No, I Haven't Fallen Off The Planet

I've just been REALLY busy. I started delivering newspapers every morning, and now I've discovered a new meaning of the word "tired". I only THOUGHT I was tired before.

Many exciting things are happening on the homefront here. The biggest news is that my dh finished his PhD in Theoretical Astrophysics! He was BLESSED to get hired as an Assistant Professor at Missouri Western State University. He will be teaching Physics and Astronomy. We are excited (and nervous) about this next step in our lives. We currently live in Utah, so this is going to be a big change for us. My dh is flying out to Missouri the 2nd week in July to find us a place to live. I can't go because I have to work, and we can't afford the airplane tickets anyway. My older boy will be at Scout Camp, so it would just be me, dh, and Marshall, but that is too expensive. DARN! Once we find out where we're going to live, the real work begins! Marshall will be starting Kindergarten out there, and I think he's going to need an aide to work with him. His fine motor skills are still very poor, and he has a lot of trouble with social skills. I try to teach him that he doesn't need to talk to EVERYONE he ever meets. ~Sigh~ It's a slow process.

I get a little overwhelmed when I think about moving to a new state and having 2 kids starting a new school. I'm not sure what I need to do to ensure Marshall gets the services he needs. Utah (and especially our school district) has been one of the WORST places to live when you have a child with Asperger's. He is too smart for the Title I preschool, but not delayed enough for special education services. We had him in an integrated pre-school this year, but he hated it. He was the only kid there who was not wearing diapers. The other kids were mostly working on talking. You can't get Marshall to STOP talking. :) In April I had finally had enough, and just kept him home. It wasn't worth the price I was paying.

I'm not sure if I ever came on here and shared the news, but we did finally get an official diagnosis. He definitely has Asperger's Syndrome. I'm not sure I completely understand what the doctor wrote so I'm copying it here.

Multi-Axial Diagnoses

Axis I 299.80 Asperger Syndrome

300.02 Anxiety

782.00 Sensory Integration Difficulties

Axis II V71.09 No diagnosis

Axis III No known complicating factors

Axis IV Problems with: other psychosocial and environmental problems

Axis V Current GAF- .50

Past Year GAF- Unknown

Does anyone know what that means?

Teacher Gifts

At the end of the school year, I usually try to do something nice for the teacher. Really there is no way to adequately say "thank you" for all they've done for my children but I hope the effort is worth something anyway. For my 5th grader's teacher I have a fun idea but for my special needs preschooler... I just don't know.

Crew has an awesome preschool teacher and then there is the aide.... the bus driver, the bus drivers aide, the school's PT, the OT, the speech pathologist, the vision consultant, the audiologist.... they are all quite instrumental in our lives. I mean really, where does it stop? I want to do something really nice for the teacher and I want to recognize the others but don't want to break the bank either.

Any idea? Do you give gifts and if so, to whom?

The Trouble With School Teachers Is..

They don't see how the child behaves in a "normal" setting.
Marshall's teacher worries me. I say worries, because he has his IEP review next month and I NEED him to be in Pre-school. Here's what happened.

I decided it was about time I fill this teacher in with his quirky behaviors that we get to see at home. I'm not the only one who has seen him out of control, I might add. My downstairs neighbor has had to suffer through him jumping and screaming and crashing into the door because he's so stinking mad. He is SO much better on Risperdal. So, anyway. I told the teacher about his head butting, and the crazy bad day we had the other day which ended in him putting his face in my neighbor's crotch. Embarrassing? Oh yeah. SO VERY embarrassing!

The teacher had the nerve to say maybe his behaviors at home are a result of the medication. Oh, don't even go there lady! She didn't know him before he started on these meds! Just because he is one of her best students at school DOES NOT MEAN he is an angel at home. This makes me SO MAD!! I let my husband have the notebook and he wrote a letter back to her that was 2 1/2 pages long. He told her that I was worried about him still qualifying for Pre-School. He told her that she hasn't seen the wonderful side effects we've seen since he started Risperdal. He has come a long way but he still has some BIG problems. If she doesn't believe us, then we will have to figure out something else for Marshall. I'm glad he's good at school but don't tell me I'm full of it. I'm so sick of people telling me he's normal. He's not. I WISH he was, but he's just not. Oh, he ate cereal and crackers for a snack so we must be making it up that he has problems eating. Oh, he sleeps through the night quite a bit lately so we must be making that up too. GRRR!