Eddie's Therapy: The End

As of today, Eddie is officially done with physical therapy! Julie came by for the last time today to conduct a huge test and Eddie passed with flying colors. His feet are doing a lot better, so we are just going to keep using the sample insert that Julie let us borrow for another month and if he doesn't get any worse, he will be able to be done with that, too.

The test was a little ridiculous, but they have to test him in all the developmental areas before he can be done with therapy. The test itself took over an hour. It might not have taken so long, but Eddie was woken up from his nap by the ridiculously loud rain storm we had from 1:44 to 2:00 today, so his nap was cut short, and he was a wreck. Julie tested Eddie's cognition, perception, communication (both receptive and expressive), and fine and gross motor skills.

Julie started with what we knew he could do already and then worked her way up until we found what he couldn't do yet. It was gross motor skills that put him in therapy in the first place, but now he is in the 63rd percentile! He blew us away with some of his fine motor skills. Julie brought out some big beads and a piece of string and showed him how to thread the bead on the string. She said, "This is hard. He probably can't do this." Then we watched in amazement as he concentrated really hard and got the string in the hole. I also learned that he knows how to put lids on bottles. Where he learned that, I have no idea.

The area he scored lowest on was "self care," which includes things like feeding himself with a spoon, removing his shoes without help, etc. Mostly he scored low on that category because these are things I haven't really given him the opportunity to do. So I guess we'll work on those things.

The only other thing we need to work on now is curbing Eddie's blossoming temper. Dave and I are at a loss as to where all of Eddie's rage comes from, but it has been getting worse and worse over the past weeks. I have suspected that the anger stems from his desire, but inability, to communicate his needs and wants to us. Julie confirmed my suspicions. She recommended that we try to always offer him a choice between two things that we think he might want. That way, he knows that we understand that he wants something and then we don't give him the opportunity to say "no." We'll see how that works out.

Overall, Eddie is doing great. So now we'll be focusing on communication and anger management.

Eddie likes wearing this "hat."