A few months back, they replaced our local swirly slide with the above…and Tony’s been afraid to go down it because the decline angle comes with increased sliding speed, which is harder for him with his sensory differences. This past week, he worked up the courage and found a way that worked for him to give it a try, and he’s been happily sliding down it ever since. Photos by Ariana.
Dr. Anna De Ocampo
I cried when I got the phone call a few months ago that you had left the previous practice you had been working with (not so happy tears). Our experience working with you had been nothing but wonderful since Tony’s care was transferred to you after Dr. Kessler retired. While we are also deeply grateful to the physician who helped support his needs over the past couple of months, the level of understanding you have of our son’s case cannot be gained over a single visit and is irreplaceable in my opinion for a kiddo whose case can be so complicated. Undeniably you have always provided him top notch care, and you have been there to support any need our family had, whether it was to help secure him necessary services, quickly change a medication that wasn’t working, or document what was needed for his IEP team, so I cried again (much happier tears this time) when your new practice popped up on-line and I was able to transfer his care back into your hands.
Sometimes it is easy to make too many decisions for a kiddo with the level of needs our son has, and in trying to be sensitive to that, I asked him recently if he wanted to be able to go back to seeing you as his developmental pediatrician. I only got one word from him pressed twice on his speech device: “yes.” So more than being my choice for supporting his ongoing developmental needs, you are his also. We are deeply grateful for everything you have done to promote the best outcomes possible for him over the past six years. Thank you <3
A Quick Note
Y’all, I remain burned out and tired. As I look to the months ahead, we are facing the very real possibility that as Tony reaches the milestone of attending a full day of school every day, there will not be an RBT available to support his ongoing ABA needs after school once we reach October. Which means, in practical terms, that I personally am going to have to provide any of those additional therapy supports he needs after school until such a time (if ever, because the most honest reality is this is not too different from trying to find a unicorn on our end of town) as one can be located. His current BCBA and ABA team have been nothing short of wonderful to work with, I love their programming, so it’s a loss on more level than one. That aside, my schedule is going to remain difficult to balance and I’m going to be spending some time thinking about how I want to format my posts here to best support my personal needs during that period. I don’t even have much time for personal reading right now, and this month’s recommendations are going to reflect that, so it’s possible I may not be recommending as much reading for a while, posts could be very short for a while come fall, that sort of thing. Because I need to keep posts shorter right now to support balance in my own life, I’m going to be waiting for next week to discuss any happiness bringing recommendations that I have for this month.
