Challenges

Sometimes, I have trouble deciding if something is BS or if it's for real.

Like now. My current dilemma started in early January, when Fly went back to preschool after the Christmas break. But really, I guess, it started long before then.

His preschool teacher said by halfway through the school year, most kids have settled into the routine and what's expected of them. But not Fly. He doesn't want to participate in class. He knocks things on the floor on purpose. He won't sit down for story time. He hits his classmates. He goes to a religious school, and they won't take him to chapel anymore unless I go too because they can't handle him and he is too disruptive for the other kids. The teacher suggested he get tested by a free program run by the county school board. "Parent to parent," she said, "I would want to know if he has a developmental delay."

Fly? Developmentally delayed? The child who knows more about trains than anyone I know. Who keeps asking to learn to play the violin. Who uses four-syllable words on a regular basis.

And yet ... I recognized his impulsive and often out-of-control behavior.

Warily and wearily, I scheduled a testing appointment.

I also got great advice via Twitter from Jodifur, who had similar school conferences with her son. On her recommendation, I also got an appointment for Fly with a developmental pediatrician.

I even had food allergy tests run for Fly.

These appointments have taken us on a bumpy, frustrating, time-consuming and expensive ride through the first quarter of this year to where we are now. Which, well, frankly, I don't know where exactly we are.

The school board testing, in my opinion, was a joke, and I told the preschool that. They thought that was "interesting" and said they wanted to "chat more" about why I was so unimpressed with the program.

The developmental pediatrician was more helpful but very stern and very expensive. But at least, that route led us to occupational therapy, where Fly has been diagnosed with a sensory processing or sensory integration disorder and low muscle tone -- reasons, or excuses, for why he rarely remains still, why he can't hold a crayon and color for more than three seconds, and why he's so uncoordinated that he is always running into things, tripping on his own feet and can't pedal a tricycle yet.

I get that Fly "has challenges." I have blogged before about his intense, high-need, high-energy personality, which he has had since he was a baby. It's not uncommon for people to tell me, "Boy, I thought my kid had a lot of energy, but yours has even more!" This afternoon after quiet time, Fly broke a toy and then hit the Bug and me with it. Twice. Even after timeout for the first time hitting. Then he hit JP at the dinner table, where he can't ever sit still. He can't follow multi-part directions. He asks the same questions repeatedly. He will argue with you and say or do the opposite thing you say just for the sake of doing so. I could go on.

But, big deal. Lots of kids -- normal, healthy kids -- could be described in these same ways, right?

As a mama, I am overwhelmed and bewildered at this array of doctors and therapists that has come into our lives.

I wonder how much of this is just Fly being an active three-year-old boy and how much is a real medical or developmental problem. Obviously, there are areas he needs to work on in the classroom and at home, but I can't believe that Fly is unique in having to work on certain areas -- surely every child has strengths and weaknesses, like adults. Part of me wants to think all the "experts" know what they are talking about, but part of me thinks it's a lot of mumbo-jumbo.

Does having a sensory processing diagnosis mean his teachers will be more understanding now that there is a reason, a label, attached to his seeming bad behavior? Will it be a great early-intervention tool to getting him on track and ready for kindergarten?

Or does a diagnosis mean that educators are too quick to put a stamp on a child and herd him through "the system" to get him to conform? Does it mean that as a parent I've fallen prey to some new-fangled notion that therapists have come up with for excusing bad or weird behavior?

I haven't decided which.

In any case, JP and I want Fly to do well, and the occupational therapy can't be bad for him, so we will try this out for a while and see how it goes. The therapist says after a few sessions, she will come up with things I can do with Fly at home that will help him -- she called it a "sensory diet" -- not food, but activities that will help him. She is also doing exercises that help him focus and help strengthen his muscles. I don't get how a kid who is constantly moving, who plays on the playground and takes soccer class has low muscle tone.

I don't get a lot of this.

But I want Fly to succeed and feel good about himself. I know beyond his sometimes almost-manic behavior and despite the days when he wants to hit everyone, Fly still has a kind and generous heart. He has a spooky-good memory and likes telling jokes (badly). He likes animals and can identify several species of birds. He enjoys music and asks me to sing songs with him, or play specific songs for him. He likes to give hugs. And get hugs.

To get right down to it, he's worth fighting for.

P-p-preschool!

Everyone else does it, and I'm giving in to peer pressure: the standard photo-by-the-front-door picture of a kid on his first day of school.

Fly! In preschool!

Just a few weeks shy of his 3rd birthday, Fly is going to school two days a week -- six hours total, really. His first day went perfectly. In fact, while I was handing off his snack bag and diapers (still not potty trained, ugh) with one of the teachers by the door to his room, he slipped in without me noticing. And then it was too late for me to take another picture or even say goodbye. Something about no clingy parents inside the school.

One day, you're carrying a child everywhere you go, and the next he's ambling into a preschool room without you even noticing. Gah! I didn't get to savor the moment.

But I didn't cry. No, I'm not emotional over the thought of Fly growing up and moving on. (Although he better not love his teacher more. I already consider her The Other Woman.) Maybe I'm a weird mother, but I am excited for him. And a little jealous. After looking at the daily schedule the teacher handed out, detailing everything from story time to water table play to music class to bathroom breaks right down to the minute, I kind of wish it was me going to preschool. It's a great gig. I want to play all day with super-cute little people!

Oh. Wait. I guess I kind of do that already. Except, you know, laundry and meal planning and dealing with home repairs and changing diapers and stuff.

While Fly is in school, I'll be playing with my little Junebug. Because soon enough, he'll be the one trotting off to The Other Woman when I'm not looking.

(Find me over at my new blog.)

Talk about talk

Believe it or not, at one time in my life, I considered studying for an advanced degree in linguistics. Language, semantics, alphabets and how people communicate have always fascinated me.

I'm also fascinated by chocolate. But . . . you know.

At the time, though, it seemed options for linguistics people were teaching (on a community college or university level) or research (images of teaching sign language to gorillas came to mind). Neither path was my cuppa joe.

But later, I realized linguistics researchers also study how children learn language. And that did grab my attention.

Even before I considered becoming a mom, I enjoyed talking with toddlers and preschoolers. The way they speak is so free -- they don't know all the language rules, they haven't learned the words for everything and they aren't constrained by colloquialisms. They usually don't even know what's appropriate to say. Their whole thought process for getting across what they want to express is unhindered by the language conventions we learn as we get older. That kind of freedom of mind and tongue is amazing to think about. Here are people who communicate from their own unique, brand-new, fresh perspective on the world.

Today is the first day I realized Fly is really and truly talking. Not just a few phrases he has learned. Not just yes-or-no answers to my questions. Not just to say the alphabet, count, or point out shapes or colors. Fly formulates his own ideas, asks questions, tells me what he wants (or more likely, what he doesn't want) and narrates what he is doing.

Fly is talking!



Not only is my munchkin now a walking, talking child I can have an actual conversation with, but I get to experience that freedom of mind and tongue I so admire.

I feel so lucky.

And yet . . . .

My adult mind is already wondering how I'm going to put up with constant little-people chatter!

Proof of my child's genius

I really don't like to brag. But sometimes you have to. All in a mama's day's work....

I got a set of alphabet flash cards for Fly. On each card, one side has a letter, and the other side has a picture of something that starts with that letter.

Last night while picking up, I noticed J was missing.

Silly me, I should have known where to look....

....being Easter and all....

Learning and living through strengths

It might have started as a way to keep track of how much Fly nursed and how much he slept as a newborn -- yeah, I think that was it.

Then it evolved as a way to fill in the first year baby calendar I got as a gift at a shower.

After the first year was over, I still made notes about him in a computer file. Every week for the first six months, I cataloged Fly -- his first smile, when he sat up, crawled, walked, what he liked to eat, what his daily routine was like, which toys he enjoyed playing with. Then I went monthly with those details. I still like to write down when he learns new words or understands something new!

I know, I know, it sounds a little anal. But from month to month, I can see how he is growing and changing. The person he is today won't be here again. And I know it's so easy to forget the little details moms cherish....

I am keeping track of Fly's growth and traits, and this will eventually help him discover his strengths, it turns out, after reading Your Child's Strengths: Discover Them, Develop Them, Use Them by Jenifer Fox. She actually recommends keeping a record of your child's preferences, activities he enjoys, tendencies, quirks and personality traits because they will help uncover strengths.

Fox's book takes a look at the ways many students are shortchanged in their education because our typical education system is set up to focus on a student's weaknesses, not her strengths. For Fox, strengths aren't talents or skills, but something that makes you feel strong when you're doing it -- and that is the key to learning and to living.

What she says makes a lot of sense, really. Do you remember the scene in Pretty Woman when Julia Roberts tells Richard Gere that the bad stuff people say about you is easier to believe than the good? Fox makes a similar point in many places throughout the book, including her own experience as a student, giving anecdotes about students who were having problems in school because their strengths weren't being recognized.

Most of Your Child's Strengths seems to focus on children who are already in school -- this is a book about education, after all -- but there are some sections that mention things parents of very young children can do to help their kids find their strengths, like family traditions and rituals that help kids form memories and projecting a positive attitude yourself as a model for your child.

This is a book I'm going to hold onto and read again when Fly is ready for school. I will need a refresher on the three kinds of strengths (activity, learning and relationship), and I will use the workbook in the back to help uncover those strengths.

One of the things I loved best from the book: "Knowing your own strengths will help your children understand theirs.... You will teach your child how to live a full life by living one yourself."

Sounds like something that is more caught than taught.