process seems like it could be a real battle. We’re pretty determined to do what we need to to get him the right kinds of services but the odds are rather stacked against us. We’re not experts in this field and we’ll be trying to negotiate with people who do this for a living. Not fair! We’ve decided we’re going to hire an advocate to come with us to the meetings and help us get the most we can out of the process. Advocates are specially trained and do this sort of thing for a living too so that will help even things out, I hope.
On Thursday Duhdee, B (Monkey’s EI coordinator) and I attended a Fragile X seminar/lecture deal. The director of the new Fragile X clinic stopped by and was introduced (we are SO going there soon) and then 3 really fabulous experts on Fragile X spoke. We learned so much. By the time we left the three of us had decided that we needed to have a meeting with all of Monkey’s therapists to get them on the right track. There are some very specific techniques that you need to use with kids with Fragile X so we need to share the information with them. We’re also having a few itty bitty issues with his new providers that we need to address at that time too.
On Saturday we attended a “Turning Three” workshop that covered the transition from EI to the school system. We picked up more information and were able to get answers to a couple of questions the Basic rights workshop had raised.
On Sunday we went and cut our Christmas tree. Duhdee was in a big rush because he wanted to work on the fence so he said we had 10 minutes to find a tree. He then proceeded to shoot down every single tree I pointed out over the next 90 minutes. Ahem. He did mutter at one point “this is one time I hate being a perfectionist…” lol. We were both pretty skeptical about the tree we picked. Heh, I pointed out three other possibilities AFTER he’d cut ours down. We thought it was going to be too short. It’s perfect though.
On Monday Duhdee and I went on a school tour. Cambridge is opening it’s first public Montessori program starting next fall and I think I want Monkey to go. We toured the building and saw the space but it’s not set up yet. We need to enroll in January and by March we’ll know if we got in or not. Terrific. It’s a lottery so it’s not a given. This may cause a big battle in our IEP planning but we’ll just have to see.