New one for the birding life list - white-crowned sparrow. Very noticeable black and white striped head and bright yellowy-orange beak.
Drove by the river yesterday and was wondering what the little fluffballs on the ground were. Then I realized they were baby goslings! Awww, little fluffballs. I've also been watching some birdcams - great heron, red tailed hawk and peregrine falcon - so have seen lots of little fluffballs.
Cooper had his speech evaluation today. He has all his sounds except he's about 50% on R and misses almost all of his L and TH sounds. The speech therapist is a friend of mine and works for the school district, so she is going to do speech therapy with him over the summer. She says she doesn't think it will take that long to get his sounds in, it will just take some training to get his tongue to go to the right place after having a tongue tie for so long. I'll just pay her directly - take that insurance! We'll do two 15 minute sessions a week until we get him caught up.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Friday, April 20, 2012
Monday, April 16, 2012
Last day of Spring Break
I got the snow tires taken off my car. That pretty much guarantees that we will get a blizzard in the next few days.
Cooper has an appointment tomorrow morning with his pediatrician. I'm pretty sure he's been losing weight on this medication, and I want to discuss where we go from here. The recommended specialist in pediatric ADHD isn't covered by my insurance, but it is by GeekBoy's, so we will gain coverage in about four months. I need to call my insurance tomorrow morning about out of network coverage for seeing the specialist before then, and if we need an official referral. I'm sick of waiting for things to happen for him. This medication has helped with impulse control, but I'm not seeing an improvement in attention. That combined with the weight loss means time to try something new.
I also need to call the school district to follow up on scheduling a speech evaluation for him. At his five year check-up, the pediatrician expressed some concern about his speech. I'm pretty sure that it is just from him being tongue tied for so long; he doesn't know how to shape certain letters. But that's one more thing to work on.
Cooper has a large head, just like both his parents. We went to Target tonight to find new shirts. We actually have to try on each t-shirt to make sure that it fits over his head comfortably. So, all his shirts are big on him, but at least he doesn't complain about the pain they cause going on and off now. Also, thank goodness for polos and henleys. Bonus - button practice!
We also picked up a horseshoe and badmitton set at Target. More outdoor activities. I am so looking forward to it warming up. Our second daffodil bloomed today. It may be half way through April, but it is still on the chilly beginning of spring here.
Back to campus tomorrow for my last semester. I bought a new funky necklace to wear for the first day of classes on Wednesday. I am such a girl.
Cooper has an appointment tomorrow morning with his pediatrician. I'm pretty sure he's been losing weight on this medication, and I want to discuss where we go from here. The recommended specialist in pediatric ADHD isn't covered by my insurance, but it is by GeekBoy's, so we will gain coverage in about four months. I need to call my insurance tomorrow morning about out of network coverage for seeing the specialist before then, and if we need an official referral. I'm sick of waiting for things to happen for him. This medication has helped with impulse control, but I'm not seeing an improvement in attention. That combined with the weight loss means time to try something new.
I also need to call the school district to follow up on scheduling a speech evaluation for him. At his five year check-up, the pediatrician expressed some concern about his speech. I'm pretty sure that it is just from him being tongue tied for so long; he doesn't know how to shape certain letters. But that's one more thing to work on.
Cooper has a large head, just like both his parents. We went to Target tonight to find new shirts. We actually have to try on each t-shirt to make sure that it fits over his head comfortably. So, all his shirts are big on him, but at least he doesn't complain about the pain they cause going on and off now. Also, thank goodness for polos and henleys. Bonus - button practice!
We also picked up a horseshoe and badmitton set at Target. More outdoor activities. I am so looking forward to it warming up. Our second daffodil bloomed today. It may be half way through April, but it is still on the chilly beginning of spring here.
Back to campus tomorrow for my last semester. I bought a new funky necklace to wear for the first day of classes on Wednesday. I am such a girl.
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Notes about Cooper
Cooper and GeekBoy are practicing math with pretzels right now.
Last night, Cooper engaged in an act of civil disobedience. We put him to bed, but he didn't want to go to sleep, so he sang the ABC song at the top of his lungs for an hour straight. He varied tempo, but it was pretty much always at blastissimo. Sometimes he would just sing the same six letters repeatedly, like a record that was stuck. After an hour he started to fade off, and then after a few minutes he would start up again. That repeated a few times until he finally fell asleep. It is very difficult to read or concentrate on anything with the Cooper Choir in the next room.
We had our first camp fire in the back yard Friday night. We're burning off a lot of brush that we trimmed out of lilacs and other bushes. Cooper perked up after about ten minutes and said, "We need marshmallows!" He loves roasting them, but doesn't really like eating them.
We went to Salt Lake City last week and rode the commuter train around downtown. Friday Cooper asked if he would could ride the trains again. I said we don't have trains in our town. He pulled out his hand, pointed to a dot on his palm, and said, "Here they are! I don't know how to get there, but this does." I asked him, "Oh, is that your map?" And he replied, with a slightly disgusted tone to his voice, "No, that's my phone." Okay, child of the 21st century, excuse me for not realizing that a phone is a map now.
He also wanted to go back to "the room with all the balls in it," i.e. the Children's Discovery Museum at the Gateway in Salt Lake City. He thinks we should be on vacation every day now. GeekBoy took him to McDonalds to play on the indoor playground, but it totally did not cut it.
He turned five a few weeks ago. He gets more fun every day.
Last night, Cooper engaged in an act of civil disobedience. We put him to bed, but he didn't want to go to sleep, so he sang the ABC song at the top of his lungs for an hour straight. He varied tempo, but it was pretty much always at blastissimo. Sometimes he would just sing the same six letters repeatedly, like a record that was stuck. After an hour he started to fade off, and then after a few minutes he would start up again. That repeated a few times until he finally fell asleep. It is very difficult to read or concentrate on anything with the Cooper Choir in the next room.
We had our first camp fire in the back yard Friday night. We're burning off a lot of brush that we trimmed out of lilacs and other bushes. Cooper perked up after about ten minutes and said, "We need marshmallows!" He loves roasting them, but doesn't really like eating them.
We went to Salt Lake City last week and rode the commuter train around downtown. Friday Cooper asked if he would could ride the trains again. I said we don't have trains in our town. He pulled out his hand, pointed to a dot on his palm, and said, "Here they are! I don't know how to get there, but this does." I asked him, "Oh, is that your map?" And he replied, with a slightly disgusted tone to his voice, "No, that's my phone." Okay, child of the 21st century, excuse me for not realizing that a phone is a map now.
He also wanted to go back to "the room with all the balls in it," i.e. the Children's Discovery Museum at the Gateway in Salt Lake City. He thinks we should be on vacation every day now. GeekBoy took him to McDonalds to play on the indoor playground, but it totally did not cut it.
He turned five a few weeks ago. He gets more fun every day.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Monday, February 27, 2012
Getting a diagnosis: Part Two
Part one is here.
I spent several hours last week dealing with doctors and insurance companies. We called to schedule the testing that Cooper's pediatrician recommended. The highly regarded specialist in our town who does this testing with children doesn't take our insurance. If we want to have it done anyway, it's $2600 out of pocket. Goodbye plans to fence the backyard this summer.
So, I called my insurance company and asked if there was someone in-network who performed these services. They put me on hold for a while and then told me that they don't cover that procedure at all until ADHD has been ruled out as a diagnosis. So, I have to get ADHD ruled out before they will authorize anyone to perform the examinations. It doesn't matter if ADHD is co-occuring with other disorders, they won't authorize it at all at this point.
So they send me back to their website to pick a provider to do a psych eval to determine if Cooper has ADHD. I finally found one person who specializes in psychiatric diagnostics rather than in counseling, and he can't get Cooper in until the end of April. The specialist I was referred to could have gotten him in this week.
To make this even more fun, my insurance ends when I resign this summer, and we'll be switching to GeekBoy's insurance. GeekBoy's insurance covers this procedure with no hoops to jump through. But we can't swap to his insurance unless there is a "life change" like loss of insurance coverage someplace else. But I can't voluntarily terminate my insurance so we can get on his insurance.
At this point, I'm seriously considering just trying Cooper out on medication, and waiting until August when we are on the new insurance to get him properly assessed by a specialist, rather than paying for an ADHD diagnosis twice.
Things like this are why I support single payer health insurance.
I spent several hours last week dealing with doctors and insurance companies. We called to schedule the testing that Cooper's pediatrician recommended. The highly regarded specialist in our town who does this testing with children doesn't take our insurance. If we want to have it done anyway, it's $2600 out of pocket. Goodbye plans to fence the backyard this summer.
So, I called my insurance company and asked if there was someone in-network who performed these services. They put me on hold for a while and then told me that they don't cover that procedure at all until ADHD has been ruled out as a diagnosis. So, I have to get ADHD ruled out before they will authorize anyone to perform the examinations. It doesn't matter if ADHD is co-occuring with other disorders, they won't authorize it at all at this point.
So they send me back to their website to pick a provider to do a psych eval to determine if Cooper has ADHD. I finally found one person who specializes in psychiatric diagnostics rather than in counseling, and he can't get Cooper in until the end of April. The specialist I was referred to could have gotten him in this week.
To make this even more fun, my insurance ends when I resign this summer, and we'll be switching to GeekBoy's insurance. GeekBoy's insurance covers this procedure with no hoops to jump through. But we can't swap to his insurance unless there is a "life change" like loss of insurance coverage someplace else. But I can't voluntarily terminate my insurance so we can get on his insurance.
At this point, I'm seriously considering just trying Cooper out on medication, and waiting until August when we are on the new insurance to get him properly assessed by a specialist, rather than paying for an ADHD diagnosis twice.
Things like this are why I support single payer health insurance.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Getting a Diagnosis: Part One
We met with Cooper's pediatrician today, who said he is presenting like a textbook case of ADHD. He said we have one of two options at this point, 1. Test him for any other conditions that mimic the symptoms of ADHD to rule out anything else, or any co-occurring disorders, or 2. Put him on meds and see what happens.
I went for one. He'll refer us to a group that does diagnostic work with little kids and they will do a full screen of IQ, learning disorders, developmental or sensory disorders, and psychiatric conditions. We should be expecting a call from them this week.
Can I say that I just love Cooper's pediatrician? I know so many people who have to fight to get their kids the treatment they need and proper assessments done, and we have a doctor that's completely on board with letting us determine what course to pursue.
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