About Me
I first became concerned about my daughter charlie's development just after her first birthday, she was running around by this time and physically had met all the milestones so far! her first 2 words were ball and car and
i had no reason to worry, until i started to compare her to her 2 little friends who where born within a month of her. their speech rapidly progressed as the months
went on while charlie's stood still. also, charlie seemed
uninterested in playing with her friends and seemed
very detached from them, she also became unconsoleably
distressed if they were to cry! Next came the fits and the
temper tantrums which would start for no reason
and cause immense embarrasement in public places, as she
got older it became physically impossible for me to restrain her or snap her out of these rages, as she was
completly absorbed in her distress, kicking and punching!
As a parent it is a very upsetting thing to see your child so distraught , you just feel helpless................
these traumas are due to charlie's inablility
to communicate and deal with the stresses and volume of information that occur in everyday life. on many occasions
i have been asked to leave shops or get off buses
and in the end you just want to give up going out all together. charlie has always been a bad sleeper, she
is restless throughout the night and constantly wakes oh the sleepless nights i have endured.
It wasnt until her 2 year check that the proffessionals started to show an interest in the concerns
i had been raising! this was triggered by her
still very poor speech. At 2 charlie could
still only say 6 words. though she was able
to count in her own language! Charlie seems to have
a photographic memory and has many obsessive
compulsive tendancies , like lining things up
and having to live to a set routine. eventually charlie was refered to speech therapy, but due to charlie's
lack of comprehension of language it was very difficult for the speech therapist to coax out any improvement.
At 2 and a half charlie started playgroup for 2 mornings a week , all though she seemed to enjoy the physical aspects
ie running around, the climbing frame and taking part in the activities and responding to the music and songs, this
was overshadowed by how nervous she was at being around other children as she did not understand how to relate to them and had to be with an adult constantly. this was very difficult for the staff to deal with as there were 30 other
children to keep their eyes on. charlies behaviour and needs along with my concerns were raised to the area senco
representative who visited the playgroup once a month.
charlie charmed this lady so that she at once
started to fight her corner and if it wasnt for Kathy dyson
pushing for help for charlie , i do not know
what i would have done , having had no support from my health visitor. Its a very bleak world out there for parents when it feels like there is no one listening!
the next big step for charlie was going to a childminder, so i could increase my hours at work, it was very hard for me to leave charlie with someone other than my family but christine has been a god send and has been invaluable in improving the quality of charlie's life and very understanding with charlies emotional needs!
By a miracle charlie was accepted into dragonflies
at thomas wall nursery which is a daily intensive speech therapy unit with only 8 children in the class
and 3 highly trained teachers. this class has absolutely
transformed charlie and to those teachers i am eternally grateful, she has been such a little soldier
going to school in a cab all on her own everyday
as the school is so far away, but it has been the making of her! in the six moths charlie has been attending
she has become a completly different little girl
who can now speak in sentances and understand the world
around her and treat other children with an affectionate regard. then the statementing process began, which ended up diagnosing charlie with an autistic emotional and communication disorder, the spectrum is so broad its not something that can be pinned down exactly , unfortunatly
there is no black and white answer and there
is no one to blame and no cure and this can be hard at first to come to terms with, you just have to make the most of it and encourage development in everyway possible no matter how much of a struggle it can be. the process was
very long winded and i felt very out of the loop
all the way through it. it was not explained to me how the process works or what i was supposed to do to move it forward, i felt like i was stumbling around in the dark
randomly tripping over pieces of information and slowly putting them together. though saying that i must admit that i did have the top proffesionals pushing for charlie all the way along.an exceptional educational psychologist
jan watson was a life line for me. she had every faith in charlie's potential and she was able to reassure me and explain charlie's condition and how best to help her and
crucially was a support to me both practically and emotionaly. the statementing process has just been
completed , (march 2007) educational psychologists
speech therapists, paediatritions , school teachers and g.p. all have to submit reports along with my recommendations , then all this information needs to be collated and analysed and a draft statement of educational needs is prepared. which is checked and tweaked before the final article can be issued. i was given full access to all reports and able to give my opinions. my main concern for charlie was where was she going to be able to go to primary school considering her lack of speech and behavioural difficulties, as it seems there are so few schools that have provision to deal with autistic children and i strongly feel that the facilities really need to be improved in the uk compared to other countries for example the states.
in my borough for example out of well over 40 primary schools there is only one with an autistic centre and that only has 3 places this academic year. thank goodness that the statement came through just before the deadline of when the places were to be allocated and thanks to everyones hard work to my joy, charlie has been excepted into this centre , forrester's primary school opportunity base. where she will have the special care and attention she needs but also and most importantly will be able to intergrate with the mainstream children as she progresses , which for me is essential for preparing charlie to be able to function in the real world.
this last year has been very hard going and the demands charlie has had to cope with have been intense but my little charlie is such a star and she has risen to every one of them. i am so proud of her and i am certain she is going to turn out a right little genius!
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