A Kat In Pajamas: A Post About A Boy

After catching hell from my Aunt Kay... "You NEVER write anything about TJ!" Here it is, a post all about him.

TJ has some issues. He's got ADHD, and he's freakin' brilliant. However, these weren't the issues he started with. He cried constantly as a baby. After many tests, it was concluded that they didn't know what was wrong with him. He had a very rare case of true colic. Supposedly. Now that I think about it, it was probably his sensory issues. He didn't do things on a regular developmental timeline. He was almost retardedly (yup, made up word) delayed. I don't mean this as an offense, he really was nearly as off as some kids with Down's syndrome. He didn't put two words together in a phrase until he was 2 1/2. He refused to pick up anything, roll over, crawl, walk, etc.

Solid foods were a trial, too. He wanted everything thick & chunky right from the start. If it was remotely "slimy", like most baby foods, he would spit it out and scream. He wanted everything to be practically paste.

When when I put him in daycare (my parents said "get a job, or move out completely") they "suggested" that he see an occupational therapist, which was free through thier program. Fingerpaint was just not happening. Neither was the sand table. Any food that got on him would send him into fits, and he wouldn't eat half the stuff they offered for breakfast and lunch. She (the therapist) diagnosed him with an acute sensory disorder.

He didn't read until he was forced to. I was reading short books by the time I was 2 1/2, so this was really frustrating for me. When he was about 4-ish, I got him a Samurai Jack video game. There was lots of reading involved, but, they also narrated it. The proverbial shit hit the fan one night when I was making dinner, and could not read the text to him. I told him that if he wanted to know what it said, he was going to have to learn to read it himself. And he did. So, video games taught him to read, not me. Within a few months, he was reading to me, instead of the other way around. Things like Alice In Wonderland. He read it better than I could. My tongue always trips over the words in that one.

He hit more road bumps when he started real school. He would get out of control and sometimes become aggressive with his teachers. Ok, that's putting it mildly. He got sent home in K for punching the principal.

>.<*

His father was extremely opposed to medication. This went on for years. PET after PET, no matter what, his father refused to recognize that TJ really did need something to help him get in control of his actions. After we moved to the Lake, a few months in to school, TJ had already been sent home several times for violence against his teachers and peers. He just did things without thinking about them. GW & I decided enough was enough. I let the doctor write a script for methlypenidate. And he is a different child now. We were cautious, and started with the lowest possible dose of Concerta. It (so far) has proved to be just enough to make it so that TJ can get through his day without flying off the handle and lashing out. When he gets home he takes a Ritalin, to get through his homework and chores. It's really been a blessing, a medicated miracle. I'm not advocating that everyone who has problems focusing to be medicated, but for us, this really has improved our home life, and TJ can actually function as a normal human being. Without being sent home from school every other day for kicking someone.

Recently, there was an "episode" at school when he kicked in the door of his locker. After talking to TJ, I discovered that he hadn't taken his Concerta that morning. DOH! /facepalm

The latest thing is that he's also been diagnosed with social phobia. Um... Big surprise there. I'm practically a hermit by choice. He doesn't have problems with crowds and such like I do, though. (He'll just wander off anywhere) His thing is perfectionism. He's afraid that if whatever he does isn't perfect, people will make fun of him and/or not like him. And I loooove his social worker. She is incredibly awesome!! She knows I have issues in unfamiliar settings, so if she has something to talk about, she comes to the house to visit.

Also (bonus points for her) she has had a VBAC! She's the first woman I've ever met (in real life) that's attempted it. Her first was breech, too, and she couldn't find anyone that was willing to do a breech birth. And she's way crunchy, too. She's not all about "MEDICATE THIS CHILD!", she likes to exhaust every other avenue before it comes to that. She wanted to cloth diaper (desperately, as she put it), but her DH said no freakin' way. I told that was a good thing, there are way too many cute diapers out there, and she would be an addict like me. (She laughed, but she really has no idea.) So she & I get along really well. She said she sometimes lets her love for TJ get in the way of a medical diagnosis, and that he's really an easy kid to ♥. Which pretty much describes him to a tee.