Looking Forward

After recovering from a brief but nasty virus which had me knocked off my feet (so bad in fact that there was no way I could get the girls to school yesterday) I feel a bit better which is GOOD because I'm really looking forward to Friday.

I'm off to the NEC as I have managed, somehow, to sweet-talk my way into helping out at the Card Fairy stand. I bought yet more of the lush Danelle Johnson/Art Warehouse/Limited Edition stamps which are so new I can't even find them on the Limited Edition site to give you a preview. Anyhow, they are fabby unmounted clear stamps, circles and diamonds. Cos I can't find a piccie of them anywhere, and can't be bothered to take one myself today, you will just have to come along to the stand yourself (if you are lucky enough to be having a day out) to see what is so special about them!

I had a little weep this morning. I took the car for the MOT and it failed on some rear coil thingymejig, so have got to get that fixed next week and re-tested. But it wasn't that; I got back home to the report from the Speech Therapist assessment Mia undertook last week.

Mia is my angel, my baby, she is beautiful, funny, charming, caring and adorable. And she has *developmental delay*. Something I spotted from a very early age. Well straight away. When she was born she wouldn't stay awake at all, certainly not long enough for a proper feed, meaning she lost loads of weight when she was only a wee one to start with. Then at a few weeks I realised her basic reflexes just didn't work. She didn't flinch at loud noises nor blink if you quickly moved your hand in front of her eyes. The standard stuff. She went through tests and they couldn't find anything wrong, but over the years, she has been *behind* the others at the major points of development. Sitting up, crawling, teething, walking, potty training (not achieved until she was almost four) and talking.

No-one took me seriously until she had been at school for a term but thankfully, since then, she has had one to one sessions with a speech therapist. This has really helped but her latest assessment still puts her between one and two years behind her peers in terms of language use (which is coming on) but more worryingly, her ability to process information continues to be very poor. Simple understanding such as first, next, last, has her flummoxed. Ability to remember things stays poor (we can go through her word list of and, said, go, the, time after time and she will still not get them right for several weeks). This impacts all areas of her life, from understanding conversations at home, to following instructions at school.

We have a special needs assessment lined up for the end of the month, I really want the assessor to recommend that she needs to continue having extra one to one help in the classroom and am really worried about how she will progress (or not) as the current help is due to end at Christmas. She is an adorable little thing, everyone tells me they love her and that (more importantly) the other kids all love her too. But for how long? I can remember how cruel children can be as soon as they realise that someone is a bit different. I know in the scheme of things, Mia's problems are miniscule, but to me they are the world.