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Saturday, April 7, 2012

Psych Appointment

Yesterday we met with a Child Psychologist at Children's Hospital.  We have to get our hands around how to deal with Ethan's behavior issues.  When we were at NIH they did a lot of testing and one of the tests (Mullens) showed that Ethan's developmental age is 16-19 months. She shed some light on things...

Ethan is just beginning to enter the "terrible" twos.  It is going to be hard, really really hard.  He is a big kid who is acting like a baby.  I never really thought of that until she said it.  Ethan constantly wants to be held, carried, hugged, rubbed and needs constant attention.  The first two years of his life Ethan could have cared less if you held or snuggled him.  In fact until he was about 2.5 years old he never even held his arms out for you to hold him.  We have to remember that when  he is "acting" out.  We need help in the evenings but we don't have enough "hours" of care to get the help we need.  When his aide leaves in the afternoon Chris or I have to give him our 100% attention and that means that one of the other three kids doesn't get what they need from us.  Sucks...really really bad.  We will figure it out...

She is meeting with Ethan next week all by himself.  The following week she will meet with Chris and me to determine a "plan" and go from there.  She mentioned that because we don't know why Ethan is the way he is that we are doing a good thing by trying to figure out the best thing for him now.  As I left the hospital I passed a child who looked about 17 or 18 who was so excited about a stuffed bunny that he had.  He was acting like Ethan does when he is excited.  I had a glimpse of my future if Ethan doesn't progress.  Ethan didn't' pass his educational or speech goals.  He is going to summer school.  We will continue to look for answers and do everything in our power to give him the best life possible just like we will for the his brother and sisters.



She is going to
Save Babies From Premature Birth