Gah. I hate to wait. I hate it. I am the person that strategically moves through a day in avoidance of waiting. I never hit the BMV at open or close or lunch. I go at two o'clock when the luch break crowd is gone and before the after work crowd gets there. I would rather starve then wait in line at a drive through with more than three cars and I will mill about the grocery store for hours if I have to in order to avoid waiting in a long line. I figure at least I'm moving. So it makes sense that I am losing my mind waiting for the results of Mr. Pants' big giant "does he have autism" tests. Tests, mind you, that we spent two months waiting for. Fudgcicle. So while I wait (which I totally hate doing), I guess I will document here how the tests went.
The big day was last tuesday. I got us both packed up to spend the afternoon at Children's Hospital. Diapers, snacks, juice, wipes, dinos. Check! Breast pump. Check! Cooler to bring home pumped milk. Check! Extra clothes for any accidents (because 85% of the time this is needed). Check! Purse with all reports, tests, evals and insurance information. Check! Then it occured to me that I had no idea how I was going to walk my "I will not hold your hand but rather will thrash myself about until you have to make a choice to let me go or my arm with dislocate" boy from the parking garage to the specialists office. This was about a quarter mile. There were 3 elevator rides involved too. This is when I realized I had an Ergo. Thank the Lordy.
The big day was last tuesday. I got us both packed up to spend the afternoon at Children's Hospital. Diapers, snacks, juice, wipes, dinos. Check! Breast pump. Check! Cooler to bring home pumped milk. Check! Extra clothes for any accidents (because 85% of the time this is needed). Check! Purse with all reports, tests, evals and insurance information. Check! Then it occured to me that I had no idea how I was going to walk my "I will not hold your hand but rather will thrash myself about until you have to make a choice to let me go or my arm with dislocate" boy from the parking garage to the specialists office. This was about a quarter mile. There were 3 elevator rides involved too. This is when I realized I had an Ergo. Thank the Lordy.
I crossed my fingers that he'd go for it and what do you know? He thought it was cool. The last time I tried to wear him he acted as though I was trying to stifle him/control him/ruin him. He let Daddy wear him once this summer but never me. Thankfully he totally cut me a break and took the ride. When we got to the office, there was no one there waiting and I was like "YES! I hate waiting". The specialists were waiting for us! I took note of that as very cool on their part. They were very kind and introduced themselves to both me and Mr. Pants. All of them were quick to acknowledge his excellent eye contact. This made me super proud since we have been working on this for 3 solid months and have had great success. As recently as June, when you called out to Mr. Pants he didn't look at you. He very very very rarely looked anyone in the eye that wasn't daddy or myself. And we had to work hard for it. So that they noticed was pretty cool.
We were taken to the office of one of the specialists were it became clear pretty quick that Mr. Pants would be having no part in seperating from his mama. This wasn't shocking to anyone, so they told me I could stay but that I had to be "very uninvolved". I was asked to remain in the chair filling out paperwork and to ignore all that was going on in the room. And that was soooo friggin hard. Ever try and not parent your kid when he's sad or frustrated or stressed? It sucks. I told the worker that if (and when) he came to me, I wouldn't be able to reject him. Not that it would be hard, but that I wouldn't hurt him like that. Maybe we were better off seperating us and dealing with some fallout before the testing, I asked them. But they thought I should stay and were happy to allow me to comfort my baby if (and when) he came to me. So they got started. They handed me about 75,000 pages of questions to keep me busy and began playing with Mr. Pants. For the next three hours they tested his memory, his motor skills, speech and cognitive abilites. They adminstered the ADOS test and asked me about 200 questions in addition to the ones I was answering on paper. Mr. Pants delivered several face melting tantrums and showed off his ability to open and close doors. He side-eyed and spinned and spoke in his native tongue for them too. When the specialist pulled out some beads and thread he stopped to give them his full attention. Every game he played with him, Mr. Pants mastered without having to be shown how. Smarty Pants.
They were sweet to my boy and also to me. I was really grateful for that. It was also clear that they thought he was pretty cool. He made them laugh. That's my boy. But at the end, there was no mistaking that he was done. Truthfully, so was I. On the way home in an effort to reward him for a hard days work we hit Burger King. But Mr. Pants was so thoroughly exhausted that he fell asleep eating. Food still in his mouth. I started to cry. I felt guilty that he had been through such a hard day. Daddy and I work everyday to make life smooth for the little dude. This kind of stress is very rare for him. I hope we are done with this part of the journey. My mama heart is heavy for him.
People keep asking me how it went, and how he did and the answer is that I have no idea. They had amazing game face. They gave nothing away. Whatever they were thinking, they didn't let on. They shook my hand and said goodbye to Mr. Pants as I loaded him into the backpack for the ride to the car. They'd call to set up a meeting in a few weeks to go over results. So now we wait......and um...I hate waiting.
We were taken to the office of one of the specialists were it became clear pretty quick that Mr. Pants would be having no part in seperating from his mama. This wasn't shocking to anyone, so they told me I could stay but that I had to be "very uninvolved". I was asked to remain in the chair filling out paperwork and to ignore all that was going on in the room. And that was soooo friggin hard. Ever try and not parent your kid when he's sad or frustrated or stressed? It sucks. I told the worker that if (and when) he came to me, I wouldn't be able to reject him. Not that it would be hard, but that I wouldn't hurt him like that. Maybe we were better off seperating us and dealing with some fallout before the testing, I asked them. But they thought I should stay and were happy to allow me to comfort my baby if (and when) he came to me. So they got started. They handed me about 75,000 pages of questions to keep me busy and began playing with Mr. Pants. For the next three hours they tested his memory, his motor skills, speech and cognitive abilites. They adminstered the ADOS test and asked me about 200 questions in addition to the ones I was answering on paper. Mr. Pants delivered several face melting tantrums and showed off his ability to open and close doors. He side-eyed and spinned and spoke in his native tongue for them too. When the specialist pulled out some beads and thread he stopped to give them his full attention. Every game he played with him, Mr. Pants mastered without having to be shown how. Smarty Pants.
They were sweet to my boy and also to me. I was really grateful for that. It was also clear that they thought he was pretty cool. He made them laugh. That's my boy. But at the end, there was no mistaking that he was done. Truthfully, so was I. On the way home in an effort to reward him for a hard days work we hit Burger King. But Mr. Pants was so thoroughly exhausted that he fell asleep eating. Food still in his mouth. I started to cry. I felt guilty that he had been through such a hard day. Daddy and I work everyday to make life smooth for the little dude. This kind of stress is very rare for him. I hope we are done with this part of the journey. My mama heart is heavy for him.
People keep asking me how it went, and how he did and the answer is that I have no idea. They had amazing game face. They gave nothing away. Whatever they were thinking, they didn't let on. They shook my hand and said goodbye to Mr. Pants as I loaded him into the backpack for the ride to the car. They'd call to set up a meeting in a few weeks to go over results. So now we wait......and um...I hate waiting.
