Evaluation Results

Friday Mike and I met with the panel of therapists that evaluated Kolton to see if he should be placed in a special pre-school program this fall.  He will continue to receive speech therapy but at this time they are holding off on any type of Autism diagnosis.  This means that he will attend his regular pre-school and I will take him for speech once a week for about 30 minutes or so.  I could also continue with his current Early Intervention speech therapist until he turns 3 in January and then switch to the school program.  The advantage there is that they come to us.  I'm thinking a change in therapists might be good for him.  It wouldn't start until September anyway so we will still have 3 months with the current one.

I am very comfortable with this plan.  Although they kept telling me that since he is so young he was able to test out very easily.  There are still some Autistic behaviors that we need to keep an eye on...mainly the obsession with spinning objects.  His saving grace is his social skills.  He did just fine interacting with all of the adults but since they weren't able to see him with his peers they still aren't convinced.  I guess its easier for kids with Autism to have normal interaction with adults but struggle with other kids.  So it'll be nice to get another year of pre-school under his belt.  They urged me not to say anything to his teachers right away to see if they bring up any concerns.  Again, I'm super comfortable with this plan.  And since he is so young if we re-evaluate next year he will still have 2 more years of pre-school before kindergarten.

There is one other avenue I'm looking into.  If you ever read my favorite blogs you may have seen this post from It's Always Something.   I was blown away.  I don't believe anyone has ever suggested I get Kolton's adenoids checked before.  One sign that there is a problem is chronic ear infections.  Kolton has only had 1 in his life.  However, he snores; has since birth.  I'd just like to rule it out so I made an appointment with the pediatrician tomorrow hoping she will refer me to a pediatric ENT.

So after all of that worry I'm not sure if I have all the answers.  For now I'm happy to let Kolton be Kolton.  And I'll admit that I still hold on to the hope that one day he'll just start speaking in sentences on his own.