Outcome of Psychiatrist Appointment

We met with the Child Psychiatrist this morning to discuss options for medication for Brycen to help with his stimming, aggression, and obsessive behavior. It's been awhile since I've had someone ask so many questions about Brycen and his everyday behavior! Since so much of this behavior has been going on for a couple years, I find myself just going about my day around it. I don't think I even notice some things that he does until I am directly asked about it. I'm guessing this is part of that "acceptance" piece of the puzzle where we just have accepted that he has these "quirks" and we just go on as it's so normal to us now.
Anyway, she briefed us on the 3 different classifications of meds that treat 3 clusters of behaviors. After our discussion of his behavior, she concluded that she would like to treat the cluster of repetitive/anxiety behavior first. The other two clusters are aggression and Attention Disorders. While some medications help with all 3 or two of the clusters, some are very specific to a certain behavior and of course have a lot more side effects, especially with a child so young.
The decision was to start him on 4mg of Fluoxetine (Prozac) every morning. If side effects happen, she said it will be seen within the 6 hours after giving him the dose hence the reason we want him awake to spot the side effects. The main side effects that could happen but typically go away after a few days are headaches, stomach aches, etc. Since many studies have shown that people with Autism react very differently to some medications, she said if he becomes more irritable and anxious than he already is, then we will need to try something else. We are starting at a very low dose of course and there is room to go up if needed. He will continue to take the Children's Benadryl and Melatonin at night to help with sleep.
Tomorrow will be our first dose so I'll make sure to keep everybody updated on how these next few days are. Watching for side effects will be interesting as he doesn't really seem to feel most pain and of course has no way to tell us if he is feeling differently.

P.S. On another note...Brycen's trial Alt Chat device should be getting here next week!!! Once we try it out for a few weeks and send it back, we can start the process to order his own!

Brycen is now "identified"!

The medical ID bracelet came in the mail today! When I asked Brycen if he wanted to try on his new bracelet, he immediately put his arm out...yay!! He kept it on, admired it, tugged at it a little, and then soon forgot about it. He's been wearing it for a few hours now and it's only come off once, and I think it was not on purpose but that he accidentally pushed on the part of the buckle that releases it and it just fell off. He willingly let me put it back on which is very, very good! It doesn't hurt that I chose to get a sports band that has a train on it...with two back-up bands that have soccer balls and various trucks/cars.

I am so excited about his response as we were really unsure how he would feel with something on his arm. Here's a couple pictures of him wearing his new bracelet! So happy we have made this next step into making sure he is safe.

Communication and Therapy Updates

Brycen has been doing a great job of communicating more through his actions for what he wants! A good example today is that he wanted to watch a video during rest time and I got busy in the kitchen and forgot to start it for him after laying his sister down. In the past, he would get upset and just yell until I figured out what was wrong. Today, he nicely brought the DVD remote to me in the kitchen and when I asked him if he wanted to start his video, he said "sss" (his approximation for yes) right away and ran back into the living room! I was so proud of him and he was so smart with bringing me the remote to tell me what he wanted.
We've also noticed more signing during his therapy and at home, as well as increased sounds when he is trying to imitate a word. The speech therapist has noticed he is attempting to sign "help" while also saying "ep" and wanted me to check with the speech therapist at the school to see if they have been working more on this. He is so much more consistent with this than he was several months ago!
During Occupational Therapy, they have been attempting some very basic music therapy through head phones. He refused to wear the headphones before this and would typically throw them down. They decided to use his favorite toy in the room to help with this which is a mechanical Cookie Monster that opens it's mouth for Brycen to put a cookie in and then he closes it and says stuff like "yum, yum. Me like cookie." Brycen LOVES this! The speech therapist uses this toy to get him to ask for more cookies to feed Cookie Monster...and now they are using Cookie Monster to demonstrate to Brycen how to wear the head phones.
On the 3rd session of doing this earlier this week, Brycen grabbed the headphones off of Cookie's head and put them right onto his with no prompts!! Then they would take turns the rest of the time and it got to the point that Brycen wore the headphones for about 30-45 seconds! That is huge progress for him...and he didn't even seem to mind the music that was playing through them. I'm not quite sure what this music is supposed to do but I think it's supposed to help with desensitizing his ears since he is afraid of loud noises like alarms, hair dryers, and vacuum cleaners.
Anyway, that pretty much summarizes what we have been noticing the last few weeks with Brycen. Slow but steady wins the race!!!

Safety with Brycen

As I've shared before, I think Brycen is at risk for wandering away from us in the future. Right now he is very hesitant about his surroundings and tends to stay near us, but I know that day will come when he sees something he likes and will take off for it...maybe even without us knowing.
After talking to his Case Manager in October about Brycen's lack of awareness of safety issues and such, we decided on a safety goal for this year that will work on Brycen learning how to be safe in the community. This goal included us ordering a Medical ID bracelet for him and helping him get used to wearing it every day...just in case.
As I was googling these bracelets, I found some awesome sports bands that look very similar to a fun watch but just has a metal plate with the information on it instead of the clock. What was even better is I found one with trains on it! I know how Brycen is with wearing anything extra on his body so I had to find a way to make this appealing to him and we know anything train gets him very excited! I also ordered back-up bands with trucks and another soccer ball one in case he breaks the first one or just to change it up a little once in awhile. The metal plate just slides off of the train band and then onto the back-ups as needed.
I feel like we have made some fabulous strides these last few months in Brycen's care and needs. We are advancing towards looking into the future and keeping our heads held high as we fight this battle and help him as best as we can!