Another round of testing...

Why does having our sons tested for learning disabilities have to be so draining?  We just finished testing our youngest, because we know he has a learning disability, however when he was first tested he was too young to get a proper diagnoses.   Now that he is finished for a few years I felt that I could draw a sigh of relief. 

Things, as it turns out, aren’t going well for my middle child.  His round of testing is still going on. After we thought we were done, the doctor wanted to do further testing because he feels that the tests done don’t reflect his abilities as they should.  When we had our eldest son done, it was explained to us that the testing revealed Alex was vegetable.  Alex is not a vegetable, LOL.    He just answered the questions in such a way that there was no way to mark the answers.  For explain she showed Alex a picture of an umbrella.  He answered with gestures of opening an umbrella, and swinging it up to his shoulder saying, “it’s raining, you walk dry now.”  She explained that the tests required a certain answer and Alex’s answers didn’t fit into the tests answer spectrum.  I’m assuming something like this is something along the lines of what is happening with our middle son.

I thought I could handled another round of testing, his doctor has been great in offering to do the further testing at no cost(which was a huge relief).  But last night I received a call from him saying that he would like to have him tested for autism.  He doesn’t think he’s autistic, though he may have a mild form of it.  That was hard to hear.  Unfortunately, he isn’t qualified to do the testing for autism, and that means more testing.

I know I should do some research on autism though, I really don’t want to.  It might be denial, or some deep rooted fear that I’ll have to accept certain limitations.  I believe in being proactive, and not wanting to wait when it comes to helping my boys.  This scares me, or rather the label and what it could mean scares me. 

Today I’ll indulgence myself a little. I’ll focus on the housecleaning, running errands, and take Alex out for lunch; he’s been waiting a very long time to lunch with Mom.  Tomorrow I’ll sort out what the next steps are in dealing with this.