Lily has adjusted quickly and is doing very well at school! The school is totally wonderful and I feel so blessed that she is able to go there. It really is the perfect place for her and has yielded some wonderful results! She is listening better and is able to process information faster. Her eye contact has improved and she is following directions much better. Her speech is better (she is able to have much longer word utterances). She still has difficulty communicating with actual sentences, but that will come in time. Some of that is just about getting out of the habit of communicating with just a few words and some of that is about us having to enforce her use of sentences more often and waiting for her to ask.
Her teachers love her and she loves them too! They sing songs, do crafts and have a lot of field trips and special things that they do and I am happy that I can be a part of all of it! Last week we went to the pumpkin patch and a picnic in the park. Tomorrow (well, today actually) is their fall festival where all the kids dress up in costume and have little games and activities planned where the parents can come too. Lily likes going to school and I am so happy! It has given me some time to catch up on some appts. and things and has been nice to be able to schedule dr.'s appts. in the am and not worry about having to bring Lily or ask for a sitter.
Lily seems to be much happier and I am enjoying her more than ever! Anthony told me that last weekend she was hiding and yelling "Help!" over and over again in desperation. He ran to her as fast as he could in a panic and when he found her she smiled at him and yelled "SURPRISE!"
Gotta love it.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Saturday, October 17, 2009
10/17/09
My little girl turned THREE this week! I can hardly believe it! We had a great time celebrating with family at Chuck E. Cheese the night before, a wonderful day with friends the day of and a happy little girl who LOVED opening all of her presents!
I went to an eligibility meeting for Lily that evaluated her to see if she qualified for state services. We went over all of her scores from all the testing that she had had done. She did not qualify for special education (wouldn't have put her in that anyway), she did not qualify for OT services (no surprise there), she did not qualify for speech services (shocking to me) and because of her cognitive scores they were on the fence as to whether or not they would be giving her any kind of services at all! The speech therapist really went to bat for Lily (I initially did not like her at all in previous meetings, but sometimes a hard ass comes in handy! Actually she was quite nice to me during the meeting and it was great to hear everything she had to say, I have to say I agreed with her on most everything). In the end it was Lily's diagnosis of autism that got her services. Without it, she would not have qualified. This is very sad to me. She's come VERY far and I am so proud of all that she has accomplished, but she still has so far to go. What is wrong with the state? She so clearly needs services. How many slip through the cracks? What if I had not gotten Lily diagnosed?
We put together her IEP (individualized education plan) and I was very happy with it. We set up all the goals that we would like for Lily to achieve as well as giving input as to how Lily learns best to give her teachers something to work with. They told me she qualified for an inclusion class that is very close to home, yay!
Lily will be starting preschool on monday! We checked out the school and it seems perfect. I heard wonderful things about their preschool program.
Lily will be the only child in the class that is on the spectrum (there is one other but they are part time), there are 5 typical kids and 5 developmentally delayed kids, with 3 teachers. Lily loved it there and threw a tantrum when it was time to leave :) I spoke with her teacher at length and she was very surprised Lily didn't qualify for speech, especially since her IEP has 2 speech related goals. She told me that she would basically be pushing Lily through the back door for her to get some extra help with the speech therapist there. I will either have her go 3 or 4 days a week, depending on how she does. I'd love her to just go M-W and have off th/fri, but I'm thinking this may be really good for her, so I'll just see how it goes.
One other great thing that Lily has been doing: today she watched herself in a video and said(a few times)"Hey, that's me!", which is fantastic that she did not refer to herself as "Lily".
I went to an eligibility meeting for Lily that evaluated her to see if she qualified for state services. We went over all of her scores from all the testing that she had had done. She did not qualify for special education (wouldn't have put her in that anyway), she did not qualify for OT services (no surprise there), she did not qualify for speech services (shocking to me) and because of her cognitive scores they were on the fence as to whether or not they would be giving her any kind of services at all! The speech therapist really went to bat for Lily (I initially did not like her at all in previous meetings, but sometimes a hard ass comes in handy! Actually she was quite nice to me during the meeting and it was great to hear everything she had to say, I have to say I agreed with her on most everything). In the end it was Lily's diagnosis of autism that got her services. Without it, she would not have qualified. This is very sad to me. She's come VERY far and I am so proud of all that she has accomplished, but she still has so far to go. What is wrong with the state? She so clearly needs services. How many slip through the cracks? What if I had not gotten Lily diagnosed?
We put together her IEP (individualized education plan) and I was very happy with it. We set up all the goals that we would like for Lily to achieve as well as giving input as to how Lily learns best to give her teachers something to work with. They told me she qualified for an inclusion class that is very close to home, yay!
Lily will be starting preschool on monday! We checked out the school and it seems perfect. I heard wonderful things about their preschool program.
Lily will be the only child in the class that is on the spectrum (there is one other but they are part time), there are 5 typical kids and 5 developmentally delayed kids, with 3 teachers. Lily loved it there and threw a tantrum when it was time to leave :) I spoke with her teacher at length and she was very surprised Lily didn't qualify for speech, especially since her IEP has 2 speech related goals. She told me that she would basically be pushing Lily through the back door for her to get some extra help with the speech therapist there. I will either have her go 3 or 4 days a week, depending on how she does. I'd love her to just go M-W and have off th/fri, but I'm thinking this may be really good for her, so I'll just see how it goes.
One other great thing that Lily has been doing: today she watched herself in a video and said(a few times)"Hey, that's me!", which is fantastic that she did not refer to herself as "Lily".
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
10/7/09
Well, we got our second opinion from another neurologist regarding her medication. The message I got was, she's on a low dose and why change something that is working? He seemed surprised Lily was diagnosed moderate autism and said she's looking good, he thought she would have been diagnosed PDD (a lesser diagnosis on the spectrum). I got the impression he sees a lot of kids that are severely autistic since he seemed shocked that she could follow a command (I guess even I take certain things for granted now, just another reminder of just how far she's come).
Lily is starting to have quite an imagination. She pointed in the air and said "Look! Bees!" I said, "wow, look at that, their are so many!" she then said, "Bee's fighting!" smiled, and ran away.
Lily turns 3 next week, I can hardly believe it! She has been doing so well. Preschool may be in her future soon, we'll see what they say at our meeting tomorrow.
Lily is starting to have quite an imagination. She pointed in the air and said "Look! Bees!" I said, "wow, look at that, their are so many!" she then said, "Bee's fighting!" smiled, and ran away.
Lily turns 3 next week, I can hardly believe it! She has been doing so well. Preschool may be in her future soon, we'll see what they say at our meeting tomorrow.
Monday, October 5, 2009
10/5/09
Lily has been excelling in so many ways! I have taken her off her antifungal for a couple of reasons (Dr. did not want her to continue her current one, and an old one we tried that we wanted to try again kept her from sleeping even with her sleeping medication). I want to try another suggestion for her yeast build up, but right now she is doing so well I don't see a need to change anything. The theory is once off the antifungal she should regress due to yeast build up. I'm not sure how long it takes for that to occur, I think it's different for every kid but I've seen no signs of regression and it has been a week so far.
Recently, she picked up Anthony's hat and said "that's Daddy's hat", she put it on and in a deep voice said, "Hello Baby Girl...Hello Mommy","Can I have a kiss?"
I had tears streaming down my face it was just too funny! I've always told Anthony to stop bothering her for kisses, lol.
She's also been telling me about things she's been doing. She doesn't use a lot of words yet, but she's initiating it on her own! She has also been wanting to call me on the phone when I'm at work and she is getting very good at communicating. We use to have to prompt her for what to say, but now she is doing a lot of that on her own. A couple of days ago she got on the phone and told me, "Park...slide" to tell me she went to the park and went down the slide. And then told me that she loved me :)
Yesterday Anthony had trouble putting her down for a nap and he was getting angry with her because he would tell her to lay down and go to sleep and she would put on her "anthony voice" and parrot everything he was saying. She ended up crying for a long time, stopped and then went over to Anthony and said "I'm ok" "I love you" and gave him a big hug.
We took Lily to the park the other night and she kept trying to point stuff out to us, saying "look!" (she was really loving nature) "trees up sky" (the trees were VERY tall). We went by the water and she saw the lilly pads and said "Frogs go?" that was her way of asking me "where did the frogs go?" since she assumed they should be with the lilly pads. Then she saw a duck and started yelling, "Hi Duck!!" several times and giving him a great big wave.
She has had such an easier time to communicate and has really been initiating conversation more. She has also been processing information a little better.
She's also been singing the songs she loves so much with different rhythms and tones. She thinks it's fun that she can do things "her way" if she wants to. Just now instead of singing the itsy bitsy spider, she said it out loud without singing, as if she was telling a story.
Several months ago Lily asked me for a baby sister, by coming to me out of the blue and saying "Baby Sister?" it was actually one of her very first questions (or maybe she was telling me what was to come). We weren't trying to conceive but weren't exactly preventing, just trying to time things right so that it wouldn't happen. Well, we weren't very successful (for the long haul, it did work for a while!) and surprisingly conceived a month later. Well, I have been feeling as though I have been carrying a boy. When trying to get Lily down for a nap she would accidentally kick me in the stomach and I would tell her "don't kick your brother!" and she would be adamant and say "kick S-I-S-T-E-R!" and she probably corrected me at least 3 or 4 times. Well, we just found out that we are indeed having a little girl. My girl has some serious intuition, or she is getting some inside information from someone, lol. She'll have her sister around mid March and yet another journey will begin!
Recently, she picked up Anthony's hat and said "that's Daddy's hat", she put it on and in a deep voice said, "Hello Baby Girl...Hello Mommy","Can I have a kiss?"
I had tears streaming down my face it was just too funny! I've always told Anthony to stop bothering her for kisses, lol.
She's also been telling me about things she's been doing. She doesn't use a lot of words yet, but she's initiating it on her own! She has also been wanting to call me on the phone when I'm at work and she is getting very good at communicating. We use to have to prompt her for what to say, but now she is doing a lot of that on her own. A couple of days ago she got on the phone and told me, "Park...slide" to tell me she went to the park and went down the slide. And then told me that she loved me :)
Yesterday Anthony had trouble putting her down for a nap and he was getting angry with her because he would tell her to lay down and go to sleep and she would put on her "anthony voice" and parrot everything he was saying. She ended up crying for a long time, stopped and then went over to Anthony and said "I'm ok" "I love you" and gave him a big hug.
We took Lily to the park the other night and she kept trying to point stuff out to us, saying "look!" (she was really loving nature) "trees up sky" (the trees were VERY tall). We went by the water and she saw the lilly pads and said "Frogs go?" that was her way of asking me "where did the frogs go?" since she assumed they should be with the lilly pads. Then she saw a duck and started yelling, "Hi Duck!!" several times and giving him a great big wave.
She has had such an easier time to communicate and has really been initiating conversation more. She has also been processing information a little better.
She's also been singing the songs she loves so much with different rhythms and tones. She thinks it's fun that she can do things "her way" if she wants to. Just now instead of singing the itsy bitsy spider, she said it out loud without singing, as if she was telling a story.
Several months ago Lily asked me for a baby sister, by coming to me out of the blue and saying "Baby Sister?" it was actually one of her very first questions (or maybe she was telling me what was to come). We weren't trying to conceive but weren't exactly preventing, just trying to time things right so that it wouldn't happen. Well, we weren't very successful (for the long haul, it did work for a while!) and surprisingly conceived a month later. Well, I have been feeling as though I have been carrying a boy. When trying to get Lily down for a nap she would accidentally kick me in the stomach and I would tell her "don't kick your brother!" and she would be adamant and say "kick S-I-S-T-E-R!" and she probably corrected me at least 3 or 4 times. Well, we just found out that we are indeed having a little girl. My girl has some serious intuition, or she is getting some inside information from someone, lol. She'll have her sister around mid March and yet another journey will begin!
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