Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Changes are afoot...

and I'm nervous.

For some of the changes I am excited.. for others I am really not so excited, and more apprehensive.

Liam starts with his American Sign Language interpreter in the classroom on July 9th. For this I am beyond happily excited. I can't wait for him to be able to communicate more. I know in no time he will expand into even more complex sentences and ideas, beyond what I have already been able to teach him.

I found out yesterday.. or was it two days ago ? Oh well, I don't know but it doesn't really matter... I found out recently, that Liam's speech therapist is changing companies and won't be Liam's therapist anymore. I love love loved this therapist. She orchestrated a trip (and came with us) for us to see Dr. Nancy Kaufman of Michigan, thee apraxia expert, and ever since that trip, Liam was catapulted into a tazmanian devil like spiral of progress. Our insurance was able to pay for the week long intensive therapy session in another state, completely, hotel stay, government credit card for food and gas, rental car, etc. Tricare is the world's best insurance I have got to say. She came with us and I think had to pay out of pocket.. but that is the dedication she has to her kids, and to Liam. She is seeing Liam 7 times per week, 5 paid for by the school and 2 by Tricare. Because she is a speech "pathologist" and has a masters in speech pathology this is possible. Now I hear Liam's new therapist only has a bachelors and so he will have two separate therapists. The therapist with the bachelors degree will do his school portion, 5x a week, then he will have a different "pathologist" 2x week through Tricare. (because Tricare will only pay for a pathologist) It's confusing, I know. It's almost a full time job knowing all the ins and outs of the therapy world, the IEP world, the insurance, learning an entire nother language, and on and on and on. My husband knows about 5% of the details. And really, it's not because he doesn't care.. it's because I just don't have the time to explain it all to him, when you compare the benefits of him having full disclosure vs. the benefits of getting to discuss something fun with him, I just say forget it. This is my world, and I will run it. I did ask him to learn the oral motor stretches (Beckman) so that we could have a better chance at doing this therapy with Liam everyday. He hasn't yet. I'm still hoping.

So anyway. I am really nervous about Liam's new therapists. I don't know if they are qualified to treat children with apraxia. All the books say that apraxia is difficult to treat, and you want a therapist who knows what they are doing.. who has experience. And everyone says Liam is the most severe case of apraxia. And this is the time. The most important time to hurry up and acquire speech before it's too late. I have read this is the time of immense importance for language apprehension as far as the brain is concerned : between the ages 4 and 5.

The other big change is Liam is changing to the new classroom starting July 9th. He will have a whole new room, all new friends, all new rules, a new teacher (a man!) and of course his 1 on 1 interpreter with him who I met today! hooray!

Well, we will see how all these changes go, as the next few months pass along by. I am glad I have this journal to write down all my thoughts (or some) and go back later, and kind of reflect on how I was feeling then and how things really turned out. Because my memory is just terrible
!
On a totally different (except somehow now related) note. I watched the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind this weekend and LOVED it ! I plan to watch it again tonight !

3 comments:

britmummybites said...

You do have a lot on your plate, hope everything goes smoothly and these new therapists know there stuff. Am envious of all the support that you get. Even tho it's insurance and it comes out hubby's? paycheck. Still sounds so much better then the UK NHS.

Run ANC said...

Change is good (even if I have to keep reminding myself of that). It's great that you have such a strong support system.

Annie D said...

Yes, the system in the US is set up pretty good. There is a lot of support out there and you can get it, though sometimes you might have to do some investigating/research/fighting/advocating.
It's not perfect, but it is pretty good.

As for hubby's insurance.. right now my husband is a soldier in the US army. The health insurance seems to be the best in the USA..
He is getting out of the army next year though (THANKFULLY) but the bad side is we will have to go back to regular crappy insurance having been spoiled. We weren't too spoiled all around though, my husband having been deployed to Afghanistan and all..