OK, this is all very useful. I love our pediatric practice, but as they are part of the same children's hospital as the dev peds they always just refer us to them. Which is at least a 6 week wait, and that's if we claim it's an emergency. And they are the same ones who refuse to reevaluate. They did give him the TS diagnosis, pretty much based off of their observations, my reports, and the fact that his father has tics and his father's brother has TS. They did not even want to make the diagnosis official, but I asked them to in case it might help us get services for it specifically. They are entirely unconcerned about the tics (even though ds had some that were causing him pain and one where he was smacking his forehead frequently) and when I asked about a neurologist they said they didn't think it was necessary. They definitely have neurologists though. And yes, they accept our insurance. I trust your expert opinion here and if you think that the medical route is the way to go I will just go ahead and bug the pedi to refer us to a neurologist (leaving the dev peds out of the loop) and see where we can get from there. I guess this whole angle never really occurred to me.
Of course today at the library DS grabbed a Cork and Fuzz book (not high literature, I know) and read right through it without stopping more than 3 or 4 times. He still omitted a lot of words and skipped some lines, but he read smoothly and expressively, more like he used to. It was entirely quiet at the time, the library had just opened and we were the only ones there. DS also found a hiding spot to read in, no idea why, but we had to stay in the hiding spot the whole time. The book took maybe 10 minutes, whereas at home it would have taken half an hour. DS is an only child and my house is very quiet, so I don't think there are any distractions here. I've decided to do his school work at the library once a week to get him used to working in an environment a little more similar to school, other kids, some distractions, larger room, etc. Today we just read the book as I forgot a pencil
He did complain at one point when I was talking to him that he couldn't hear me because someone was singing. I hadn't even noticed until he pointed it out and it was rather far away and faint. That problem isn't going to help him out much at school either, but he has come a really long way in actually telling us what is going on in his head and that is very helpful. This is part of the reason I advocated for written instructions when he was with the IU. Of course they never actually tried written instructions because they didn't believe he could actually, really read. They also insisted loud noises didn't seem to bother him, so there was no problem with sensory processing... well, loud noises don't bother him, he just can't seem hear like others can if there is more than one sound to attend to.
I'm not sure if there is a name for that problem, but if so I would love to know what it might be to help with advocacy. I feel pretty confident that the gifted school will be just fine with the idea of written instructions. I'm still shocked DS got in. Apparently he was amazing at his interview and they just loved him. I'm still wondering if they got him confused with another kid or something, lol. DS is extremely talkative and friendly, but he's also constantly moving and into things. They ended the interview when he got on the table and was jumping on the math worksheet they gave him. I thought for sure he wouldn't get in! He must have been amazing up until that point.
Thanks so much for everything, I will definitely call the pedi tomorrow and push for seeing a neurologist. And I'll update after our reevaluation on Monday. Have a great weekend everyone
