psych and school stuff

I took Ricky to see his psychiatrist yesterday (he goes once a week). Dr. Cendana brought Ricky out of their session looking rather grim. I don't pry into what they talk about, but Ricky knows he can tell me if he wants to.

On the way home, the school psychologist finally called me back. I've been leaving her messages for weeks in regards to the assessments Ricky is supposed to be having for his IEP. The only message I'd gotten from her was that they had no record of a previous IEP, which horrified me because a whole stack of papers from the school district (who did testing on him last May) was supposed to have come over in August. Well, so this time she told me that she'd found the paperwork and was going to take it home and read it tonight.

So, anyway, I'm meeting with her next Thursday morning at 9 a.m. to discuss Ricky, and then she's going to start testing him at 10 a.m. that morning. She was making comments like, "Oh, we don't need to do such-and-such testing, they already did it in May." I informed her that lots has changed since then and I'd prefer if they did all of the testing over again. She also mentioned that he's been traumatized by this whole thing with his dad moving out[October of this year] and such, and maybe the results of the testing would be skewed. Nice try. I assured her that his behavior has been awful for several years, having nothing to do with recent events -- something she'd've known if she'd already reviewed his paperwork.

When we got home, the lady from the YWCA (where that "Parenting the Child With Challenging Behavior" class is held) finally called me back and got me all registered for the class, so I hurriedly fed the boys and took them to my mom's, and then I was off to the class!

The class was really great. The therapist who runs it is a little abrupt and brusque, but she knows her stuff. The bulk of last evening was taken up by us introducing ourselves. Several of us (me included) got pretty emotional. Many of the kids represented there have ADHD, as they say Ricky does (I'm still in denial, and proud of it). Some also have ODD, as Ricky probably does. There were a few parents of kids on the autistic spectrum (PDD, autism, Aspergers) and some bipolars and others. I actually felt fortunate that Ricky's problems are as "mild" as they are.

Afterwards I drove to my mom's and got the boys (who were asleep). I stayed up too late, went to bed, and got up around 7:15 this morning. We were sure running to get ready in time. Both boys had to eat at day care, and as a result I forgot to give Ricky his Risperdal. Ack!