We added Occupational Therapy to his routine to help sort out some of his sensory issues and hopefully help improve his pickiness in eating. He goes to OT every other week where she works on different textures and working with utensils with the fundamentals of gross motor play, which he loves most. This helps center and regulate him for additional therapies. Unfortunately we had to drop music therapy for the time being to accommodate the OT.
He continues with his private Speech Therapy, and we tried out a Speech social group his ST put together, thinking it would be ideal for his social skills in preparation for preschool. After 4 sessions we decided that his time with his therapist is better spent individually, as he had trouble sitting with circle group and engaging in the group activities.
Sam aged out of the the Help Me Grow (Ohio) program at 3, when he gets turned over to the school system for intervention. (Unfortunately we had to say goodbye to our home therapist, who has been so great with him for the past year and a half.) Sam had a home evolution by the local school's psychologist which led to an invitation for further evaluation at the school. We took him to the school where he was observed by a speech therapist, occupational therapist, developmental specialist and school psychologist, all trying to get him to do different tasks. We cooperated very well and, I think, showed a true representation of how he typically is. A few weeks later we were back to review the results, with all the above parties, plus the school assistant principal, his Dept of Disabilities caseworker and his Help Me Grow therapist. It was really moving to have this wonderful team of women surrounding him and intervening to make him the best he can be.Each of the specialists reviewed their observations, combined with other tests he's had and a survey we completed. All came to the conclusions that, from an educational standpoint, he should be classified as Autistic, but acknowledged he would be on the low end of the spectrum. (The only other classification would be Developmental Delay, but aside from the speech delay he doesn't exhibit enough disability, plus in some areas he's already ahead of his peers (shape, color, letter, letter sound recognition. There are also so many more programs and opportunities available to the Autism diagnosis than Developmental Delay.)
We accepted the diagnosis after some discussion, including whether any ceiling would be placed on him and worries that he would carry the diagnosis throughout his school career. (He'll be reevaluated every 3 years, with a new Individualized Education Plan (IEP) every year.) With all that discussed to our satisfaction, he was accepted into the school system preschool program!We met once more, this time with the school principal, his preschool teacher, and the speech therapist and occupational therapist assigned to his classroom, to review his IEP they created for him. Each reviewed their area and the goals set for Sam during his time with them. He will have speech therapy twice a week for two 20-minute sessions and occupational therapy once a week for 20 minutes. His therapists will also be on hand if he needs additional assistance in the classroom during regular learning activities. He will be in a blended class with typical children, attending 4 days a week, half days, at the same school as Adam. (Unfortunately their school times don't correspond as conveniently as we hoped, but we're adjusting.)
We are thrilled for this opportunity for him! We feel so good about the staff that has been put in place around him and like them all so much. (I even told Michael I wished we could have them all over for a barbecue... fun people!) We expect wonderful changes in Sam.
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It's been two weeks since Sam started school, and there have been no tears at drop-off! We get little day-to-day feedback about his day, though the first day we were told that he "communicated well and participated in circle time." After his first OT session, we had a note in his backpack that while he did not like the tackiness of the stickers they worked with, he did great overall. And his speech therapist gave a very optimistic report about his attentiveness and participation, eye contact and alerting to his name.
Just within the past two months his sound output and word vocalization has spiked, and he has over 30 words now. He repeats everything he hears and since starting flash cards with him we realize he knows a lot more words than we thought!
A running list -- Dada, Mama, Adam (Ad-duh), ball, bear (Bah), milk (mm-k), shoes, socks, outside, car, cookie, go, cereal, Oh's (cheerios), all done, star, pumpkin, no, door, up (up-ah), off, on, Sam, more, slide, apple, baby, diaper, cheese, please, nose, Elmo, bye bye, carrot, cheese
He doesn't sing songs but will fill in the blanks, like high, star, sky, are on Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
Adam is so great with helping him, often challenging him to say something (the other day he had Sam saying pineapple) or exclaiming when he hears Sam say a word.
He knows shapes, colors, animals, letters, letter sounds. He can count to 20 and backwards from 10, and each time his pronunciation is better and more distinguishable.
Sam has greatly reduced his stimming, where he would track horizontal planes with his eyes. He still likes to align objects but we can now enter a building with automatic doors without him wanting to stop and watch.
He can write letters! We bought an easel, wrote his name and was shocked when he traced the letters. He now writes his name on his own.
I need to take some updated video of him. These videos are up to 3 months old so just imagine how much more he's doing:
Sam counting down from 10, video from October
Samuel playing with automatic doors, video from September
Sam writing, August 2015
Sam talking, August 2015
Next up: In December we return to the DDBP (Dept of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics) for what I'm assuming is his annual assessment. Curious to hear what they say about our boy!.
