Katelyn's Evaluation...

Finally, we have an answer -- well, at least a partial answer to the main question that I was so desperately needing to hear.

Katelyn has autism. My daughter has autism. Finally I know, and I can breathe.

After months of worrying that the doctor would not see the signs that I knew in my heart were there, the doctor reassured me that she is indeed on the spectrum. Upon hearing this news, I thanked the doctor over and over, and I told her that she didn't even know how much weight she had just taken off of my shoulders. I know it must sound strange to think that a mother would be relieved, even happy, to hear that her daughter has autism, but when you have known in your heart and your gut since your child was a newborn that something was different with her, all you want is validation for those feelings, along with knowing that your child will now receive special services to help her be as successful as she can be throughout her life.

I am not one to cry about anything, even devastating news, but I cried the entire ride home. I was so overwhelmed with the relief of hearing the answer disclosed, even though I had known 100% all along that it was true. Hearing those words, "Katelyn definitely is on the spectrum," took away all of the heartache and worry that I had been holding onto for months, fearing that they wouldn't see what I knew, fearing that she wouldn't get the help that she needs.

We will receive her official detailed diagnosis on January 12th, which will outline exactly where she falls on the autism spectrum, and what specific services she will need.

Now, the journey truly begins.

Katelyn's Video...

As I mentioned before, when my hard drive crashed, I lost the video that I was compiling for her evaluation. However, I did have the previously posted videos, plus some new footage that I captured over the weekend. Although I feel that some of the lost footage was more telling, I do believe that this video demonstrates a lot of her autistic tendencies. It was over 2 hours of footage total, but I managed to condense it to 28 minutes (and I stayed up until almost 4am on Saturday night to finish it).

Since I was so pressed for time and completely emotionally and physically exhausted, I'm not completely satisfied with the outcome (for those of you who know me personally, you know I am quite a perfectionist, lol). I would have liked to have edited a lot more, but overall, I think it captured some good footage of Katelyn.

Completely Fried...

My computer, that is.

My hard drive completely fried today out of nowhere. I was in the middle of typing an email and everything froze, and the only way to reboot was to push the button on the tower. When it tried to restart, it said, "Missing Operating System" -- well, after hours and hours and hours on end of trying everything possible to fix it, we realized that we can't even reinstall the operating system...we have to buy a new hard drive.

Now, luckily I have an online backup program called Carbonite (highly recommend this...it has saved me twice now from losing everything) so almost everything is recoverable. However, I had uploaded a ton of video clips of Katelyn and was working on making the movie to bring to her evaluation on Monday. I was almost done and that is when the computer crashed. I hadn't even had a chance to back up the movies, and unfortunately, they are all deleted off the camera. I am SO upset that the videos are gone forever. I finally had captured some awesome evidence for her evaluation that she NEVER does outside the home and rarely does it when we are around (because we usually redirect her).

I guess it isn't the end of the world, but making that video was one of the things that I've been focusing on all week to relieve my anxiety that they won't diagnose her. I felt so confident being armed with the videos and now they are gone. Not to mention, I have to spend every waking moment now trying to reinstall everything on my desktop once Kevin buys the new hard drive tomorrow (gee, the malls shouldn't be too crowded the last weekend before Christmas, lol).

Merry Christmas to me! :)

An Oldie But Goodie Movie...

Well, not too old. This is from October 2008, right after we first started to suspect autism.

Another Katelyn Movie...

Here is another video of Katelyn, taken this evening. I am realizing now that she is not showing her "true colors" on the videos either, lol. She seems to be toning it down once the camera is on. Oh, well. I'll keep at it :)

Bad Day at the Office...

Yesterday was Ashey's 6-month doctor visit. I didn't expect there to be a problem since the appointment was for Ashley and not for Katelyn. Boy, was I wrong!

Katelyn started out okay for the first few minutes, but then she saw a man sitting in the waiting room and said, "Hi Dada." He laughed and I explained that she calls all men "Dada." Well, then she proceeds to run to him saying, "Dada!!!!!" I go get her before she leaps on him and at first she is laughing. Then she goes into a fit of RAGE! She started screaming at the top of her lungs -- I thought the windows were going to crack! She was flailing, kicking, punching, screaming "Dada!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" and she even resorted to biting and clawing me. I was holding both of her arms so tight and she was fighting me, which was so hard. She kept screaming for Dada, but I was trying to explain to her that it wasn't Dada. He didn't even look like him! The man felt awful.

This went on for over a half hour, with the entire waiting room just looking in disbelief. I almost lost my mind. I told myself I had to keep calm because if I lost it in public, it would do no good for anyone. Finally, they called Ashley's name. I was about to go to the window and see if they would please take her sooner since Katelyn was having the worse meltdown she EVER had, and in public.

It felt awful to have her go through this, and it was certainly embarrassing to me since it happened in public, although at the time I tried really hard to ignore all of the stares. The worst part of all was that I realized that this was only the beginning -- there will most likely be MANY more days like this, and many more stares to ignore. That makes me so sad, not for me, but for Katelyn. Hopefully once she gets her diagnosis, we can proceed with therapies to help her (and me) in these situations.

Needless to say, I will never take the 2 girls to the doctor's office by myself again :)

Katelyn, the Movie Star...

Katelyn's evaluation is coming up soon and I decided to take some videos of her to bring with us in case she doesn't show her "true colors" at the evaluation. She definitely shows more of her stims, etc., at home, which is why some friends and family members who do not see her in her home environment do not understand that she is most likely on the autism spectrum. This is also why it was difficult for us, her parents, to even suspect anything until we really started looking.

I feel that these two videos capture some of her symptoms (certainly not all, by any means) and I am hoping that it will be enough to demonstrate that she is on the spectrum. Some of the things that you will notice on the videos are perseverations, stims, and strange head, eye and body movements. The first video is 8 minutes and the second is 10 minutes.

O' Christmas Tree, O' Christmas Tree...

This is the first year that Katelyn is old enough to really appreciate Christmas...well, maybe not the true meaning of Christmas, but at least the "ites" and the "green tee" (translation: lights and green tree). She was super excited when Dada came through the front door with a giant tree. She couldn't believe it was going to be in our house! She didn't leave Dada's side until it was completely finished, clapping and cheering him on. And she even helped decorate! Unfortunately, we had some icicle casualties, but that's okay. She had fun in the process :)

Katelyn hanging an icicle...

Katelyn spotting an ornament with a giraffe on it...

The finished product, complete with crooked angel and ornament-free bottom...

Ashley supervised and gave her smile of approval, dimple and all...

It's a Date!!!

Yay! We finally have a date for Katelyn's autism evaluation. She will be evaluated on Monday, December 22nd, at 9am and it will take approximately 3-4 hours. We also have her feedback appointment scheduled for Monday, January 12th, at noon, which also happens to be Kevin's birthday - Happy Birthday, here is your daughter's diagnosis.

I feel some relief that we will have an answer soon and that Katelyn can start to receive help as soon as possible.