Preschool

School is starting soon.  I honestly can't wait!

When we had our first follow-up visit with the geneticist at 2 months of age it was noted that he still had very low muscle tone.  He was unable to hold his head up for any length of time and was also unable to hold down his milk if laid down right after a feeding because the smooth muscles in his stomach/throat were just too weak.

Carson was entered into a program at 3 months of age that helps facilitate care coordination for him.  Here in Ohio it is called Help Me Grow.  From birth to 3 years of age they have specialists who come into your home and will evaluate the situation and make decisions about physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy.  Every couple of weeks a speech therapist and physical/occupational therapist would come to our house and work with Carson while also teaching me how to do the exercises with him myself between visits from them. 

The team that worked with Carson was amazing.  Within a few months he was able to hold his head up on his own and by the time he was 9 months old he was crawling.  A HUGE feat for a child with hypotonia (low muscle tone) because the cross-body action is almost impossible.  He was walking at around a year- but when I say walking think of a very slow staggering drunk, leaning forward almost ready to face-plant at any moment.  They told me that he probably would never run and jumping wouldn't be possible for him.  I was just happy that he was upright.

At the age of 3 he was transitioned out of Help Me Grow and I was given the option to enroll him into a special education preschool program that has therapists employed by the county who come and work with the children in our local school district.  At first I was very skeptical.  I didn't want to leave him alone with people who I didn't know and couldn't trust with my little man.  With him being non-verbal what would happen if they treated him badly and I wasn't there?  How would I know?  At first I turned them down.  I bought the Baby Signing Time DVD's and began to work on teaching him American Sign Language. 

Of course he was entranced by the music and the movement on the TV but really wasn't interested in the actual content of the movies.  At the next visit with his coordinator she told me that I also had the option to use the itinerant services and he would only go to school one day a week for 2 hours and I could be there with him.  She told me just to take the meeting at the preschool and then I could decide.  Because it is ran through the county Carson would be getting PT/OT and speech therapy for the price of submitting the paperwork.  If a child is enrolled in the preschool and doesn't need services the parents pay $400 a month.  Seems unfair, but those are our tax dollars at work there.

So far I have really had only one person with the preschool that I have had an issue with.  Carson's first speech therapist for some reason decided on the very first time that he met Carson he would lock himself and his aide in a room with him alone.  He made me sit in the hallway and I listened to him scream for what seemed like a half an hour.  By the time they opened the door for him to see me his poor little face was covered in hives and he was frantic to be in my arms.  He had just turned 3 the day before and this was the first time he'd ever been in a room with strangers without me.

Needless to say it was a rough year.  Caron would do great in PT and OT but as soon as we would get to speech the panic would start.  He had to sit on my lap and I basically had to pin him down just to get him to do what the speech therapist wanted from him.  It first started with an 'easy button' which had a pre-recorded word like ball.  Then he would be shown a ball.  He would have to push the red button and have it say "ball" in order for him to get it.  After a while he figured it out and it would come easy to him...pardon the pun.

Not far into his first year in preschool I saw a news feature on a new program that was being used to help people with autism communicate.  It was Proloquo2go, an app for the iPad.  It really got me thinking about how it could probably help out in our lives too.  At school they were using a board with Velcro spots to place a sort of timeline and he would have to pull a picture to get what he wanted.  Velcro is Carson's Kryptonite.  One touch and he will vomit all over the place.  (think Pitch Perfect) That is part of his sensory integration but I will get to that in another post..

So I paid the $500 for the iPad and then the $190 for the program and wouldn't you know it? The kid has a brain in his head!  It started out slow but now he is able to do so much on his iPad than I ever imagined.  He is learning how to sort shapes and colors.  He is far beyond what anyone would've ever known had I not gotten it for him.

Carson's second year of preschool (last year) went much smoother.  He was given a new speech therapist who I would die without.  Her name is Amy and she seriously is a true miracle worker.  From day one she has always looked to Carson to excel.  She will give me an idea to go home and work on with him and by the next Friday he'd have it mastered.  She got to the point where she was afraid to give me something to work on because then she would have to rewrite his goal.  She is the yen to his yang.  He adores her.  I hope that he is as happy to see her as I will be. 

This is his last year for preschool.  I don't think even if I decided to red shirt him (wait until he is turning 7 to start school) they would let him continue there.  This is something that I will have to look into...  Until then I won't worry so much about it.