Repeated Crises
Rough times! I haven’t been posting much lately because we have had many appointments with specialists, and Matthieu has not exactly been easy to manage over the past month. He’s always been a little difficult, but recently he has started to shout when frustrated, which got quickly exhausting for us other family members.
I told the child therapist we are seeing about it, and he advised me to get Matthieu enrolled at the SESSAD (Special Education and Care Services). The problem is, one day has only so many hours, and one week so many days – I already spend most of it taking him to various sessions. Besides, we’ll be moving soon, and he should be starting school in September. No, really, coming to town more often is not going to be possible.
The therapist’s other argument is that SESSADs are used to taking care of autistic children, which is not the case of the kindergarten Matthieu goes to, where they let him do whatever he please (switch lights on and off, open and close doors, hand flapping and so on). However, we have agreed with his future teacher that the efforts he is making at home should be maintained at school, and she accepted to work along with an AVS (School Auxiliary).
So we explained the deal to Matthieu: improving his behaviour or giving up school for SESSAD. We have put too much effort in school to give up now, but if his behaviour doesn’t get better, we’ll have to change our plans and get him enrolled at the neighbouring department’s SESSAD.
Ever since we have explained this to him, his attitude has changed in a very obvious way. Now, most of the time, his brother is the one misbehaving. Matthieu now also begins to understand that we are not addressing him when scolding his brother (phew!). Hopefully, he has a good chance to start school in September.
Translation: Aurélie
