ready for the weekend!

a gorgeous day today for a michigan spring...sunny and 80 - PERFECT! Arianna had a great day with her friends at daycare and at school. teacher conferences are next week and looking forward to meeting with her teacher to hear how she's been coming along at school. My proud "mom moment" was some of her math homework sent home yesterday where she wrote the answers, numbers, by HERSELF without help. It may seem small to most but HUGE for her/us! Every improvement, every sign of improving her thought process and fine motor skills is a blessing.

Back to 2005...once I finally convinced Arianna's pediatrician, well maybe more like I DEMANDED, we were referred to a pediatric neurologist. Trying to get an appointment was like waiting to win the lotto! The first available appointment wasn't for 2 months and the wait seemed like a year. During that time I watched my beautiful baby continue down the crazy spiral more and more into her own little world not wanting to be near me, or grandma, or anyone less and less. Mind you, i was also in the recovery process from my brain injury and had my own speech therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, chiropractor, psychologists etc... i became depressed more and more and Arianna became disconnected from this world at the same rate.

Finally at the neurologists office, it was recommended to do an EMG to measure brain waves to be sure Arianna wasn't having seizures. I couldnt fully understand the "whys" back then but we did the test. Tons of wires all stuck on my little girls head for what seemed eternity was NOT a fun visit. That experience also caused her to have a horrible fear of doing anything with her hair which lasted for over a year and still to this day she is hesitant with hair washing, brushing etc... Test results were negative - no seizures. Next step was a referral to Macomb Co. Intermediate School for a full evaluation. Knowing that MISD works with children of developmental delays, this next step of discovery to come accelerated my depression and feelings of failure as a parent. "What did I do to my baby?" was the question in my mind from then on.

Evaluations were completed at MISD in speech, motor skills, psych. evaluation and hearing tests - FIVE hearing tests to be exact because they were certain she was deaf. After waiting a week or two for the next meeting, my memory of that last visit with the psychologist getting their 'diagnosis' of what was wrong with my daughter was the most devastating thing a parent could think to hear......." Arianna is moderately, mentally impaired." How on earth could my normal child BECOME mentally impaired??? The sentence to follow was also a huge blow...." Arianna will never be normal, will always be in special education and will possibly never speak or do things that other typical children do."

That was the day that I wanted to leave this world. I went home, drank heavily and told my mom (who cared for me AND Arianna during my own recovery) that "I wanted to go away (aka DIE) because I was a failure as a mother and that Arianna deserved someone better than me." It took my psychologist an emergency visit to our home, lots and lots of her listening to me and helping me cry and a close visit to the psych ward to give me a glimpse of hope to NOT give up....that I HAD to be here for Arianna and find a way to help her.