Dallas Neuro Pshyc Debrief

Dale and Pat came over this afternoon and watched the kids while I went to my Neuro Pshyc appt to hear the final results from the evaluation he did on Dallas. It went very well. He didn't have his written report ready so I'll look forward to reading that when it comes. The good news is that he isn't in the spectrum of Aspergers! Yah!!!! He said he has PDD, which is kind of the catch all for kids who have symptoms of Aspergers or Autism but don't have the social skills problems that they have. He mentioned that he has anxiety problems and attention problems. He didn't want to diagnose him as ADHD because he's only 4 but says we will need to work on that so that when he gets to 1st grade he won't have that problem. (Glad we caught that now!) He does have some fine motor skills problems and sensory integration problems that can all be helped with Occupational Therepy. I'm soooo happy with the evaluation. I feel like we have a more clear understanding of why he has some of the behaviors he has and how we can help fix them. He also mentioned that he has only a few ways of responding to situations (most children would have more than he has.) For example, if he is playing with the puzzle and can't do it he would just throw it across the room, instead of just walking away or asking for help. He needs to reprogram his brain to learn more ways of coping with situations. He said these problems could also be stemming from his ventricals in his brain being slightly larger. The good news for me was that every behavior he does has a purpose. None of them are random. The hard part for me is that I have to try and figure out how he's thinking so I can better equip him to handle the same situation in the future.

All in all....he's just like any other kid. He has a few things that with some OT and behavioral therepy will be fixed, and there maybe more meltdowns and such than other kids, but it's nothing that we can't work on and equip him to better understand himself and respond to situations better in the future. It's going to take work and patience. Honestly I think the big problem is that he has some sensory issues (the WHOLE reason I started this journey in the first place.) I think the sensory issues can overwelm him, also causing the anxiety. I'm reading a great book called, "The Out of Sync Child, " that offers some great advice for handling different sensory issues kids have. I'm looking forward to some innovative ways to help sensorize Dallas!