ABA Assessment

We've had a busy week. . .Is it Friday yet?? :)

Monday was Charlie's ABA assessment. Unfortunately, Charlie did not nap on Sunday and got up about 5:30 a.m. on Monday so he was very tired when it came time for his appointment. He had big circles under his eyes, and, by the end of the assessment looked like he could easily fall asleep in the desk chair. He started off throwing quite a tantrum. I've never seen these behaviors in Charlie before. We walked by the play area to the back office for the assessment. Charlie was not happy with this. He wanted to play, not go sit in some stuffy office. He let us know about his displeasure. He kept going up to the owner/therapist who was doing the assessment and tried to grab her out of the chair so she would open the door. He hit her, pulled her hair, screamed at her, etc. She ignored him, even as he hit her and pulled her hair. She said that is what they do, they ignore the bad behaviors (unless it causes physical pain to the therapist) until the child quiets down. At that time, they thank them for being quiet and give them positive feedback. I just sat there kind of stunned as I had never seen Charlie like that before. (However, later in the day he got mad at me and pulled my hair a couple of times. I did not ignore it because it DID hurt!!!) I am still wondering if we are seeing yeast die-off or if he was just tired. . . or probably a little bit of both. I looked back at Jenny McCarthy's book, Healing and Preventing Autism, and some of the symptoms for yeast die-off include tantrums, aggression and hitting. It is enough to make me wonder. Thankfully, the tantrums seemed to cease by Tuesday.

The ABA assessment was informative. Charlie did very good with verbal instructions and did everything he was asked to do. He also did well in matching 3-dimensional objects (such as a sock to a sock, or a toy car to a toy car, block to block, etc). However, he would not even take the time to look at pictures to match those. He literally took the picture out of her hand and just threw it on top of another without even really looking at it. Obviously, he scored very low (if he even scored at all) in the requesting category since he does not ask questions and rarely tells us what he wants. She noted that a lot of the other areas where he scored on the lower end were largely due to lack of compliance (no attention span or he just did not want to do what was being asked of him). She said he is in a much better position than most of the kids that come to therapy because he already has the skills, we just have to work on his compliance and draw him back out again.

Charlie had his second OT session today. The therapist said he did great and listened to all of her instructions. She said there was some spontaneous speech, but she thought it was probably scripted (or echolalia). He did protest rather loud (as I heard in the waiting room) when she took him from the gym to the desk to work on fine motor skills and writing. Once again, Addison and I stayed in the waiting room. Addison is quite the little personality. She went around to EVERYONE and handed them a toy or a brochure. Anyone who walked through the door was greeted by Addison and shown toys and babbled at endlessly.

Other than some behavior issues on Monday, Charlie has had a good week. After he napped on Monday afternoon, he seemed to be in a better mood. His sister can get on his nerves with her constant habit of yelling "NO!" at him. I can't say as I blame him. She actually seems to get a kick out of making him react. Charlie has been repeating a lot and singing songs with me. Today I was sitting in the car trying to read the OT assessment and both kids were getting cranky just sitting there, not moving. Charlie said "You want to get out!" Clearly he was telling me to get a move on or get him out. While he did repeat it exactly as heard as it was asked to him instead of "I want to get out". . . he can still find ways to get his message across!

Charlie is going to have a very busy summer. He will have OT on Monday and Thursday afternoons and ABA on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings. Tuesday and Thursday will be 4 hours of ABA, Wednesday will be 2 hours. It's a tough schedule, but one that other parents of autistic children know well.

Next week Charlie will get an EEG and has an appointment with a pediatric neurologist. The pediatrician wanted Charlie to see a neurologist since his regression was later than average just to make sure there is nothing else going on. I saw on her report that she recommends the neurologist do a blood test for lead. Keeping Charlie still while they put numerous electrodes on his head should be fun. . . almost as much fun as holding him down for a blood draw will be! I'll have to figure out a fun and special treat for him that day.