A Proper Update

Hi, how's it going?
This is far overdue and I apologize...been busy as usual!

Sorry for my absence as of recently.  I wrote that blog post about A-Man going to be assessed at the JKL Neurological Clinic and was exhausted.
And then to top it off - I'm studying Finnish intensively in a small beige room with tiny windows...and by the time my brain shuts off the English translating part - my head hurts.  I've had headaches everyday after class to some extent.  And it's cold here - so the fresh air after class does help flush out my brain.  But then we're back to square one the next day.
This was three weeks ago - I'm now in a school doing a work practice!  Time to finish this post!

So a few weeks ago we had a meeting with the psychologist (who saw us in the autumn), two of A-Man's day-care teachers and V-Man's day-care teacher (she was replacing someone else).
The meeting was planned in October but because this particular psychologist is fully booked most of the time - we were able to get a meeting with her in early January.
We had met with the same people in the autumn of last year but it wasn't a very progressive meeting because the troubles that the day-care (and us at home) had with A-Man had disappeared.
However, over the course of the autumn and Christmas holidays - they resurfaced.

We sat down for a pow wow and this was the result:

• We cut off A-Man from his soother (dummy, pacifier, binky etc.) in October prior to his 3rd birthday.  
• He seemed fine at home but still had occasional night terrors.
• He started getting a little fiesty with his brother - pushing him and hitting him for no reason other than to be protective of the kitchen (he really loves cooking) and the bedroom.
• He doesn't eat meat at home.  Occasionally bacon.  He doesn't eat vegetables and only just started accepting fruit into his diet - mostly bananas and occasionally apples and he'll taste cucumbers then pass them onto the dogs or his sister.
• We call him our "part-time vegetarian" because at school he devours everything and multiple portions of it!
• He won't eat pizza - only the crust and if there's any other ingredient (other than a bit of sauce) - he'll pick it off and say "yuck".
• At day-care he was fighting and having regular melt downs about getting dressed to go out to play and cannot follow instructions (hence why he's still in the youngest group which is normally 10-months-2 years old).
• They didn't want to move him up because he doesn't listen and the older groups are larger and with less staff and the children are more independent (i.e. can dress themselves).
• His speech wasn't developing for his age - of course there is the mix of two very different languages (his day-care is a Finnish one) but he was repeating very short sentences repeatedly and not trying to say anything else.
  (This has since changed a bit for the better - he's played some Fisher Price apps in English on my phone and seems to really enjoy them and his vocabulary has nearly doubled during his sick leave.)
• He has very strict routines like saying goodbye to the bus.  And if the bus is not continuing a route and just staying there for awhile - we also have to stay.  Which is quite a pain when we have to go somewhere!

So what did they all think?

(Of course I cannot remember every single thing we discussed but this gives you a rough idea.)

• He should transfer day-cares in the fall.  Because the day-care that V-Man attends is full for the year - and because of the fighting - A-Man will hopefully be transferred to the day-care next autumn, while V-Man goes to school.
• The hope is that A-Man will be in a smaller group and the larger number of children won't overwhelm him.  Also he'll be with children closer to his age - so hopefully this will boost his vocabulary.
• V-Man's day-care teacher also advised that while it does sound like possible autism - she thinks that having clear photos of "what happens next" will help A-Man and calm him down.  So they're trying that at day-care too.
• He may be showing signs of autism - of course a very different case of it compared to the V-Man.  So he'll be getting assessed at the neurological clinic in the future - just waiting now for the appointment.
• He's having another appointment after the ski holiday (last week of February in Central Finland area) to see how things have progressed with having his schedule turned upside down (staying at home for a week) and then going back to a strict routine of day-care.

So yeah - that's the proper update without the hate and anger from the first post. :)
BIMU