SOMETHING’S UP WITH JACK #2: The Assessment Era

You know when you go to the doctor and you are trying to describe what you’re feeling inside and you can’t put it into words and you feel kind of embarrassed and awkward and you hope the doctor says you’re fine, but you also kinda hope he’ll tell you that you really do have a problem because it will justify your thoughts, even if it means that you really do have a problem to deal with???

Yeah? Me too. Except this time it was me describing to several professionals what I thought was wrong with my son. It was so strange to point out all of his weaknesses and quirks and put him in such a negative light.

>>If you haven’t read my post SOMETHING’S UP WITH JACK #1: Diagnosis First Steps I would suggest reading it first. It has my list of my concerns and a list of who I first called when I was questioning Jack’s behavior.<<

Jack at 3 1/2, during his ‘assessment era’

It’s scary to take a step into the unknown and go a different direction than I had previously gone with my 3 other ‘exceptional’ kids. But, the nagging feelings beat out the fear and on I went…

First Up: The Pediatrician

I told her of my uncertainty regarding Jack’s development and I read off my list of his concerning behaviors. She said that many of the things I mentioned were normal conduct for a 3 year old. However, she WAS alarmed by the fact that a 3 year old had entered her office, not said a thing to her—even when she tried to ask him questions—and sat in the corner quietly staring off somewhere. She was decidedly concerned and was anxious to give me a referral to a pediatric neurologist.

The result of that: I followed her leads to a pediatric neurologist and our insurance covered none of them. I would have tried harder, but my other paths lead to other (free) options, so I went those routes.

The 1st Assessment

Soon after was an appointment for a First 5 California developmental assessment: This was a frustrating, eye-opening experience into my son. The specialist kept trying to get Jack to talk and Jack mumbled, he refused, he hid. He wouldn’t play with the toys she presented. He didn’t cooperate at all. I suppose he was giving a very successful performance to trigger all the red flags. The specialist called the school district on the spot to schedule a speech evaluation with them. I’m sure I could have called the school on my own after digging up a number somewhere, but this referral got me directly in without any run-around or trying to convince anyone of a need.

On to: the School

I was put in a corner with a stack of fill-in-the-bubble sheets to work on. I had to answer about his temperament and skill level in pretty much every aspect of the world ever. It was intense and it was all I could do to not contradict myself in the repetitive, yet slightly differently worded questions. Once again, it was a deflating experience to sit and ponder on the weaknesses of my son.

This is NOT the room where Jack was assessed. This is just a generic picture of the type of equipment in the small testing area.

While I worked, Jack ‘played’. One woman supervised him while another watched and recorded their interactions and his responses. I looked up from my stack of paperwork to watch occasionally. (I think they intentionally kept me very busy so I wouldn’t interfere with the assessment, trying to prompt him or something.) There was some kid gymnastics equipment they used to watch his coordination with his gross motor skills. They had him sit and draw a face—both to look at his fine motor skills and to see if he had any awareness of how a face was organized. She played matching card games with him and pointed to things to have him identify them. She tried to pretend play with him.

I wish I could remember each of his responses, but like I said I was distracted and my memory is fuzzy. There was one key interaction that I saw and they referred to it again and again: there was a small basketball hoop and a ball. The assessor asked Jack to pass her the ball, he did, she passed it back, and he shot at the basket. They cheered when he made it and he was happy.

When it ended, they said they would give me a formal written report in a few weeks. I knew that he had been referred only because of speech concerns and issues like autism had not yet been discussed. I was making some small talk with them and I suddenly felt foolish that autism had crossed my mind. They said he had done well and I threw it out there casually that I had been worried about autism, silly me. They both shook their heads and said something along these lines: No, no he for sure did not have autism. Did you see that interaction back there, where they passed the ball back and forth and they cheered and high-fived together? He gave eye contact during that, so no, he is not autistic.

The man of the hour.

Then they gave me a heads up about what they were seeing. There is something called Auditory Processing Disorder that they sensed he had. They felt he was not quite understanding what was said and that’s why he was responding awkwardly and not talking back. They described this disorder to me: it is as if Jack’s head is underwater. When he hears sounds, it is garbled and distant and takes time and a lot of effort to put the sounds together and then come up with the meaning of them. They said it can’t be formally diagnosed until age 7 because that’s when (and I’m not sure if I have this right, so please use other resources to study it) communication skills are mostly established and a person is mature enough to be assessed correctly.

So, in my mind I felt, ‘Phew! Ok, it’s NOT autism.’ On to research about this other disorder. And to wait for the official results…

>>I am going to stop here for now. This has gotten long enough and the next part gets a little complicated. Click here to read part 3 of this diagnosis process.<<