It's the Last of the Tests...I think.

Today Eden had her medical evaluation today. She got to see a real Doctor, and have a real test, and we will have a real answer. The outcome of this test, with the reports from the other evaluations, some questions answered from the preschool should give her enough information to give us some sort of diagnosis. Unlike physical medical issues, Autism or Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) can not be diagnosed with a blood test, x-ray, or any physical test. It is a disorder that effects the social development of the child, and the symptoms range in severity and every person or child usually has different symptoms. That's why this is such a long process.

I'm not sure what the test results will say. I really don't understand what this particular test is supposed to show. I do know that the Doctor told me that this test takes her inability to speak out of the equation, so they are just looking at her social development. They had her do some "free play" they noticed she only played with the toys that had hinges ( a toy cell phone that opened up, and a toy that pops up when you pressed a button). She did manage to take all the toys that were on the floor and picked them up.

The Doctor played a bunch of games with her, every once in a while she would say Eden's name and it was apparent that she had to make an effort to try and get her to answer. I counted more than 3 times it took her 3 times calling her name or more to get acknowledgement. I'm not sure about some of the tests and what they were looking for like playing with a balloon, blowing it up and letting it fly; bubble blowing, and snack eating (I think that the snacks were to see how well she does with routine things). She did repeat things the Doctor said and did some 1 work responses with a few "phrases" like thank you, gotcha, what's that; and they were appropriately said was a good thing.

They did do a pretend play activity, playing a birthday party with a baby. Eden had to make a cake with play dough (she didn't do but she put it on the plate), putting candles on the cake (she did pretty well, but taking them out she had to fix the holes), singing Happy Birthday (she didn't do), feeding the baby (it took some prompting but she did it), giving the baby juice and pretend spilling (she didn't know what to do, but she does help clean up spills at home). At the end, she did put the baby to bed and that was so cute.

Eden while playing with the baby spontaneously looked outside and said "raining!" and then "cold!" I was secretly so happy, it usually isn't something normal for her to just comment on things like that unless she is outside. She did so well after too. She let the Doctor do a small physical on her. Eden wanted to copy everything the Doctor did and even used her stethoscope! Overall, I was happy with Eden. She had a difficult weekend (the only good day was surprisingly Saturday when we had a BBQ outside).

We will have a meeting with just the Doctor, Ed and I on Tuesday and will discuss her findings. After our meeting, the following week we will have a meeting with CDS, Dr. Rock, the OT evaluator (maybe), and maybe one of the preschool teachers. At the second meeting, we will discuss a plan for Eden including the possibility of OT and summer school sessions. It's going to be very interesting. Here's hoping we at least get some answers next week. Then it's going to be a new chapter; for good or bad? We'll see!