We have a diagnosis

After seeing two different doctors Parker has been diagnosed with Asperger’s Disorder Syndrome, a social anxiety disorder, on the autism spectrum. If you would like to find out more about it click the link. Due to the upcoming family reunion I wanted to share this information before we all got together again. Hopefully this information will help us interact with Parker, because knowledge is power! Right!; and maybe what our family is going through will help others in similar situations. Jeremy and I love Parker very much and we want others to love him too, and sometimes to love someone you have to understand them. I have some special people in our lives that are well educated in Special Education, and have been my life lines. I want to give them special thanks for all they do to support us; my Aunt Kathie, my cousin Mariah, and our good friends Aunt Katie and Uncle Troy.

Parker was having a hard time focusing in the classroom, to the point that he was distracting other kids. Parker’s classroom teacher was great, and she supported us, but could not keep him in his seat, and couldn’t keep him from being a distraction. I had a really bad experience with the Special Ed teacher, pretty much Parker hadn’t been serviced for his needs the whole year, because I was told that we couldn’t do a new IEP (Individual Education Plan) until April, because that is when the last one had been done and you have to wait a whole year. (To any of you who may need this information, you can ask for a new IEP any time, by law.) So Parker wasn’t be serviced the whole year, but we didn’t know because he was bringing home speech papers once a week and was in a special reading program. During this time Parker’s classroom teacher was expressing concern about his lack of focus. I would go and sit in the classroom and Parker would act perfect, but I couldn’t be there everyday. So I asked the classroom teacher what the special ed teacher was doing for support, and was told nothing. So I went to the special ed teacher to find out how to help Parker, she said she didn’t even have Parker’s special ed paperwork from Grand Junction (which is a lie because she had told me that I couldn’t have a new IEP until April, and how would she have know that if she hadn’t had his papers at one time.) I went straight home and called Grand Junction to get the records faxed over again. A big thanks to my cousin Mariah who told me to just take the IEP that I already had into the school. Thanks Mariah, after all of this you can do all the thinking for me! So I took Parker’s IEP in, but still nothing. On the last day of school I went in to take something to Parker’s teacher, the special ed teacher grabbed me and told me that she had just gotten the fax from GJ, which I looked at the date and it said 4/28, and the date was 5/22. REALLY?!?! The first thing out of her mouth is “Have You thought about medicating Parker?” Just for your information it is against the law for educators to suggest medication in Utah, and just what would we be medicating him for? What was wrong with him?
So I was mad, and I marched down to Parker’s classroom teacher, and as calmly as I could I asked her if we needed to medicate Parker, she told me NO!, but I would have him observed. Thank – you, to this special person who championed Parker all year, and at just the right moment made the perfect suggestion to me. Why am I including this crazy story of me getting mad?, because it was the breaking point – the ah ha moment! After this interaction I went to my medical doctor and asked for help. My Doctor put his office staff on this and by the end of the day I had a contact, and they were faxing me forms to fill out. I filled out the forms in record time and faxed them back in and called to get my appointments. I told them my crazy story of how we had lost a whole year and I needed help and I would jump through any hoop they asked me to, and I meant it. They finally called me back with an appointment date; it was the 27th of July and the day that Jer and I were flying home from Alaska. The date was almost a month away, but it was a cancellation, and the next appointment was in late August. So I begged my family that someone would bring the kids to SLC from Moab so we could get Parker into the Doctor before school started, and my wonderful Father did. Jer and I were really tired after taking a red eye from Anchorage to SLC, and went to the movie UP just so we could sleep while we waited for Parker, but were still out of our minds tired. Dad brought the kids to the Mall in Provo and we threw them in the truck and headed to SLC. When we were almost to the Doctors office Parker said, do you think I will get a new cast? Jer and I looked at each other in all of our craziness we had failed to tell him we were going to a doctor to help him in school. So we explained this to Parker, and he went into classic Parker shut down mode. We met with the Doctor who asked us tons of questions, and did tons of tests; for the most part Parker was acting like the Doctor wasn’t even in the room. The Doctor told us what that he thought that Parker had Asperger’s syndrome, and we scheduled more Doctor Appointments with other Doctors. We also purchased a few books and have been doing some very heavy reading.
So why am I sharing this? Because we love Parker, and we want him to learn how to behave correctly and not use Asperger’s as an excuse. We have told him that because he knows he has it he has to work even harder to act right. So here we go down the road of Asperger’s syndrome, learning to make eye contact, learning personal boundaries, how to take no for an answer, focusing in school and for Parker not talking just about X-men, transformers, and horses! Please join us, it is going to be a bumpy road, with a lot of pit stops, but we love our kids and want them to be well rounded, healthy people. I would love to answer any questions, or read any comments.
Thanks & Love,
Jeremy & Stacy

And they're are off....

Today was the first day of school for the kids. Parker started 2nd grade today, and Miss Payton started Kindergarten.

MY KIDS ARE SUPER HEROES!

Anyone who knows Parker knows that he is extremely passionate! His new passion???? Super Heroes, mainly Wolverine. We have to dress like Wolverine, act like Wolverine and do our hair like Wolverine (kind of funny the kid has perfect hair to do it like Wolverine!)

Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, kind of nice to look at, mainly because he doesn't live at my house and he isn't always jumping out in front of me making sound effects like snikt!

This Payton being Kittie, I have no idea who that is!

The Cons of Parker being Wolverine, is he has used all the mousse, hair spray, and gel in the house, and he is really warping his sister, she now thinks she has super powers, and she calls people mutants at the grocery store.

I am cathing up on my blogging.

I have gotten a little behind in my blogging, and I have accidentally posted some posts before I am finished them, so today I am fixing that. I am totally blaming summer! We have had such an awsome summer, even though our Dad has had to be in Anchorage training most of the summer. Every minute that he was home he spent doing fun things with us, so yes the yard has suffered a little, but I am loving watching my kids grow, and blossem this summer. (Don't worry Aunt Sandy I haven't killed anything, but my garden will never be in the same leauge as yours.)


For the Fourth of July Jer got to come home for a whole week, we are so lucky. We went to the cabin with my family, and then Jer's Dad came up for a day to ride the four wheelers.

Mom is glaring at Pockets because he is a close talker! Lindsay still loves him, and he is going to be so sad while she is in China! We will all be sad while she is in China!

We even have a little fishing movie with my Dad and Parker.

We took a trip to the cabin in August, and went on some fun four wheeler rides, and some great hikes, Miss Payton thought that we were walking her legs off.

Stories and pictures we drew about the flower we saw.

So Very Blessed!

I am so very blessed to have a great pioneer herritage, my ancestors come from the Hole in the Rock pioneers. But the best is that my wonderful husband has embraced my pioneer roots, and supports our family in our service to the "Hole-in-the-Rock Fondation".

Getting ready to go back to school.

With parker having a cast on his right arm (his writing arm) I have been worried about him going back to school, so we have been working on writing a little something every night.

The first night we wrote about a flower we saw while on a hike, the next day we wrote about horses, but tonight was diffently the best. We were doing something on the internet and found this story. Parker and Payton were so excited about this I had them write in their journals about it.

Click for link to story

Neglected

One word to describe my garden - Neglected. I have watered, weeded and watched over my garden and for what? Nothing, it just wasn't producing. I was sick of reading peoples' facebook status, "We just had a juicy red tomato out of our garden!" I finally made my family eat a not so ripe tomato just to say we had eaten one out of the garden. So I left it, I left it and went to Anchorage, I've left it to go to the cabin, and finally we are seeing results.

Obviously I let the zucchini get way to big, but these aren't even the baseball bat sized ones that we fed to the horses. My peas were eaten by a horse or cow earlier in the year, but are coming back nicely. My beans are now longer than the plants that they are growing on. I am glad my family likes cucumbers because my two plants are out of control! And out of 12 tomato plants I have two tomatoes. My pumpkins are growing like crazy and the kids are so excited, and I do have one that is already turning orange. Is that normal???? It seams a little early to me. So not to shabby for my first real try at growing a garden, and it looks like I have kept the rest of the yard alive too.

My Boys are Back

Nathan invited Jer and Parker to go to the Father and Son Campout with him this weekend. Jer was so excited he forgot that we had previous obligations, so we dropped those plans and the boys headed to Nathan's for some fun (sorry Megan & Andrew).

They played capture the flag until way late, and when they walked in the door Parker went straight to his room to lay down.

Jer didn't take a camera so I made them go back outside so I could get a picture.

I also enjoy annoying my cute husband and got some other nice shots of him.

Jer made me take the other photos off, he was worried people might think he is goofy?