T-Bird Anni Rides Again

Not long after getting home from aforementioned meeting, Aprilia was delivered home from her day out with Nelly.  They had been to another friend’s house making pizzas and playing in the garden.  Aparently she had "hid behind the sofa" a few times as it all got too much for her but otherwise it was good.  Unfortuneately we then needed to rush about a bit.  I needed to get to Rainbows via Asda to pick up Chinese nibbles.  We made dragons, played Chinese Whispers (and i’m well aware that Chinese whispers is probably not remotely Chinese!) and snacked on spring rolls and prawn crackers.  Aprilia periodically hid in the kitchen, huddled on the floor with a blanket to snuggle and a thumb to suck. 

She made a fantastic job of explaining to me how she was feeling when it was bed time and although she was exhausted she just couldn’t settle.  She said she felt like a pan that was boiling over.  Aparently it had happened during the day so the image was quite clear in her head, even after someone had realised that there was a problem and turned the heat off, it still kept on boiling for a while until it had cooled down and that was just how she felt.  I was really impressed that she had found such a clear way to express how she felt.  But I was sad that she felt like that becuase I knew taht she really needed to not go to Rainbows but she also needed to not be left on her own until Duke got home but he doesn’t get home until after I need to be at Rainbows.  I think this is the first time that I really struggled to balance my own child’s needs against Rainbows.  Not nice.

As it gets more evident that Aprilia is at least as dyslexic as me I’ve started thinking more about assessments and so on.  By chance I "spoke" to someone by e-mail who is involved in advocacy for parents trying to access services in Cheshire and she  put me onto the Parents Partnership.  I hmmmm-ed and harrrr-ed about going to the "forum" (sort of meeting-y type thing meets parent support group) but ended up going just to see what I could find out and meet up with people. Whilst it still looks like I’m on my own as far as funding the whole assessment process goes, it was still a good meeting for lots of reasons. 

the "Elective home education team" were there (on behalf of all of Cheshire’s home edders, hoping to get a bit of straight information about what home edders can and cannot access) and I spent a while talking to the lady who is "looking after" my area now.  She’s nice.  She doesn’t believe in all this nonsense about samples of work etc but she will admit to liking to put faces to names either by visits (or meeting on neutral ground) or by catching up with people at the home education forum meetings taht they run arround the area.  She’s very quick to point out what she is and isn’t allowed to do legally though and to frown on overbearing practices outside her area!  We had a long chat about accessing dyslexia resources and I informed her about free library audio book loans for dyslexics which she didn’t know about.

 I sat on a table with several mums of children with dyslexia (and other problems) non of whom knew about things like coloured overlays being available without waiting several milenia for the school to get off their butts to "test" the child (by test, read "spend 5 minutes trying the 10 different overlays easily available via Crossbow to see what colour seems to help)  It seemed odd to be considered almost "expert" on a condition although it wasn’t nice to ahve to say "I got lots of funding but it’s not available to school age children, you ahve to wait until they get to college, assuming they haven’t already given up on trying to learn by then" 

I spoke to someone who does some work with dyslexia and who may have access to some funding for listening skills for Aprilia (she has "dyslexic ears" - posh title is auditory processing disorder) which would be a damned good start as part of the reason she avoids noisy places is her inability to filter out noise and pick out speech.

And actually, it was just nice to be in a room full of (mainly) mums who know what having a child who struggles is like.  I went thinking that really having a child who "just" has dyslexia would make me seem like a whinger compared to some of the families there where they are coping with complex needs but it just didn’t happen.  It was almost like being in a home ed setting but without the children!