Psychiatrist

Post #2 for the day so be sure you check out the Halloween pictures!

We met with the pediatric psychiatrist for Oksana.  After a huge load of paperwork, time spent with Oksana, and time spent with me, this is the list we were presented with:

-mood disorder
-anxiety disorder
-Post traumatic stress disorder
-autism spectrum disorder (specifically PDD-NOS)
-Reactive attachment disorder
-ADHD (The one that I disagree with.  She is VERY active.  She really does not sit still much...but....it does not affect her negatively, nor does it affect our family or her school negatively.  The good news is that if down the road there does become an issue we don't have to start from scratch...the diagnosis is there.  Until then I'm just kind of ignoring this.)

So my first reaction was "WHAT?  SIX NEW DIAGNOSIS?!"  After a good cry...or two...or three...or maybe it was just one really long one, I realized that really they are all interconnected so many of them aren't separate diagnosis but rather the effects of just one or two of them.  Does that make sense?  Well if not it did to me and it made me feel better so I'm going with it. 

So what does this mean?  Not much really.  We did increase her Risperdal dose.  I was actually going to request that even if the psychiatrist didn't recommend it.  She's doing much better on it but there is definitely room for improvement.  We started the new dose today and she had a great day at school.  I know it's only day 1 but hey, I'll take it!  I asked the psychiatrist if she was going to add any medication.  She was not at this point and I was very thankful for that.  We are focusing on what is most adversely affecting her life right now and tackling that.  In the end this doesn't change who Oksana is but it sure helps us to understand her better.  It definitely sheds some light on what we have been seeing from her.  I have requested a staffing with her IEP team so that I can share this with them all in one place and we can have it formally documented in her records.  That has been scheduled for the 13th.

The psychiatrist said 2 things that really stood out to me.  One was that Oksana is a miracle.  She said that the fact that she is functioning like this considering all we've learned is amazing.  She said that we are on the right track with her and need to keep doing what we are doing.  That was good to hear.  She also totally and completely confirmed my feelings about her placement in school.  That was also REALLY good to hear since I've felt a bit like some of our IEP team thought I was going a bit overboard when I requested that we significantly decrease her time in the regular classroom and increase her time in special ed.  They never said that, it was just my impression from some of the comments made.  The psychiatrist went as far as to say that she should not be in the regular classroom at all.  For now we will keep her in there because it's just for things like story time, and she is doing fine, but I do think that once she hits around 3rd grade and story time and calendar are replaced with paper pencil work she will rarely be in the regular classroom, if at all.  I had also asked that they focus this year on her emotional health and behaviors and let academics come secondary.  The psychiatrist said the exact same thing before she even knew that I had requested that.  Oh yeah....it feels good when those mommy instincts kick in and do their job right!

So now we will continue to follow up with the psychiatrist.  I have to call next week to let her know how Oksana is doing on the new medication dose.  Then we see her again in January at which time they will do an EKG and a blood draw for some baseline labs.   Until then we thank God that as hard as it has been to parent her, at least she isn't in a mental institution in Ukraine.