Homemade roasted tomato soup, beef bourguignon, and Ginger Pumpkin Tiramisu (I just made that one up as I went along) are in the refrigerator. The Homemade Granola is toasted a cooling in the kitchen. If Diva Frog ever goes to sleep, I'll get to help Santa with his wrapping and tomorrow night I might even get to sleep.
We had a long couple of months leading up to winter, but most everything is settled now and we plan to enjoy the holiday before the real work begins. Little Frog has been having sever itching/pain attacks that we are still trying to figure out. When he gets stressed, red splotches begin to appear on his body (sort of like hives, but less defined and not raised). He scratches, and then screams. When he screams more splotches appear and he scratches some more and screams louder. Episodes can last between 5 and 30 minutes. When they are over, he laughs or picks up a toy and plays and the splotches fade away. Other times, he starts screaming out of the blue grabbing at his genital area in what appears to be extreme pain. These episodes are usually shorter. We've spoken to the doctor, but she needs to see him in the midst of these attacks. Other providers and caregivers have suggested wheat intolerance, yeast overgrowth, anxiety disorders, testicular torsion, allergies, or dry skin. When I put his symptoms into the medical website searches it comes up "rabies" - I don't think so. We are looking into referrals for a pediatric urologist, gastroenterologist, naturopath, developmental optometrist, and who knows who else. Any other ideas out there?
We've lost a nanny (had a healthy baby boy early this month), and a DIR tutor in the last six weeks. Little Frog also picked up an Apraxia diagnosis. The school SLP, of course, is skeptical and tells me that the diagnosis does not change anything - her last idea was to teach him sign language using verbal behavior techniques that require teaching four signs at one time and giving him a maximum of 3 seconds to respond with the correct sign. She had seen video tapes at a two day conference. I asked her how that was going to work with a child who has severe motor planning issues and auditory processing problems. She had seen the videos - that was all she needed to know. We also have issues with the special ed teacher who is having trouble reconciling our DIR methods with her "highly structured ABA" - not - program. Living in a small community, there are not a lot of options, but I've been very bummed out thinking about how hard it is going to be to educate all the special education and general education staff we will work with in the future when we are having this much trouble with an SLP and a special education teacher who specializes in ASD kids.
To top it all off, due to the rather dramatic slow down in the local real estate industry, it looks like I will be dusting off the old law degree next month to generate additional income and provide further employment opportunities for those who work for my family's business. I'll be the newest (and in some cases only) disability, education and elder law attorney in town.
Hope everyone is having a happy holiday, making lots of memories, and enjoying the company of family and friends. We are treasuring Diva Frog's excitement (as much about giving gifts as receiving them this year) and Little Frog's new found delight in Christmas Light displays and Christmas Trees.
I wish you a New Year filled with peace, love and happiness -
3 comments:
Hi Frog’s Mom,
The dinner sounded great (mmm!). I hope that your Christmas went well. It is a nice combination that you get to watch your children experience both the novelty of Christmas and the joy and excitement of giving as well as receiving.
Sorry to hear about Little Frog’s new issues. The first issue sounds a bit like something my wife went through, which the doctor suggested was panic attacks. She used to get a bad case of hives with these attacks (which flared up quite dramatically at times), but they would recede within the hour. It might be a good fit with the idea that children with ASD are under a considerable amount of anxiety and stress. In my wife’s case there was no particular cure, but through reducing some of the stressors in our lives they faded over time. I have no thoughts or experience on the second issue, other than to suggest that maybe the pain or anticipation of pain from this issue might cause panic attacks? It would certainly generate some panic in me!
I don’t know anything about apraxia other than via Wikipedia, but it definitely does not sound like good news. It’s also too bad that it sounds like the SLP and special ed teacher are not as willing or able as you would like to adapt to Little Frog’s needs (“I saw a video, therefore I know” – Geez!). But (optimistic thought), the fact that they specialize in ASD kids might be making them less flexible than others with whom you might work in the future. Sometimes those who recognize that they know less are more open to listening and learning than those who know a little bit but ‘don’t know what they don’t know’. FWIW, the whole ‘school’ thing scares me a lot. For us it comes up next September. But I’m trying to be warily optimistic.
Sorry to hear about all of the issues, but hopefully next year will be a great year.
I wish all of the Frog family a great 2007!
Frogs mom, I can't even get his tehers to tell me what he had for lunch, lol! Can we come to your school? lol!
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