It is the end of the academic year. Strictly speaking Moglets number 3 and 4 finished a good while ago. They have been arguing themselves into a blue fit for the best part of two weeks now, so you could say that the summer holidays in this house are a bit tired before they have even begun! But, as of 1.30pm today, Moglets 1 and 2 join the fray when they break up for summer. Truly then the fun begins, in every sense of the word.
I am struggling to believe that we have reached the end of Moglet number 2's first year at Secondary School. This time last year we were looking forward with equal measures of hope, excitement, fear and trepidation. We were on the brink of the next big adventure, the adventure that was Secondary School. On paper we were all ready, uniform in place, transition days had gone well, our meetings with the SENCo had given us warm and comforting feelings. And yet no amount of paperwork, of phone call, IEP'S and support plans were going to still that nagging feeling that all SEN parents have about this great big move. There was still that persistent and devilish voice banging away in my ear in the wee small hours asking all those real, silly and unanswerable questions. "Will he be OK? " " Is this the right place?" " Do the teachers really get it?" "What happens if this, that or the other happens?"
Luckily for us Moglet number 2 was, and still is blessed with a true pioneering spirit and dyspraxia or not he was more than ready to embrace the challenge of Secondary school. He threw himself into it whole heartedly. By the end of the second week, every lunchtime and some after school slots were taken up with various activities and clubs. There was an ever widening and changing circle of friends. Instead of dipping his toe in this great new pool of discovery Moglet number 2 was dive bombing it! I watched with a mixture of awe and relief, at his energy and enthusiasm, tinged with an edge of appreciation for any problems that might be on the horizon.
By half term my mummy radar was starting to quietly beep. Moglet number 2 was pretty exhausted and some of the clubs had naturally fallen by the wayside, much to my relief. I was hoping now that things would calm down a little and we could start to look at some of the issues that I thought were beginning to creep in, our old buddies; organisation and sleep, to name a couple.
But then life threw us a couple of gigantic curve balls and everything took a slightly different direction. Firstly I was told that I needed major surgery. It wasn't unexpected but neither was it welcome. We shoehorned the surgery into a time frame when Moglet Daddy wasn't travelling and we set about making plans to keep our family of six on track. Operation Coping was put in place.
Here comes the second curve ball. Enter 'The Cough'. To cut a long story short Moglet number 1 started coughing on the night of Halloween and he didn't stop until about two weeks into the New Year. It was unlike any cough I had ever heard before. Try to imagine Darth Vadar with a serious 60 a day habit and you are about halfway there. Antibiotics, steroids, x-rays, and even hospitalisation got us no near to a solution. Finally Whooping Cough was diagnosed, but not before he had coughed his way through every day and night, finally falling asleep at approximately 3am every morning. It was horrendous for him and certainly not the way we had envisaged my recovery from surgery. In all he missed 7 weeks of school and Operation Coping quickly became reclassified as Operation Survival.
So, not for the first time in our family lives, the emphasis from Moglet number 2 and his needs had shifted. We were all busy just surviving and Moglet Number 2 was moving forward in what seemed to be a perfectly happy way. I was more than grateful.
That bubble of gratitude burst and was replaced yet again by guilt, not long before Christmas when I opened a letter giving us Moglet number 2's Year 7 assessment results and his subsequent academic sets for the following term. Even in my sore and sleep deprived state I could immediately see that we had a problem. Neither results or sets in anyway reflected Moglet number 2's ability or previous levels of achievement. My Mummy radar was now beeping off the scale. One desperate phone call to Moglet Daddy, followed rapidly by one to school to set up at meeting and we were back to the business of making sure that everyone was aware of and were addressing his needs.
The thing is, even as I write this, I am aware that it is difficult to be clear about those needs in a logical and linear way. I am continually learning, and then relearning, that Dyspraxia and it's effects are anything but logical and linear. If I had to list Moglet number 2's main difficulties they would be as follows.
A) Tiredness
B) Organisation
C) Homework - completing it, recording it, remembering it...
D) Motor planning and Co-ordination
E) Sensory processing difficulties.
This list is by no means extensive and exhaustive but it does get to the heart of the problems. The issue is that they are so interdependent that they often become a web so tangled that they are impossible to separate, let alone try and convey to someone else.
And so began our real journey into secondary school life. We were lucky. As soon as I raised my concerns Learning Support and the Head of Year were on it like hawks. But we all knew and still know that there are no quick fixes. It speaks volumes that even today on the last day of term I have been in to school to sign off on the latest Ed Psych. referral, which will hopefully take into account how Moglet number 2's situation has changed and therefore the support he receives needs to change accordingly. Every child has ever changing needs, but with a child with a specific learning difficulty this is so vital to address.
The most difficult part of this year was bang in the middle. The pace of school life began to crank up and the honeymoon settling in period was a thing of the past. Moglet Number 2 was suddenly aware that he was in lower sets than he had even been in before and he was struggling to organise himself to deal with demands of the school day. He would fall through the door, white with exhaustion, unwilling to engage with any talk of what was happening at school. Socially things were ok, but academically were were in danger of grinding to a halt. Being so over tired mean that he was having chronic trouble falling asleep, setting up a very nasty and vicious, in every sense of the word, cycle. His sensory processing issues kicked in like never before. A marker of our problems was the fact that around March we had to abandon the duvet cover, because it was ' burning his skin' and it has not made a reappearance yet!!
Suddenly this label of dyspraxia that we had fought so hard for was, before my very eyes, eroding the self esteem and confidence of my son. Homework became a battle ground. Quite apart from the issues with not writing it down, or not having half the required resources, he was defeated before he even started. He was determined that he couldn't do it. He began to talk in negative terms about his dyspraxia, something which had never happened before. He swung wildly between shunning it completely and refusing to access support that was offered, to using it as a catch all excuse for any issue or behaviour that arose. Between us and working together, school and home had to come up with some kind of plan to pull him out of this pit of negativity. To show him that hard as it sounded, his dyspraxia was for life, but that didn't mean it was the end of his hopes and dreams. That just because life was taking him down a different and maybe more meandering path, it didn't have to be any less exciting, fulfilling or interesting.
Cue huge input from school. One to one tutorials, nuture group sessions, additional IT support, new referrals, reassessment by OT. And cue THE BLOG!!!
The Blog was my attempt to show to Moglet number 2 that the world of neurodiversity was made up of some fantastic and fascinating individuals and that he wasn't the only one dealing with its challenges. It was a spur of the moment decision after a really trying day; there were lots of those around that time! It was also a huge gamble! I was putting my family out there and hoping it was for all the right reasons.
It was a gamble that paid off. We are now three months into the blog. Twenty two posts later I am sitting here still in slight disbelief about what a boost our little blog has given my Moglet number 2.
Being a technology savvy kind of boy, it was the numbers game of social media that first grabbed his attention. The more 'likes', 'follows' and 'shares' we received the more his interest grew. Over the first few days he made more and more frequent, if discrete, enquires about the number of visitors and page views. But if the numbers hooked him then it was words that reeled him in. The day we received a message from a family in New Zealand, telling us about the journey of their wonderful, talented and dyspraxic teenager who was learning to drive (!!) , we turned a corner. This communication to my petrol head Moglet was like manna from heaven. Suddenly the future was bigger, brighter and it was car shaped! He started to believe that this label didn't have to hold him back.
The proof of his new found optimism came in one of the last meetings with learning support this year. He announced to the meeting that he wanted to do 'something' at school to mark Dyspraxia Awareness Week in the autumn term. Suddenly the boy who just months before was trying to cram his dyspraxia into a box and sit on it now wanted to wear it like a badge.
So I say to anyone who has visited, liked, shared, followed, commented or tweeted our blog, thank you. The turn around in the way my son now views a very important part of himself is down in no small part to you. Slowly he is starting to realise that this label might not be the millstone he believed it was, but may even be a gift that allows him to see the world in different way. But what ever role dyspraxia has to play in Moglet number 2's life it won't stop him doing what he wants to do. He is in control, not dyspraxia.
Thank you one and all.
5 Comments
Very emotive post here. I'm so pleased to hear that things are getting better for your son. Finding out you have a disability is a double edged sword and probably more so at that age when you're forming your identity but I feel just knowing about the condition at this fairly early stage will really help him flourish. I found out I was dyspraxic 3 years ago at the age of 30 (had suspicions before then and technically don't have a diagnosis even now as it's very difficult to get one as an adult)
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Herding Moggies
7/17/2015 09:48:49 pm
Thanks for getting in touch Cat. In the long term having the 'label' and the power of the knowledge it brings with it will be overwhelmingly positive. But, yes, getting a teenager to see that has some pretty big challenges of it's own! However we are in a good place right at this moment in time. Long may it continue!
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Lu
7/19/2015 06:03:53 am
I have 2 boys aged 5 & 7 with Dyspraxia, and love reading your blog. I also have a husband with dyspraxia who is hugely successful in his career, he spends around 60 million a year of his companies money. So I know it's just a case of finding the right thing and I am sure number will bloom!
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Herding moggies
7/19/2015 06:32:22 am
Love it when people comment! Thanks Lu! Great inspiration for the future. Though to be fair Moglet # 2 is already pretty amazing at spending money! Hope you keep coming back x
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Georgina Paterson
8/21/2019 06:58:34 am
Moglet mumma!
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CategoriesRachelI am a Mum of four fantastic children (or Moglets), one of whom just happens to have Dyspraxia. ArchivesP.s The RSS Feed button is the FOLLOW button!!! In case you are technically challenged like me!! Or follow us on Twitter: @rmc19
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