new to PDD dx 10/4

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-03-2004
new to PDD dx 10/4
2
Sat, 10-06-2007 - 3:16pm

Kennedy Krieger just diagnosed my quirky almost 3 years old ( Brady ) with neuromotor abnormaility and PDD-NOS. We knew he

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2004
Sun, 10-07-2007 - 8:50am

Dear Theresa,


Welcome!


Almost everybody on this board has a feeling after a diagnosis. In my case, when my first son was dx, I both knew and wanted the dx, because it would help him get the speech therapy I felt he needed. Yet when the words came out of his neurologist's mouth, I felt like I had been slapped and nearly burst into tears on the spot. For a diagnosis I expected and wanted. My son was three then. He was not involved in Early Intervention.


I was on maternity leave at the time, and spent many hours nursing my infant and reading. This was three years ago now, and I have the clearest recollection of reading Elijah's Cup, partly because it was one of the only books available in my smallish local library that had had anything to do with Asperger's syndrome. It is a first person account of raising a young, talented boy on the spectrum. The most practical thing I had read was The Out of Sync Child. It gave me a lot of activities that brought my son "here." However, I think for the most part, I just read everything I could get my hands on.


The curious thing is that while I was doing all of this, I was frankly in a kind of denial (about the diagnosis I had wanted). I felt like I was simply

APOV on Autism
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-07-2003
Sun, 10-07-2007 - 9:13pm

When you ask, "What are my first steps?" I'm not clear on what you're asking. It's great that you already have an IEP meeting in place to get your ds the services he needs. Do you have any paperwork yet from ds evaluation/diagnosis which you can take to the IEP mtg in order to get all the necessary services added into his IEP? It took us several weeks/months to get the paperwork when my kids were dx (at Children's Hospital in Rockville, MD), and we couldn't get an IEP/504 written until we had the paperwork. I know that some of the EI schools in MD also have special ed preschool and special ed early elementary education services, so hopefully there won't be too much change for your ds other than the increased services he should receive.

OT, but my 12yo AS dd just had an initial appt at Kennedy Krieger this past week for her bowel dysmotility. Although I'm not thrilled with the location of Kennedy Krieger (downtown Baltimore during rush hour -- aack!), I was really impressed with almost everyone I came in contact with there.