Therapy Progression - Occupational Therapy

Occupational Therapy is one area that we slacked on for a long time. Concentrating more on the big physiotherapy aspects.
But occupational therapy is coming into focus now. It is the day-to-day part of life.
The holding a pencil, putting on clothes, doing activities of daily living (like entering your house).

It is also walking and wheeling. Sure physiotherapy looks at the legs and body in the walker, but occupational therapy looks at everything else. Watching areas of pressure in the elbows and wrists, functionality of the wheelchair.
 It is using your hands and fingers. Writing, drawing, dexterity.

 Nick is having a very difficult time with that. Nick has exploded in his interest and ability (surprising how those go together) in regards to language and physiotherapy. But he could really care less about writing anything other than his name or colouring inside the line.

This is a picture that Nick drew in July. One of the first person-pictures he has drawn

 Even drawing pictures, he really doesn't have any interest in it. I have only a couple drawings of Nick's on the wall. The rest are crafts that he has done it school, usually cutting and pasting.

 When we discussed occuptional therapy last month, we talked about how to make things easier for Nick. Yes he needs to learn how to write, but he spends so much time and energy on the actual physicality of making letters that he isn't actually writing ideas. He is just copying. He just got a computer at school (that will travel with him to his new school next year).

This took Nick 7 minutes and 17 seconds to print out

The computer lets him get his ideas across in words, without the struggle to make the letters.
Using a computer makes things easier, but with actual typing, but also with a program called word-cue. With this program when you type a letter "t" it gives you choices of 5 different words "the" and you pick the number associated with that word. "the" may not be the best example. But it helps to get words out.

The computer can also be used for pictures and creativity. This picture he made on the computer for Christmas (of course a ninja turtle)

But even with a computer as a writing-aid, we still work

And we've been working on some hand exercises. Helping to distinguish between different sides of the hands. Moving little and ring finger separate from pointer and middle finger (live long and prosper... or ninja-turtle related high-three)

Nick has a computer for school right now. It will travel with him when he moves schools and has programs for him loaded on it. We are also looking at getting him a designated computer for home. I have my laptop, Kyle has a desk-top, and we have a table, but it just doesn't have what we need for Nick. So we are having a writing aid consultation to see if we can get some type of computer for Nick to use at home.

Therapy Progression - Speech

Nick's speech is amazing. He is inquisitive and asks about words and why we say different things.
He has the funniest expressions. My favorite right now "I did not see that coming"

He also likes to say bad words. Whisper them really, because he knows they are bad. "What the heck" is the extent of his 'swear words'. And I think that he picked it up from Ninja Turtles (Thanks Raf).
But like I did for the physiotherapy and how far we have come. I want to look at how far Nick has come with his speech.

This is the boy that didn't speak for 2 years.
And I worried and worried. Got him in speech therapy with his sister early, and he just wouldn't speak. He was very happy to just play quietly, watch and listen (and laugh)
It was 18 months before he even started to babble!

(This video is from May 2011)

Katheryn also did speech therapy, and she was Nick's greatest supporter.
There were times that I caught Katheryn coaching Nick to say words "Say Daddy Nick, say da-da-daddy"
Once he started to make sounds you could tell that he was excited to show off! (This video is from July 2011)

Just after Nick turned 2 he would talk, but he wouldn't always answer the question you were asking. Every colour was blue, every number was four. 

And then he finally started to explore his vocabulary (around the same time he got his first wheelchair). And if you watch the video from April 2012 you can hear that attitude and personality that we always knew was in there.

After Nick's words started coming, then it was working on the sounds. But that wasn't really anything new with us. The same sounds Katheryn needed help with, so did Nickolas.

Last year Nick got distracted too easily in group speech therapy. He was quiet and he was shy.

Speech therapy progression showed what we already knew. He is getting more comfortable and overcoming at least part of his shyness. And he wants to work on his sounds.

L is a big one. Leo Leads. And you can correct him, he will try again to make the right sound. He wants to speak well.

Now he sings, he has favorite songs. This is a video of his favorite song "R-E-D red"

We have made up some other songs, but this one is his favorite, and he will sing it LOUDLY, if he sees anything in the song (i.e. firetrucks).

And recently he has an O-R-A-N-G-E song (which of course is helping with his spelling as well)

When Nick was 18 months old and I worried so much about his language, I had a number of fellow parents (of older kids) who told me it will come. It was really hard to believe them at the time!

Motoring Along!

I really think it is time for an update. I find that recently I've been writing about stuff without giving a proper update. So I spent the last couple of days taking pictures of all of the great and new things that Nickolas is doing.

We STILL have not been picked up again for Grandview physio. In the middle of May I called and talked to the head PT person and was told who our new PT would be. I called and talked to her, she said that we would start in June, we just couldn't schedule anything yet, we were waiting for one person to get back from vacation.

Suddenly I turn around and it's practically the middle of June. Have we started at Grandview? Have I heard from Grandview? I called last week - she's on vacation. And I JUST heard back, we has an assessment June 24. (Picked up in May/June - don't make me laugh! Sorry is my bitterness showing?)

But that's ok, once we found out it would still be a couple of weeks in May, we got ourselves a private physio.

We are doing work, we have plans, we have progress. Nick is working hard and we are working hard with him! Katheryn especially is taking an interest in what he is doing!

And Nick LOVES showing off for us now!

He is rocking the lie to sit now! And he's doing great at kneeling!

Even no hand kneeling!

And this is just showing off!

He's actually started to do this all by himself now! We come into the room and there he is kneeling.

Nick isn't showing any interest in stepping. Except he likes playing in his car, and we caught him trying to make it move forward!

We went to visit my sister's new house and Nick LOVED the stairs! He didn't up them, but really liked to make mommy excited that he was trying!

I'm sure he's going to show off more great stuff this week, but I really wanted to get an update out there!
One thing though. We had his 18 month check up (yes at 19 months) and he hasn't gained any weight since January. He has a great appetite and eats like a horse! We are hoping that it is because he is much more active. But we'll go back for another weight check in the summer!

We have a plan, we are keeping the private physio through the summer. We are getting a move on and see what Nick can show off. I'm feeling good about it! But I'm ready to sit down and have a serious discussion about our plans and goals.
Hope I don't come off as the over-bearing, demanding mother. Wait a second, maybe I do!