The team meeting results.

Jonathan gets an IEP.  Starting in second grade my son will be a SPED student.  Ugh.  Kick in the gut.

I know this is a good thing, and there is nothing wrong with getting help when you need it.  There is nothing wrong with special ed.  A lot of kids have IEP's nowadays.  I probably wouldn't feel so bad if it was Jacob or Victoria with one.  But it is Jonathan.  The kid that has overcome EVERYTHING.  The one who wasn't supposed to walk or talk.  I made all that happen.  I worked with him every single day to get him moving, to gain control of his left side.  I wanted him to develop like a normal kid.  And he did.  He and I did that together.  And now I have failed him.  Granted I know that I cannot control everything, but I could have helped him a bit more. I could have fought him more on reading, spelling, and made him sit and do it.  I could have helped him more.  And I didn't.

That being said, it seems as though Jonathan really doesn't have any issues learning the material, he is struggling with processing it.  He isn't stupid by any means.  He really isn't even slow.  Well, technically he is, but learning wise he isn't.  But his brain shuts down when he looks at a page with 25 math problems.  Give him 5 or even 10 math problems, he has no issues.  Give him 25 on a page and he cannot do it.  Give him 10 minutes to do it, forget about it.  Let him take his time, it will get done.  And he is stuck on sounding every word out, which is totally screwing him.  It is a good habit, but not for sight words.  It is good for words that you have never read before, or long words.  But there is no reason to sound out the word THE.  And he does.  Every single time.

So the good news is that he will still be learning the same information as his peers.  He will be learning the same materials at the same pace, just in smaller blocks.  I am hoping to get him caught up a bit this summer and really work on sight words and reading.  That would help him immensely to start second grade.  I have told him that we will be doing school work all summer, and he isn't so happy about that, but he does know that when he fills up his journal a new bike will be coming.  That is 50 journal entries.  He can write in it more than once a day if he wants.  He just needs 50 entries.  50 good entries.  Anyone want to guess when he will be getting his new bike?

Sometimes you just forget.

We got the packet from Jonathan's IEP evaluation today.  His meeting is on Wednesday.  I just want to cry.

Looking at him I forget sometimes how far he has come.  I forget that the boy had a severe head injury.  I forget that we were told he would never walk and talk.  I forget my son had a stroke.  How in the world can I forget?

I have to forget.  I have to forget the NICU.  I have to forget the two spinal taps they gave my baby before he was even 4 days old.  I have to forget the IV's in his head, the seizures, the medications, the tears, the screams.  I have to forget the incredible heartache of knowing that something was horribly wrong with my baby.  I have to forget the guilt of thinking it was something that I did.  I have to forget the worry of always knowing something was going to be wrong.  I have to forget the MRI image of my son's brain.  In order to move on, I have to forget.

I focus more on the good things.  Like his typical annoying 7 year old behavior.  Or that he rides a bike without training wheels (pressure from your 4 year old brother doing it does a boy good!).  The fact that my son can walk and talk is amazing.  Jonathan is amazing.

I am dumbfounded at how all that heartache can come racing back, and the tears can start to flow from a silly test score.  Just when I thought I tucked all that pain away far enough for it not to come out, it does.