Evaluations

Our 4yr old is waiting to get into the University of Washington Fetal Alcohol (UW) unit for assessment. I called them yesterday to see how long the wait list is. Ah, it will only be SEVEN months before they can see us. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I heard that!

So I did the logical choice. I called our SW. He is totally disgusted that it takes that long to be seen at UW. So he told me he is calling UW and telling them to put us to the front of the line, seeing as this assessment is required before the adoption is finalized in court. This tidbit is not true, but he wants to strong arm them (nicely) to see if they will move us up to the front of the line. We will of course finalize the girls adoptions in a April, regardless of if we have had the 4yr old diagnosed or not. We love both girls dearly.

On a positive note, since UW is so sloooooooooooooow, I asked our SW if our daughter can be seen at Seattle Children's Hospital for a psych eval (our PCP asked for this), enuresis/encopresis eval, and cognitive/neurological/retardation/processing eval. He thought this is a great idea, we should be seen much sooner than UW, and this will give us much information. Additionally, we are starting a referral to a local hospital that offers children's therapy of every nature. We are now waiting for a Sensory Integration Referral there. This hospital isn't far from our home, and our 9yr old went there for speech therapy for years. Actually, our 2yr old went there for speech therapy briefly. She graduated practically right after she started. She only went for a few months.

I am interested in any and all medical/adoption suggestions any of you may have. I also will make it a goal to answer questions that people leave in the comments section. If I have forgotten to answer a question, please comment or email again reminding me to answer. To answer a question posed yesterday, "ODD" is Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Here is a link. Here is another link. And another link. The third link has some great article links in it as well. Personally I think ODD is a label to describe behavior, and I think there is truly something else in addition going on with these kids. We are in the middle of trying to find the "something else" with our son. I took him to a counselor about 18 months ago. The guy was lame, and like "Neal" in "The Santa Clause". He and my son BS'd for every session for a couple months, did an IQ test (found out our son is near genius), and discussed anger management. My only problem is that the doctor didn't really have any new suggestions for me. Everything and every book he suggested, I've already tried and read. So then I took my son to a psychiatrist, and she diagnosed him as ODD. She also thought he has some mood disorder, but wanted to medicate him to sedate him, so she could deal with a more cooperative kid and evaluate him. So we asked, what exactly is it you are medicating him for? She couldn't say, and said she had to sedate kids, or she wouldn't see them. What the hell? I don't want to try a Russian Roulette of meds on my child, let them experiment, when they don't even have a diagnosis. I asked her if we could do anger management, some lifeskills talks, some planning, boundaries, goals, etc.?? Wouldn't that be the first thing before sedating him? We just felt like they were going to make him a drool monkey for their own ease. So I didn't go back to that lady. This year, we regrouped and took him to a new psychiatrist, starting a few months ago. This guy is really good. He is doing a thorough eval BEFORE talking to us about meds and a life plan. We should have the eval wrapped up in a couple weeks. This has been a thoroughly positive experience seeing this psychiatrist, my son is encouraged, cooperative, interested in going, and it's been an entirely different experience than the first psychiatrist. This man is totally professional and doesn't try to bully or chastize my son. He saw from the first meeting that my son gets emotional far too easily, and he has a great repore with my son. I can't thank him enough.

On the best positive note, my husband had a great talk with our 4yr old last night. He asked her if she likes living here. She said, "yes". He asked why she likes living here. She said, "because people love me here". He said, "how do you know people love you here?". She said, "because they stay with me." Maybe it's sinking in for her, ever so slowly..............
That conversation made my day.