PDD/NOS

My 7 year old son is a 1st grader and was recently given this diagnosis. The doctor said has she seen him earlier she would have labeled him autistic. I've known all along that he fell somewhere in the spectrum. He started speech therapy at age 2. It was his speech therapist that noticed his sensory integration dysfunction. His only diagnosis until recently was communication disorder because that qualified him for the services he needed until now. He has made a lot of progress in therapy. Two months ago we started him on Zoloft 25 mg for his anxiety. He is just out of sync with his body. He still has great difficulty putting on his socks and with other fine motor skills. For the longest time I just did things for him because it was easier. It is so hard to see him struggle so much over things I take for granted! The medicine has helped a little with the anxiety. My current frustration is with his school. I was so pleased that he did so well in preschool that they decided he could attend a "regular" kindergarten class. I could tell that he was starting to struggle half way through the year. The teacher assured me he was doing fine and only needed the speech therapy. So at the beginning of first grade this year I expressed my concern with his teacher. I told her that I wanted to let him try to stay in a regular classroom, but was afraid to wait too long because I know it can take forever to get back into special ed. And now that is exactly what has happened! He is falling further and further behind in school and is even having discipline problems. He has never been a discipline problem at school!!! In my state they have 60 days to evaluate him. I went in to sign the authorization for testing and was told there were 11 kids in front of him! Does anyone have any suggestions for what I can do to help him until he is tested? He is having trouble with phonics and is a non reader. He does better with whole word recognition(sp?) He is also struggling with math. My son has a half brother by his dad. He is 12 and has ADD/OCD/ and ODD. He was also tested as mildly mentally handicapped. For awhile I was hoping that my son was going to be better off because we got him help sooner and he was responding better with therapy, but now I am really worried. I am worried that my son could have the same difficulties that his brother has. His brother is a sweet kid and it breaks my heart to see him struggle. Stephanie

My son was diagnosed with PDD/NOS just because the doc didn't want to say the word "autistic". However, here in CA I needed him to be labeled with it in order to get him services. I had him reevaluated at 4 and got him pre-school therapy and by the time he went to K his speech was "normal". He's very bright and high-functioning. He also has OCD tendancies and was on Prozac for 2 years, however, now he's 13 and doesn't need it anymore. He is mainstreamed and we couldn't be happier w/his progress. Socially he struggles but has a few friends and seems happy with that. I worry about high-school but we can handle whatever comes up. The only suggestion I can make is would you bel willing to homeschool him? I did that in 1st grade w/my son and he THRIVED-he and I worked well together. I picked a curriculum w/lots of repetition (his FAV!) and he learned to read, write (cursive!) and math fact families. The following year we put him back in school and he's done great ever since. I don't know if any of this helps or not. I'll keep you in my prayers. Beth W.

This is what I went through also. Kim

PDD NOS is a non dx really. A kind way of saying your kid is pretty autistic like but you know, we can't pin him down into a neat category so here ya go, here's PDD NOS. It puts you in a predicament for services. Ultimately it would be helpful to have someone offically call him high functioning autism. He'll qualify then for needed services. ~KD in WA