I'm sending a huge cyber hug your way - raising a child with a challenge such as Dyspraxia can be stressful and frustrating at times.
My random thoughts/suggestions:
First and foremost, listen to advice from strangers (and non-strangers), take what is offered up as coming from a caring place, if something makes sense and clicks, try it out, otherwise just toss it. Don't dwell on it. The hallmark of dyspraxia is that it impacts is a disorder that can impact many different functions and therefore impacts each individual differently. Having never met the person that the salesperson was talking about, you have absolutely no idea to what degree and how the child is impacted by dyspraxia.
Not sure if it's the same thing, but my children were taught how to grip a pencil using a compass concept. I can't remember the exact instructions, but they laid the pencil on the table facing north and then picked it up and flipped it around somewhere and that landed the pencil in the correct tripod grip position. It worked great for my n on-dyspraxic dd who had vision issues, but my dyspraxic ds only developed a correct pencil grip through 8 months of handwriting OT.
There was a specific type of grip as well as a thick triangular shaped pencil that my ds preferred when he was younger. Now that he's a teen he prefers mechanical pencils - when writing. *However* (and this is a huge however), our ds is dysgraphic, and our ds' neuropsych felt he would never be able to depend on handwriting, and recommended he move to keyboarding and scribing right away (at 8). We've structured his keyboarding etc in a way that he moved away from scribing as quickly as possible (to promote independence) - but the key for our ds was to take away the demands of handwriting. We made sure he has the functional ability to sign his name and write a brief note, and he uses handwriting at school for short-answer questions (as in phrases, or one or two word fill-in-the-blanks), but that's it.
Re the issue with using a fork etc - is it possible for you to request a one-session or 2-3 session appointment with an OT to address very fundamental issues such as this? I think it's easy to get suggestions online, but not so easy to get meaningful suggestions without having an OT or PT actually see a child in person to get an understanding of what they are and aren't capable of in terms of motor function.
My husband had the same problems. He is not now nor will he ever be truly okay.
My personal speculation (and it's nothing more than that) is that dyspraxia, along with dyslexia and dysgraphia, has a genetic connection. My dh's family includes adults and children with all three diagnoses. I do wonder though, what is meant by "he is not now nor will he ever be truly okay." Dyspraxia is for life, that's for certain. It won't go away. My ds is struggling with it as a teen, yet he's not struggling. It's a part of who he is, and when he shares how he feels about who he is, he is adamant that he wouldn't go back and take away having dyspraxia/dysgraphia even if he was able to magically do so, because living with it has made him the unique individual that he is, and he is proud of who he is. Can he keep his room clean and organized? Nope, not yet. Can he use handwriting? No. There are a lot of things he "can't" do but he is working on the things that are important and has tossed aside the things that aren't. The important thing is there are so many things he *can* do. He is, absolutely, *OK*.
The journey is long, can be exhausting at times, and yes, it's expensive. Please know that we're here to listen to you when you need to complain about all of that!
Sending you a ton of support,
polarbear
