First Steps

Apparently Indiana has a program called First Steps, which offers resources for children with delays, but you have to get into the program before the child's 3rd birthday.  Matt and I had no idea this program even existed.  All the pediatricians in South Bend that we spoke to over the last few months have suggested this program.  It tends to move quicker if your pediatrician refers you to the program, but you can also do a self referral.  We ended up doing a self referral, because Bradon's established pediatrician in Bloomington had never even mentioned that this program and when I called to speak with them about getting a referral they said they don't give referrals. They suggested I self referral.  I was really ready to freak out on some people, but decided that it wasn't worth it.  

After self referring we started getting the appointments scheduled.  The first scheduled appointment was to discuss payment, registering, basic health information, etc.  The wonderful thing about this program is that all appointments & services are conducted at the house.  It is a huge convenience and will make the whole process a lot smoother.  The payment for the services are based on a sliding scale for family size and yearly salary.  They will charge our health insurance first and then base the remaining amount on the scale.  Obviously we will pay any type of money to get Bradon talking, but it is nice to know that the bills won't be outrageous.  

The second appointment is the evaluation.  We had a speech pathologist & a developmental therapist come to the house.  One played with Bradon & the other asked us questions about his interaction, skills, language, etc.  They then tally their points up for each category based on a 3 number scale.  0 - means the action is not there, 1 - means that it is emerging, 2 means that the skill, etc is there.  After an hour they gave us a brief summary with their thoughts, the full summary will be given to us with a plan of action at our next meeting.  They said that he is meeting & exceeding their expectations in all areas, except speech.  They also said that he understands everything they are asking.  This was great news for us, because we always felt this way, but didn't know if we were being blind to problems or being bias.  Bradon's only issues is in the verbal communication. They said that they will establish a plan and that they feel once the services are in place that he will pick up on everything really quickly.  

We are meeting Bradon's new doctor on August 10th and then on August 14th the case manager will come out to discuss & get our approval on a plan of action for Bradon. After we approve the plan, the plan will be sent to his new doctor & the doctor will approve the plan.  After the doctor's approval we will begin services to get Bradon talking.  They gave us a few tips today to help in getting him started on being more vocal.  We are supposed to get Bradon to talk into a mirror & watch us talk into a mirror.  It will help him watch how we are forming words & get him aware of his own word formation.  We are supposed to continue to point out and answer all his questions when it comes to objects around him, and also continue to make environmental sounds for him.  

On a side note - Over the last few weeks Bradon has really started to become more vocal.  We are up to about 10 words (Mom, Dad, Papa, up, baby, off, hi, bye, please, eyes).  We hope to look back on this in a few months & see a drastic improvement in his vocal abilities.