"What Did You Do To Him???"

Those were the words spoken to me on Dylan's second day of camp.  They were spoken by one of the camp counselors at after care.  She has been going on and on about how much his behavior has improved, how well he listens, doesn't run off, how verbal he's become (and understandable).  What did we do?!?!

By the way - our first conversation, she realized that by saying how wonderful he's doing and how much he's improved, that he was a bit of a challenge (to put it mildly) he was last year and tried a bit to back peddle.  It was okay, we've noticed lately too how much he's grown.  Not just physically but emotionally and behaviorally. 

Let's be honest - it's a year.  The year between 5 and 6 is HUGE.  Lots of room for growth and maturation in even a neurotypical child.  But let's also consider how hard Dylan has worked this past year....

He's received...

Speech at school 3x a week.  2 one-on-one and 1 small group half hour sessions plus the speech work the therapist does with the entire classroom.

Private speech - 30 minutes on Saturday.

OT at school 3x a week (sometimes more depending on need).  2 one-on-one and 1 small group half hour sessions plus additional work in the clasroom.  He needs so much OT that he'll even brush himself when he feels the need (self care has been a huge leap this year).

Behavioral therapy every other week not just for him but for us as a family.

Hippotherapy (a/k/a therapeutic riding) 1x a week for 30 minutes.  He loves this!  It's OT, PT and speech all rolled into one with some behavioral thrown in (when he is misbehaving a quick "what would Biscuit think!" usually snaps him back into reality).

Lego Learners 1x a week.  Social skills program which works on fine and gross motor.

Educational tutoring 2-3x a week. 

Now that I've written all that out, I realize that I would be more surprised if he hadn't blossemed over the past year.  He has worked his adorable little tush off.  We are so very proud of him. 

Now he's enjoying camp.  He spends his day with friends, swimming at least 2x a day, playing Gaga, soccer, hockey, basketball, doing arts & crafts, cooking, sledding (man made hill, they run water down it and the kids fly down on inner tubes), biking, nature, boating on the lake.  OMG I wanna go to camp in the worse way!