As of last Thursday October 18th Brooklyn is no longer on ANY ADHD medications. It's been interesting to say the least. It doesn't seem that her school behavior is effected much at all. We have had very little communication with her teacher, and that's VERY upsetting. The school psychologist is GREAT, she's working on collecting information (from her teacher regarding the classroom environment, from the PE teacher regarding that environment, from the music teacher regarding that environment, and the school psychologist is going to observe Brooklyn on the playground). We're hoping to have an initial IEP meeting scheduled soon.
Last Friday we took the kids to a Portland Trailblazers basketball game. That was intense to say the least. Day 2 of no medication and a SUPER stimulating environment. Overall Brooklyn did really well. We had to remind her a LOT to calm down and respect the people around us. Thankfully there was no one in the row behind us (which also happened to be the top row in the entire arena, LOL) so we were able to let her get her wiggles out there. Leaving was the hardest part, we basically had to drag her kicking and screaming the entire way to the car.
The dragging and kicking and screaming seems to be a common way to end things. Every day when she gets off of the bus I have to drag her home kicking and screaming. She wants to be able to swing her backpack and jacket around (not caring about whether or not she hits people) and run in front of everyone. However, there are a LOT of kids getting off of the bus, there's ONE bus for our entire apartment complex. Plus, we live near the back of the complex and the bus stop is at the front of the complex, that leaves a decent walk back to our apartment where she can't just be running around acting however she wants.
I've seen an upswing in aggression at home (she seems more prone to hitting when she gets mad), but we've also been able to find ways to help calm her down. The most commonly used solution? Climbing the walls :)
This is our entry way, it's just wide enough that Brooklyn is able to "hang" like a bridge between the walls
When she doesn't quite feel like "hanging" between the walls, she does this, she loves being upside down :)
Yesterday (Monday October 22) was Brooklyn's field trip to the pumpkin patch. I was really worried about how she would be, especially with me volunteering to go along. She did AMAZINGLY well. I did my best to watch her interact with her classmates... She really doesn't do that much at all. She preferred to talk to me or no one at all. She did run around and giggle with the other kids, but she didn't actual SPEAK to any of them. It wasn't like she was playing WITH the kids, just NEAR them.
She also had behavior therapy yesterday, she seemed to do really well there as well. Her new therapist is growing on me, although I still prefer her old therapist. I WISH Cindy hadn't moved, she was amazing, and Brooklyn really bonded with her quickly. Her new therapist isn't bad by any means, but it's taking Brooklyn longer to establish any type of bond. Amanda (her therapist) says that Brooklyn does interact with her when they're in the room together, but when I'm there Brooklyn does very little interaction with Amanda.
Tomorrow is our 2nd OT visit. I'm excited about that. I need to write up my list of questions/concerns/ideas for the OT. I also need to remember to ask the clinic about whether or not they've heard from our insurance about approving PT and OT for Alayna.
I feel confident in saying that I don't think Brooklyn ever had ADHD and that I was right all along when I approached our regular pediatrician about Sensory Processing Disorder. However, I'm not going to remove the ADHD label from Brooklyn just yet. You see, schools here don't consider SPD as a reason to give an IEP or make special accommodations. So as far as the school is concerned she has ADHD and SPD. Hopefully after the IEP meeting we'll be able to push our insurance to give us the Autism evaluation.
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