psyche

Today was our long-awaited behavioral and developmental appointment for R2. In fact, we've been waiting for a YEAR, and there was no real end in sight until he freaked out at the ENT and they suggested we put the word "autism" on his paperwork. He's not autistic, but that's one of the closest diagnoses we can work with. So I wrote it, and sure enough, we got an appointment.

Turns out, that developmental/behavioral is a very long clinic name for Psychology. Psychology is one nice medium sized word that would fit in a calendar square. Unfortunately, it makes people think of psychiatry and psychotropic medications and psychoanalysis, and finally, psychos. So, we get like 15 extra characters and have to make up unwieldy abbreviations like Beh/Dev.

If you think this is boring, you should listen to people around here talk about guitar pickups and fretboards. It's like a one-way unsolicited flight to Snoozeville, free of charge. Anyways.

So we sat with the psychologist behavioral and developmental specialist and his decoy doctor, and they asked questions about R2, and his rages, and what they look like, how long they last and what do we do and what do he do and so on. So we're describing it all (the MOG came, too) and R2 is kind of making sweeping gestures toward the window and growling, and eventually pantomiming hitting himself in the face and pulling his hair as we were describing the tantrums,  and then more let's go noises toward the door and the window. Oh, and the continual poking of the inner arm to assure, again, that there would be no shots today.

I did not ask for sedatives, because it was quickly clear that R2 is doing these behaviors for a reason, and we need to try to deal with that. The Dr. said to go ahead and keep him from hurting himself for now, and we have to fill out a worksheet every time and then in a month we'll talk about dealing with it more effectively. If I know this kid, he will now act very normal for a month and have zero fits for me to document.

The doc also asked about the "babies" and how they handle Richy, and it was neat realizing that Toby has really moved into a big brother role, taking care of him and Bean is also becoming pretty nurturing. Dr. Belden said he wouldn't be surprised if they end up in "helping" professions, which was cool.

R2 jumped and giggled all the way to the van, giddy with the realization that he had, once again, poked his arm and growled just enough to prevent a shot. #win