The last week has been miraculous. We got a call from DHS two weeks ago saying that the waiting list for the Title 19 Intellectual Disability Waiver was reset or cleared out or something. Bottom line - somehow Jack Leman is one of the first names on the waiting list. A week after that call we got a letter saying a slot has now opened up and it's ours if we want it. (!) I met with a case worker today to deliver some medical records and sign some paperwork, and barring any unseen obstacles, once the state gets it some time this week they will review his evaluations and then we're in. What?!? We expected this to take anywhere from 12-18 months. I'm told to get the same thing in Illinois takes several years. I am overwhelmed with gratitude. What this basically means is that Jack will be insured under Medicaid, granting him access to therapies (speech in particular) that our own insurance company won't cover but that he truly needs. This will be at little to no cost to us (hallelujah, because it costs $330 a session at the University).
Timely news, especially since we just received a $1,455 bill from Jack's visit to the CDD last July. We're still not sure why and have lots of phone calls to make to try and clear this up. It looks like it was billed under some code for behavioral testing, which our insurance company won't cover. We're going to have to try to get the hospital to code it differently and resubmit. What a pain. And in the end I don't know if we're going to be able to get out of it. But miraculously (really can't use this word enough, wish there was some way to make the font glitter and put halos over the vowels) we were informed this same week that our family qualified for some grant money that we can put towards therapy costs that aren't covered. So even if we can't get the bill changed we can at least knock out a significant chunk of it.
And the other miracle is that full-time school for me and full-time preschool options for Jack are unfolding in the most logistically perfect way for next year. I am on my knees thanking God. This was causing me so much stress. I just couldn't figure out a way to make all of it work and I was feeling all kinds of anxiety about this transition for my little super-delayed-not-even-3-year-old. AJ and I visited 3 special education preschool classrooms today and they were so wonderful. The teachers were amazing, the kids were adorable, and it just set me at ease. I walked around picturing him in the school and confident that this was going to be a great great thing for him.
On a progress note, Jack recently started some speech therapy with graduate students supervised by a licensed speech-language pathologist, and he is doing so well! He has really become so much more verbal in the last couple of months. His word attempts are coming right along and today he even walked over to me, looked me square in the face, and said "hep" (help) when he was trying to move a big box. I was so excited. He also made his first piece of art. At the speech clinic he used a glue stick and stuck a bunch of cut out shapes on a picture of a cow. At the end, when he brought it over to me, he gave me this huge open-mouthed smile like he just knew how amazing it was that he made this. And when I squealed, "did you make this cow?!" he beamed, "Caaaaaawww! Booooo!"
I've been so teary this week, watching him play and work. He's growing up. He's such a big boy, he's so full of curiosity. I was teary when we walked through the elementary school this morning. I was teary when I watched him at the speech clinic, thinking about how far he's come and how ready he is for the next step. I am so proud of him for all the struggle and all the frustration and all the waiting. He's the most incredible little person and I'm just so glad he's mine.
It's frequently used in schedule format so that the child can see what's coming next in their routine, hopefully making transitions a bit easier. This is where it totally broke down for us at home. Showing Jack the pictures of what was next usually provoked a melt down. He didn't want to be reminded that he was going to have to stop playing with Lego blocks soon and get in his booster seat for lunch. Nonetheless, PECS has made its way back into his life and though he put up a bit of fuss about it at first, he's actually latching on to it pretty well. They've been using a triangular felt board with a "First/Then" design, storing the pictures of all kinds of activities on the back of the board. First we do puzzles, then you can have a fruit snack (his ultimate motivator). Last week when we went in, they had the room all set up with toys and puzzles and coloring sheets, with a very structured plan for the order of activities. Under the "First" slot on the board was a picture of building blocks and under the "Then" slot a picture of, what else, fruit snacks. Jack promptly walked over, removed the picture of the blocks, pulled a 2nd fruit snack picture from the back of the board and stuck it under the "First" slot. Then handed it over to the grad assistant. Smartie pants!