"I Love It When a Plan Comes Together!"

I took Bob off to his ST/OT appointment this morning, after having a great few days with him.
I decided to try giving him a few minutes of tickles and deep massage early (ish... mornings are the work of the devil) to see how that set him up for the day. These are things his OT advised me will help to bring out the best in Bob (that, and LOTS of swinging and jumping...phew! I'll definitely need a boob job and bladder reconstruction by the time he's grown up)
...and hey presto, it was less difficult to make him interact and he was generally happier all day.
And not a dolphin in sight.
No clip-clop of fabulously maned horses galloping over the Himalayas.
And definitely no Shaman wafting suspicious (but rather interesting) smoke over him to exorcise his "demons" (don't get me started on the demon-autism thing...you'll be here all night and you'll get terribly bored and want to sedate me).
It was plain old OT doing it's funky thang. Repetitive (OK, tedious), and definitely not magic...but effective in it's plodding, unsensational way.
I spoke to the OT about the difficulty we've been having with group work (as in, he simply doesn't do groups, dahling, and would much prefer to slither off his chair and eat his artwork). She advised that a group of 5 was likely too much for Sir Bob to cope with so she suggested that we take a step back and do "group" work in pairs. Simple genius.
Bob' autism team work in a different jurisdiction to his school so they can't visit him there(long story involving bureaucratic attempts to move him to another area as the borders were adjusted...and polite, but bullish heel-digging by me), but there is very good relations between them and Bob's Teacher. One of the SNAs has attended some of his sessions and there is a healthy dialogue between us all.
Good communication and a willingness to work hard between the Autism Team, the school and our family have resulted in slow, steady progress. It's not the stuff of blockbusting best sellers, but it's the real, honest bricks and mortar that are building a happy, well-rounded little site manager.


I love it when a plan come together.



On another note, the activity centre that Bob's Dad and I frivilously purchased a month ago arrived today...I have friciton burns on my butt from the slide (the silly people seem to have made it too narrow *cough*...)...and we may stand accused of being less-than-sensible with our meagre euros...but we're having so much damn fun that we don't care!
In your face Recession!!!