Another hurdle

As I sit here I just want to cry right now. I feel like we are strapped with another burden, another diagnosis, and more struggling that my child is going to have to endure. On top of everything else that Ethan has had to deal with, it just hurts me, as his mom, to see my baby have to deal with anymore. And yet, I have been expecting this diagnosis for a long time and it doesn't come as a surprise at all, but it is the confirmation of it that is hitting me hard.

It was when we came home tonight that we had a message waiting for us from our pediatrician. He said that he wanted to let us know that Ethan did score positive for having ADD according to all of the evaluations that were filled out by his teachers as well as by Rob and me. He will try to get in contact with me tomorrow to talk about it with me by phone, but he is going to go ahead and call in the prescription for Ethan to the pharmacy as we had discussed in the earlier visit on how it would all work if this ended up being the case. We also had to take Ethan to the hospital to have an EKG done to check his heart out because they won't start any ADD medication unless they get an all clear on that. Kind of a funny thing (and sad, too, if you think about it) while we were at the hospital, Ethan is pretty well known there. We had all kinds of people saying hi to us and to him that knew who he was. In fact, the guy who did the EKG was Ethan's respiratory therapist from our last hospital stay and the second he saw Ethan he started talking to him and us like we were all old friends.

I think the thing that bothers me the most about this is that I know how hard this is going to be for us as the years go by. I know the struggles of ADD are ongoing. It is hard enough to deal with that when that is ALL you are dealing with, but when you add in all of the other issues, well, I'm just having a doozy of a pity party tonight! And I don't have those often! I just really wanted something to come easy for Ethan, just once. And on top of the ADD, we are still trying to cope with the sensory and possibly anxiety issues as well. Ethan has developed this problem where he picks at pencils. He tears at the erasers, picks the paint off, bites on them, etc. It has really become a huge problem because he is destroying them and makes it so other people can't use the pencils. I tried something tonight and I hope it helps him. I wrapped a piece of velcro around the top of the pencil near the eraser. I'm hoping that it will help take care of his sensory need to fidget and feel/pick at something with his fingers during class. I talked to his teacher today to see if I can go in the class tomorrow and be a helper so I can observe the class. I don't expect him to act the same way as he would if I wasn't there, but I really want to just see the dynamics of the class and what their day is like. Since it was marked on the form that he is very disruptive to the class, I would really like to see for myself what is expected so I have a better understanding before I just blindly put him on more medication. I do know that at home, he is not capable of doing homework unless I am sitting in a chair right next to him and keeping him on task the entire time. There is no way a teacher can do that with him during the school day. Yet, he is an honor roll student.

And speaking of honor roll student...The kids had their A Honor Roll Assembly today. It was wonderful to see them get recognized and get their little awards. And I have to admit that this was one time when I was happy that the kids were in different classes. It gave them the opportunity to shine as individuals. Ethan was called first and he was so darn adorable. He was standing up on those risers on the stage and out of the 10 kids or so standing up there, he was the only one that was grinning from ear to ear and waving as hard as he possibly could at us. God love him! He is such a sweetie!!!!! And Emily is my little social butterfly. I couldn't tell whether she was gossiping, just chatting, or bossing people around. Ha-ha!! When she was standing up there with the A honor roll recipients from her class, she wouldn't shut up. She was leaning over and talking to her neighbors on the risers the entire time. She has sure come out of her shell this year, and I love every bit of it!!!