A Most Difficult Week but some things to be happy about!

Today was Cassie's school system meeting. IPRC meeting is the correct term. Identification, Placement, Review Committee. The goal of today's meeting was to pursue an Identification of Communication-Learning Disability for Cassie. These identifications are very important in Canada's school system as it allows the school to access more resources, get more funding and it as it reassures myself that the school, teacher, learning resource teacher and EA's understand Cassie special needs and then they are able to provide the best support for Cassie's education.
The Ministry Definition of Learning Disability is as follows:
A learning disorder evident in both academic and social situations that involves one or more of the processes necessary for the proper use of spoken language or the symbols of communication, and that is characterized by a condition that is not primarily the result of impairment of vision, impairment of hearing, physical disability, developmental disability, primary emotional disturbance and cultural differences and results in a significant discrepancy between academic achievement and assessed intellectual ability, with deficits in one or more of the following:-receptive language (listening, reading), language processing(thinking, conceptualizing, integrating), expressive language(talking, spelling, writing); mathematical computations. May be associated with one or more conditions diagnosed as a perceptual handicap: a brain injury minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia or developmental aphasia.

Cassie met all 5 of the boards criteria and thus was she was given a Communication Learning Disability exceptionality. Cassie already had a physical exceptionality related to her cerebral palsy but the learning disablity exceptionality will now come first as it requires the most amount of resources and time from the school at this point in time. I am glad this meeting is finally done. I feel the meeting went extremely well. Nothing was a surprise to me in todays meeting as we had extensive testing of Cassie done this summer. We were aware of a significant discrepancy between Cassie's abilities and her academic achievement in numerous areas. There had been lots of discussion previously with Mr. Moase and Mrs Holloway and we were aware as to where Cassie is in her educational level. Cassie is learning at a beginning grade 1 level and has low literacy skills, difficulty with working memory and executive functioning and needs various class room strategies to ensure success.
I heard such wonderful comments today about my daughter which is always nice to hear from others:
"Cassie uses great coping mechanisms", "Cassie is very hard working", "Cassie is so pleasant and up beat and social in the classroom and at recess". The Speech and Language Pathologist enjoyed working with Cassie very much and found her caring and thoughtful. The teacher finds her a pleasure and enjoys having her in the classroom. The team expressed surprise at Cassie's love of school with her significant learning problems. They attribute it to a positive family life with supportive parents and big sister and a good school like Fessenden. Apparently, Cassie pushes herself and works hard. She is a people pleaser and wants very much to succeed.
Being blessed with these wonderful qualities and getting the offical exceptionality on her school record, I feel positive that we have some direction to help us progress Cassie in her education. Special education resources will be very helpful as they have been in the past.

Monday Cassie went to Mcmaster hospital for her Botox needles. Cassie had a terrible time. The nurses were unable to start Cassie's IV and she had four IV pokes. She is bruised down her entire arm. Cassie lost it after the third poke. None of the previous strategies we had learned worked. Cassie was given lots of Ativan and was majorally distressed. She would not lay on the bed, she would not put on the heart monitor or the oxygen sat monitor. She screamed and cried and it was very hard on all of us. I am sure the team at Mcmaster felt bad as well. They do not like to see a child in such distress. Dr. Mesterman spoke to the family twice after the procedure offering words of wisdom. We respect this doctor greatly but we have made a family decision to stop Botox procedures. We have witnessed some benefits to getting the needles. However the botox wears off quite quickly and the difficulty these treatments pose for our 9 year old daughter has caused too much strain on the family.
I was able to have a long discussion with Cassie's Physiotherapist. We have given it our best all around effort. As a family we have decieded to listen to our daughter, respect her choices and attempt to build trust again. We have decided we will not force her to comply with treatments at this time. We will revisit with her when she is older the option of Botox treatments. We will turn our attention to some of the other therapies we enjoy doing with our girl. Our focus will be looking for exercises that can assist her to strenghten her tight hand and foot, stretching excercises learned in the past can be utilized more often. Cassie has exercise balls, trampoline and weights in our basement so our committment to spend more time together as a family working on fitness. Thirdly, we will invest our time and energy on literacy skills, maintaining a healthy weight, eating healthy and being active.
Last night Cassie took her first swimming lesson at Ancaster Aquatic Centre. Considering she has a movement and muscle disorder she is working extremely hard to learn how to swim. Her goal is to learn to swim across a pool. I feel good about the decisions we have made. We are an extremely busy family and need to focus our attention on areas we feel give us the best sense of balance in our life. We value our family time.

Cassie with her dad turns 9 years old!! Happy Birthday Kiddo. We love you very much big girl.