PDD, or LSID or WHATEVER

Warning: not a typical sassy post, more of a sobby post.

Back in October when our freaking Obama-healthcare kicked in, I was finally able to get Joshua's 3 year check up with his new Philly pediatrician. The doc was great, and when I expressed concerns with Joshua's lack of speech skills, she set me up with the practice's speech therapist. About a week and a half later we had our first meeting with the speech therapist: it was typical Josh in a new situation which translated means it was bat shiz crazy town in there. After the first 40 minutes the therapist turned me to and we had a conversation that has drastically changed my life:

Therapist: "I want you to prepare yourself that Josh might have PDD"

Me: "What...does that mean? Is that Autism?"

T: "I'm not saying it's autism, I'm not, but I want you to prepare yourself for the fact that he might have Pervasive Developmental Disorder, which is on the spectrum."

Me: "Oh my gosh. Oh. My. Gosh."--and a lot of stuttering and probably crazy eyes.

She went on to point out what Josh was doing, and explaining his actions and why he was doing it. It made a lot of sense, but I was still in shock, and still trying to process the news. 

I strapped the kids in the stroller, and soon as I walked outside I started crying. The really big, fat tears that come out silent but mess up your makeup and burn all the way down. Every step I took kept saying "PDD, PDD, PDD." I couldn't even tell Cameron right away because I was such a mess. I put the kids down for a nap and then curled into my cocoon of fear, worry and crying for the next few hours. I felt like I completely lost the future for Josh that I always wanted for him, and that I had no idea what his actual future was going to look like.

I was finally able to call Cam while he as at school and eek out in barely intelligible words what the therapist had said to me. After that I went into the next stage of shock which was to go completely numb so I could relay the news without falling apart. God bless my Wharton girlfriends who were able to drag me out of that: I got to my friend Katie's house early and she asked how the therapy session went and I robotically told her what the therapist said. And then she gave me the biggest hug and I started ugly sobbing all over her. It was great, and I think a lot healthier than being a robot about it.

And this is how our journey started. Since then, Joshua has had a full evaluation by the county department specializing in kids from 3-5, with lots of speech therapy appointments with the original therapist who has turned not only into a friend but on of the biggest supporters of Josh. In her exact words "There is not bad bone in his body--he has sensory needs and when they are not met he CANNOT sit and focus." --Yes. I mean hell yes. She gets it.

Anyways, we got the full evaluation report on Monday, and the therapists' plans for Josh. Officially, he's delayed in 4 out of 5 developmental areas. They want to put him in a "reverse mainstream school" (regular kid preschool with like 5 developmentally delayed kids and therapists who come in and work with Josh.) He would get free busing and free preschool 3 days a week. It's a county preschool, and I went and toured it the day after we got the report. Everyone was really nice, but I started sobbing as soon as I got back into the car. It wasn't like the private preschools we applied to when we first moved to the city--this was a low-funded county one. I once again had to go through the mourning process of what I expected to be Joshua's future and what his reality is. 

And I'm so worried. I'm worried that he won't get the attention, and the help that he needs, that he'll be bullied for being different, that he won't be able to have a normal childhood with friends and soccer teams or have a normal teenagehood with prom, and girlfriends and a normal high school experience. I'm worried that he'll get labeled negatively as the special ed kid, and that he'll BE the special ed kid. 

Part of me is also mad. Like rip roaring pissed off that the specialists in Utah, that EVERYONE in Utah from his pediatrician to the language specialist to others told me that there was nothing amiss with Josh. "Don't worry, he's just a late talker." to "He doesn't qualify for aid because he really isn't bad enough at all." And the most pervasive of all "he'll grow out of it." Well he hasn't. And I'm so mad because every therapist in Philly can see that Josh needs a lot of therapy and easily qualifies for it whereas in Utah he didn't need help. I'm embarrassed with the therapists here, that me as his mother isn't getting him the therapy he needs until he's 3 1/2 because I was always told he didn't need it or he would grow out of it. 

Josh won't get an official "diagnosis" until he meets with a specialists in March. Then we'll know if its Autism, or Language Social Impairement Disorder or whatever. For now, he's just developmentally delayed.

Cameron has really come through, per usual during my complete emotional breakdown and constant crying anytime we talk about Joshua's future. He's a great father, and the greatest thing he's said so far on the matter is "It doesn't matter. The diagnosis doesn't matter because he's still just Josh. The diagnosis doesn't change who he is." --God bless that sexy dad.

And it's true.

He's still my big brown-eyed boy who I love.