My son did the arts festival performance yesterday and it went very well even thought they only did 2 rehearsals, a few of the kids were absent at each of the rehearsals, and he had to learn a new dance routine that required jumping onto an older kid's back at just the right time without falling off, while smiling and singing, of course, and he only got to practice this twice at the first rehearsal. He also had to climb onto another kid's back when they formed a human pyramid. These are challenging for my child with motor dyspraxia and hypotonia but he did it. There was another dance move and I don't know what it is called but the girl had to jump onto her partner's side and the boy has to support her for a few seconds. My son's dance partner had faked this part during rehearsals because she was afraid she would knock him down but at the show she actually jumped and he supported her without falling or looking like this was difficult for him. Maybe the OT is helping a little already. But he still needed help with costume changes. At one of the rehearsals he was in a hurry because he just had about thirty seconds before he had to go back on stage and he said "which foot does this shoe go on?" and I know people are surprised when they hear him say something like this because he seems so very intelligent. He does not have a problem with dressing when he has plenty of time. He just can't compensate for his disability when he is rushed.
When he asked me to help him with his shoe, I am not proud of this, but I looked at him and with an irritated tone of voice said "What is wrong with you--it goes on that foot." Even I was guilty of thinking he was being lazy but I looked this up at home and found other people--even another adult with motor dyspraxia--that had this same difficulty.
His sister who lives in another state was able to come and watch the show and he was very happy about this and I heard people saying good things about their performance and these were people just walking around the arts festival who stopped to watch. My son kept saying that it just relatives of the kids in the group who thought they were good and he liked hearing that non-relatives also enjoyed it.
We got to watch the dance group that performed before them and they were really good. I wish I could talk my son into taking a Hip Hop dance class because I think it looks fun, but my son doesn't want to do it and his musical theater friends said they just can't see him doing that kind of dance. It looks like such good exercise though. I am thinking of buying a learn to dance video so that we can both try this at home without anyone seeing us.
We found an online message board where he can talk to teens with dyspraxia. Some of them sound like they are similar to my son--very intelligent but with motor difficulties that are worse on some days then others and having to deal with people who don't understand. He was very happy to be able to connect with other kids like him--even though they are in another country. It is so nice to find other people who understand his difficulties.
