Now we Know...

I keep telling myself that... now we know. Its been 3 years since Darren and I really started to take a look at our sweet Preston and what he was doing. We started to notice that his behavior and defiance seemed to be much higher then other kids his age or where we recalled Bryson was at that stage. We started him in Pre-school through the Jordan Child Development Program. He went in as a "Normal" child as this class is integrated with special needs, developmental delays and normal. In the back of my mind I thought "could something not be clicking?" His teacher was Bryson's same teacher so we had a very trusted relationship. So she started to test him for us and did all that she as a teacher had access to. None of which could 'diagnose' him but instead help us see his areas where he lacked. At age 4 he tested through to an 8 year old's intelligence, so that was not an issue. Where he lacked was behavior and social skills. So he went into Kindergarten with a behavior and social delay. When he was 4 we meet twice with a doctor at the U who came highly recommended. He was no help, but was willing to give us medication. So we went back to our ped who set us up an evaluation appointment with him. The appointment went well but he wanted to wait till Preston had completed 6 months of Kindergarten.

Since we are at that 6 month mark we went in to meet with him again, more tests, home evaluations and questions. The hard thing about a disorder that isn't found through a blood test is all the questions and guessing. After the hour meeting we were told that Preston has ADHD, while it didn't come to us as a surprise it was still overwhelming.

Most people say this is 'over-diagnosed' in the US, I question that. Over 11,000 babies are born every day in the US - so is it over-diagnosed or are there simply just more children to get diagnosed. Over the course of 3 years I have taken classes and read books trying to figure out how to handle Preston and help him - Autism, Aspbergers, Regulatory Disorder - none of them seemed to match. I started to read the book 'Taking charge of ADHD' from my peds referral and have found that just about everything they say seems to hit the missing nail on the head.

So, Now we Know... and now I start to learn about it. I start to know that I need to expect things of him, help him learn how to manage himself and time and help him over time understand his energy and how to redirect it. It has been a huge stress relief to open a book and finally find out what isn't clicking... on the flip side of that I learn what possible challenges he may be faced with and that we may be faced with and I feel emotional and overwhelmed. It will be an entire shift in our parenting skills with him thus far. But we are on the right road now and I am sure it will be a less frustrating adventure then the unknown adventure the last 3 years have been.

I love you my sweet Preston, you are an amazing, unique little boy... and I am so happy your mine!