Welcome to Unlimited Parenting, where we discuss having children with disabilities or special
health care needs.
I'm your host, Allison, and with me today is a very special guest, Idaho parent and
IPUL board member, Valerie.
Valerie has generously agreed to share her child's diagnosis story and so much more
with us today.
So let's get into the stuff and the things.
Love it here.
Like last time I readied my driver's license, I did the eight year thing, so I don't, I
don't plan on leaving for a while.
I have a bachelor's degree in accounting and right now I do the billing and insurance
for a marriage and family therapy for my parents involved.
I've been married to my husband for 16 years and we have four children and pay attention
to the ages here because it gets a little crazy.
I have twin girls who are 12 and they're going to be in seventh grade and then we have an
11 year old son who will be going into sixth grade and then a nine year old daughter who
will be going into fourth grade.
So that's 12, 11 and then almost 10.
So I do have kids that are incredibly close in age.
It wasn't exactly planned, but it has worked out.
Not only are they so close in age, but you have twins.
Yeah, yeah.
And then they're all kind of the same height.
So people think I have quadripleg.
We're out walking around and at this point I'm just kind of like, yes, I do basically.
So the one we're going to be talking about today is my son, the 11 year old, and he has
autism spectrum disorder and also has intellectual disability and kind of throughout his life
that one has kind of been a little bit more obvious than the other right now thanks to
a whole bunch of early intervention, whole bunch of therapy.
It's actually the autism isn't as noticeable in quotes.
It's kind of more the intellectual disability.
I think is what people are interacting with him.
They're like, oh, you're not quite 11.
It might be what they noticed first.
Yeah, whereas they're not going to notice like visual spinning or anything that he's
doing, but the autism is still very much there.
It's just not the first thing you notice as you talk to him.
So yeah, I'm just going to kind of give our interesting little timeline for his diagnosis.
I think some parents might really relate to parts of this.
I just want to kind of share a regular mom's story to figure out what's going on with her
kid.
No, if I should be worried about this or not.
And so I did what you do and I asked on Facebook and I had a lot of really good responses from
my friends.
I just asked on my own like Facebook page, like me, not a mom's group or anything, but
my actual group of friends.
And there were people that said, oh, it's fine.
My kid did the same thing and now he never stopped talking.
Don't worry about it.
And there were other people that said, oh, you know, bring it up at his next well check
the doctor can screen.
And then other people mentioned, oh, maybe it's time to have him evaluated.
But the very best advice I got in this situation was a friend who I think she is a speech language
pathologist.
She was like, you need to call up your early intervention.
And she even like gave me the link sheet at the time we were living in Texas.
She didn't live in Texas.
She took the time to Google our like early childhood intervention program in Texas and
then dropped the link for me on Facebook, which I'm like, yeah, that's kind of become
like my like the way I like to interact with other parents.
If I'm giving advice, I'm also giving a link because it was so easy to then just click
that link and be like, oh, these are the qualifications I need to look at.
And these are where the offices are located.
I didn't have to go Google it.
So we were in Texas and it was called early childhood intervention here in Idaho.
It's the infant toddler program.
But it's that intervention for kids that are under three that need things, need help with
developmental milestones.
So I was able to go to an office and do an evaluation with my son.
And then he qualified for it and they sent a speech therapist to our home.
And we did therapy at home, which I really appreciated having four kids under the age
of four at that time.
Yeah, you didn't want to go anywhere.
Yeah, there was no way we were going anywhere.
And the funny story is his little sister, his baby sister sat in on all the things and
she was like making sound progress right along with him.
Oh, was it two for one?
Yeah, she made the B sound before he did, which was hilarious for all of us.
So he made progress.
He didn't make a lot of progress, but he did make progress.
And so I was like, oh, we're going to get this solved.
It's great.
So fast forward a little bit.
My husband was in the military.
So that's what we were doing in Texas.
He goes to a different duty station in Alabama.
And so we moved to Alabama and that's where we have my son's three year old well checked.
And I go into that being like, you know, my son also seems to have problems with sensory
processing.
He hated loud rooms.
He didn't like to wear shoes.
In some ways he seemed sensory seeking and some ways he seemed sensory avoiding.
And so I wanted to get a referral for occupational therapy for sensory processing.
So we go into this well checked with a doctor I'd never met before.
And he takes one look at my son and is like, have you thought about autism?
And I was so offended because I was like, you know, Noah, what are you even?
Right.
You know, I was like, you can't just say that.
I think he just learned over time, like with these military families, I don't know if I'm
going to see him again.
I'm just going to say what I say and let the chips fall where they may because he did put
in the referral for an autism evaluation.
And you know, after a few months, my son did come back as autistic on that evaluation.
And so I was retroactively grateful for that doctor.
But at the time I was very offended.
Yeah.
What are you saying?
Maybe some changes in bedside manner.
Yeah, I was like, dude, what?
And you know, and looking back on it, I'm like, of course, if you put a communication
delay with a sensory processing problem, like you basically it's like that's autism.
Right.
But you know, I'm new to this whole world.
I just didn't know.
So I was really, really frustrated that he said it that way.
But ultimately grateful because he didn't say, oh, let's wait and see.
Or he didn't say, I don't see it.
You know, like he I do appreciate that he was direct about it.
He could have been a little, little kinder.
Right.
But you were taken seriously.
So you appreciated that part.
Yeah, I did appreciate that part.
Yeah, he could have.
He could have said it better.
But he I do appreciate it.
So at that same time, right before we got the referral or as we're waiting for the referral
appointment, you know, because there's always there's always a long wait for these.
My son started at the developmental preschool and he could have started when he turned three
in the spring.
But we were in the middle of the move.
So I just had him start in the fall.
And so his sisters were in the pre-K four program.
And then he was in like their pre-K three program.
And it was really cute.
They had like a pod set up.
So they had four pre-K classes all in one big room with this divider.
So all three kids were technically in the same room and they would go out and play on
the playground together.
It was actually a really cute little set up that all three of them went at the same time.
And he was there kind of on a trial basis.
I don't quite remember the terminology, but it was based on his speech delay.
They were gathering data and there was all these things that they kind of needed to do.
And then I remember at like our first what's the name of the first IEP meeting?
What's the official name of it when you're like getting approved for an IEP?
Your eligibility meeting?
The eligibility.
That would be it.
At the eligibility meeting, we just got the autism diagnosis.
And so I remember the SPED teacher being like, well, this is the point where we would be
looking at all the data for his speech delay and seeing if he qualified for an IEP.
And she's like, but we have the autism diagnosis.
So we're just going to, he qualifies.
And she like marked a big X somewhere on the paperwork.
And I was like, oh, this autism diagnosis is a good thing.
Because that was like the first time I realized that like, oh, if you have a diagnosis, you
get access to resources.
We're opening doors here.
Yeah.
And so it was like, oh, I'm kind of glad we have.
And so that was a big moment for me.
But I was still kind of in denial that he actually had autism.
I was like, oh, no, because it had been kind of borderline.
He wasn't super severe.
And I know that what is severe, what is high functioning, those are kind of all relative
terms.
But even the psychologists who did it had been like, we really could go either way on
this.
But she ultimately did go with the diagnosis.
But I was still kind of in denial.
Like, oh, no, we're just not my son.
And it wasn't until.
So they did this pumpkin day thing at the preschool.
And my son didn't want to take the picture on his own.
So I was sitting there with him holding the pumpkin and he's crying in the picture.
So they send the picture home to me because they send it home to all the parents.
And I glanced at it.
I don't know what it is.
I thought it was like the cover of a brochure for parents of special needs.
So I'm like, why are they sending this home?
I don't need it.
And then I look at the picture.
I'm like, oh, that's me and my son.
Yeah, maybe.
Maybe there actually is a need here.
So that was kind of another turning point where I was like, OK, this this is my world.
This is our life right now.
We're we're going to do this.
All right.
Literally and figuratively the poster child.
Right.
Yeah.
And and what's really sweet, actually, though, is the next year they do this.
They did the same thing.
They did something day again.
And I went again and he picked up his own pumpkin, sat on the little table by himself,
fed cheese, you know, like you could see the progress in the two pictures.
It's really amazing.
Oh, yeah.
So so that that developmental preschool in Alabama was amazing.
Like we just had good staff there.
They taught him so much.
He got so used to being around other kids.
Like it really met so many of his needs to be in there.
So I just I cannot say enough about like getting kids into those early intervention school
programs, like get them in as soon as they qualify because they're so good.
We were trying to do speech therapy and occupational therapy privately, but we had to drive 30
minutes out of our area to go to them.
My other kids hated waiting in the in the like the break room, not the break room, the
waiting room.
Yeah.
And and so to have all those services and everything happening at the preschool was
just just life saving.
It's a game changer.
Wonderful.
Yeah.
So that was kind of like initial diagnosis and then acceptance phase.
And then we just kind of moved on to the like how do we manage and live with this and thrive
with this phase, which we still are in really.
But because we were a military family, it kind of spanned and more than just like Idaho,
like we were still in Alabama at this point.
So we kind of bridge some of that to get us to Idaho.
You see when when Eiffel comes into this.
So let's see.
So we're in Alabama.
We're doing well.
Oh, he was in ABA in Alabama as well.
I don't know if this still exists, but I'm going to mention it in case you have any military
families and it still exists.
There's a there was a program.
There still is a program called the Echo program through TriCare and another autism mom, because
it's always another autism.
Right.
She she told me about it and and she's like, you know, it's going to be a lot of paperwork.
It's worth it.
And yes, it was a lot of paperwork, but it did get my son into ABA insurance covered
all of it.
And we had a really good lady that would come and and she would work on things at home.
She also took him places.
I specifically remember her taking him to McDonald's for french fries and the french
fries were what got him there.
But while they were there, they were practicing being in a crowded room and behaving appropriately
and things like that.
So that was a really good situation.
Unfortunately, we just weren't there long enough to really spend much time with that.
I think maybe we were with with that company for about six months before my husband.
It was time to move again.
Yeah, with four little kids.
Yeah.
So we had some progress, but then then things came up.
So my husband ended up leaving the military and we moved in with his parents in Utah.
And fortunately, fortunately, where we live, the the local preschool or the local elementary
school had a preschool for sped kids.
And then they'd also opened it up to regular kids who could come in and help be be peers
with the sped kids.
And I think this is a good example of like where you're giving services to children with
special needs, but other children are benefiting because they wouldn't have had that preschool
without the sped kids needing it.
Exactly.
So preschool isn't really a thing in Utah everywhere through the school district.
And so this was a really special situation for that local school to have that.
So I don't know how much the other parents knew how much they were benefiting from being
in a class with special needs kids, but it was a benefit for them.
And so so he finished out his pre-K four year in Utah.
And then we had already decided my husband was going to go to school in Hoka-Tello, went
to ISU.
But we needed something to do for the summer.
And this is just a fun little aside.
I ended up getting a job in Yellowstone National Park and we moved there for the summer and
lived.
Yeah, we lived in a 25 foot RV with four kids.
Oh, well, that doesn't sound very fun.
But the other part of it, what an experience.
Yeah, it was amazing.
Like I worked 40 hours a week and my husband was like the stay at home RV dad.
He had our kids out doing all sorts of stuff.
And my son was just in heaven, but he never fully understood what Yellowstone meant.
He just thought that meant geysers.
So we'd be sitting, we lived in Canyon Village and so we're in the literally the middle of
Yellowstone.
He's like, I want to go see Yellowstone National Park.
Look outside your window, buddy.
Look out the window.
But he was in heaven and loved it.
And so it was it was a good experience for our whole family.
And then then we moved to Pocatello and we like moved in days before the school year
started.
And I'd been in communication with the school and I'd been, you know, sending them the IEP
paperwork and sending them everything I had.
And they kind of drug their feet a little bit on acknowledging that they had a child
with special needs coming into their school.
Knowing what I know now, I think I would have pushed a little bit more, but I, you know,
we were we were trying to move.
So it was like, whatever, just get him enrolled.
And I guess we'll let the tips fall where they may.
But I kept being like, he's going to need a lot of help.
And I assume that he was going to go at the time.
I don't know if they still have it, but they had kind of a magnet school for kids with
special needs.
And I was assuming they were going to have them go there, but they never did.
He was always in his mainstream kindergarten class.
And I don't know, looking back, if that was the best move, but it is what ended up happening
that year.
And we made it work.
But it was kind of a rough transition for him to suddenly be in like a mainstream class
after being in kind of these more hybrid type situations that he had been in.
That being said, we loved that school.
The staff was amazing.
You know, they just I just don't think that I pushed hard enough for his exact needs.
So that year was rough, partly because I don't think he was in the right class and partly
because at the time, Pocatello did the kindergarten every or all day long, every other day.
Oh, interesting.
Yeah, they don't do it anymore.
Because now we have all day kindergarten every day now in the state.
But at the time, that's how they had it set up.
And so they did he would go Tuesday, Thursday every week, and then rotating Mondays.
So some Mondays he would go, some Mondays he wouldn't.
And then when he wasn't at school, he was in daycare.
My kids went to the early learning center at ISU, which was fabulous.
I cannot say enough about how good that daycare was.
But it did make it rough because he would play all day at daycare and then he would
have to go to school the next day and work.
And he did.
Yeah.
I don't think any kid actually would like that inconsistency, but it was really rough
and so he was just falling apart by the end of the school year.
We kind of all were falling apart.
I was like, what day is it?
Where are you going today?
I don't even know.
Yeah.
How do you keep track of that?
I mean, it was like, it was just insane.
I don't know how anyone handled it.
So and then at daycare, he was starting to fight towards the end of the school year.
And so I was like, OK, I know this kid needs intervention.
I know he needs some sort of ADA, probably some speech therapy.
He was getting a little at school, but you know, it's not quite enough.
But I mean, my work schedule, my husband's school schedule, I was just like, there's
no time to take him anywhere.
Like we just didn't have the situation.
We didn't have family that could take him to an appointment.
We just we were if we were on our own.
So what do you do again?
I got on Facebook and this time I was in a mom's group on Facebook.
I think it was Southeast Idaho Autism Moms.
We'll give a shout out to that group.
Shout out.
So I asked them there and I was just like, you know, is there any sort of therapy that
will come to the client?
Like, you know, they could come to his daycare and maybe pull him out and do speech therapy
or they could do ADA at the daycare.
Like, I'm like, what is there?
Is this exist?
How do we get creative?
Yeah. And some mom on there was like, you need to call I-Pol.
So that's a shout out to that mom.
Yeah.
This is when I pull into the story.
And so I called I-Pol and there was a lovely staff lady named Amy with you guys at the
time.
And she walked me through everything.
And I was going to check.
I'm not sure if I saved the note that I took, but I feel like I did because they were like
that special to me.
The notes contained answers, the little handwritten.
Yeah.
And then she sent me an email with good stuff and links.
Oh yeah.
You know how important those are.
Yeah.
And so she talked me through applying for children's about mental disability services
and gave me, you know, all the steps and everything.
We already had Medicaid and we already had the autism diagnosis.
So we were pretty set.
You know, we were like, okay, we got these two things.
The problem was at the time Liberty, which is the third party like eligibility assessment
service people, they had just taken over the contract and they were working through, I
don't know how many months long of a backlog.
So I called I-Pol maybe April, May of that year.
We didn't even get an evaluation till like August.
As we were waiting, I was like, I remember telling the daycare leader, I was like, I
think all of his behaviors are going to be like outgrown by the time we get there.
He's going to be a different kid.
Yeah.
I was like, oh, this is taking a while, but it did eventually work out and he did qualify
for everything.
So then we got assigned a caseworker who was amazing.
I can't say enough about her.
She doesn't work there anymore, but her name was Lisa and she was the best.
She had my back all the time.
Any question I had, she'd answer.
She was great.
And so then she gave me a list of the providers in the area and I think I called one and that
was the one that worked out.
Oh gosh, that's lucky.
Yeah, it really is.
I don't know if that's possible today, but it was in 2018.
Oh, those pre pandemic times, right?
Yeah.
So we were able to start doing, I never get the initials right, but I know we did HI,
we did habilitative intervention and then there was some other alphabet soups that we
were doing, but they were able to send staff to the daycare and start working with my son
on like appropriate ways to interact with children when you're in a giant room, you're
in a room with a bunch of kids and they're all playing, you know, how do you handle that?
And so that was a lifeline.
And then they also, there was some, they would take them out in the community too.
So there was a little bit of work in the daycare and then work in the community.
So it was like, oh, we did it.
We got it figured out.
So that fall, his first grade teacher was amazing.
Like my kids have had good teachers, but she like stands out among all of them.
Going the extra mile.
Yeah, she worked so hard with him.
And at the time he wasn't nonverbal around me.
Like I wouldn't have said he was nonverbal, but she felt like he came to her class nonverbal
and then started talking in class in her class.
So that was huge.
But you know, he started talking at school in her class.
She also, she was like, do you have him on medication?
Cause this isn't the kid that was described to me.
Because she thought he would be a little bit wilder, I guess.
And I was like, honestly, it's the fact that he's all day every day now.
We're not on that crazy kindergarten schedule.
Like he knows what to expect every day.
That consistency helps.
Yeah.
So yeah, I don't know how anyone handled that.
That Coca-Cola schedule.
It was crazy.
One thing I want to say before we move on, I don't want to forget this.
My kids were in daycare and we were able to afford it because of the Idaho childcare program.
Oh yeah.
Which is another thing that I cannot like phrase enough.
So I do not want to forget to mention that.
There's no way I could have afforded to put my kids in daycare without that program.
So if people are weighing the pros and cons of going back to work, but is it going to
be worth it daycare wise?
Look into Idaho childcare program because it is a lifesaver.
We can add some, I have a feeling you're going to love this, but we can add some links to
those resources in the description for this podcast.
Yeah.
I love the links in that.
Just for you, everybody gets a link.
You get a link.
That's great.
Oh, I love that.
Okay.
So we're up to first grade.
My husband finishes his program at ISU and he graduates.
He gets a job in Quinn Falls and then I stay in Coca-Cola with the kids while we're kind
of house hunting between cities.
And it's the summer.
And I'm like, okay, I love my son, but he requires a lot of attention.
He's a fiddler.
He has a lot of energy.
I couldn't just leave him alone.
And I was like, how am I going to solo parent this child through the summer?
Because by then I'd stopped working.
And so the kids were home with me all summer and we're like, oh boy, what are we going
to do?
And so and her again, children's DDS, we still had a big budget left over.
And so my caseworker was able to throw everything into, I never can remember the exact alphabet
super bathroom in here, but she was able to throw everything into therapy so that my son
kind of had the unofficial daycare type of intervention.
Okay.
Yeah.
I even never remember what it's called, but we did 20 hours of therapy a week that summer
where they had him out doing things.
And a lot of times I would meet up at the park with my other kids and then the therapist
would bring my son and we would hang out.
And then when he got overwhelmed, they'd go somewhere else.
And it was just nice to kind of have another adult like just kind of there.
Another set of eyes and help and everything.
Yeah.
Fully responsible for him.
And then I was able to focus on my girls.
I remember we made bread one day and I was like, there's no way we could have done this.
She was here.
We love him dearly, but there's no way.
Yeah.
It wouldn't have been edible bread after that, right?
Yeah, it wouldn't.
I don't even think we would have got it in the oven.
Like something would have happened.
And then he also did extended school year that year.
And so he was, yeah, which I love that they picked him up on a bus and took him directly
from our house to the school.
It was great.
So that was a good solution there too.
So between the 20 hours of service or services and then the extended school year for whatever
amount of weeks we did, we had that summer covered.
So then we moved between falls in August.
We literally closed down our house on the first day of school.
Oh my goodness.
Once again, I kind of just dropped the special needs kid into the lap of the school.
It was like, I want to hear a lot, have fun.
And I tried.
Let me know how it goes.
Yeah.
Once again, tried to warn them, but they just didn't quite get it.
Right.
So I was like, I'm sorry.
And so that was another rough year.
We kind of had a rough time that second grade year.
And I feel like maybe we would have figured it all out, but then it was 2020 and we all
know what happened in 2020.
I think I blacked that part out.
Yeah, really.
I think I did too.
So all my kids were home.
It was tricky.
It was tricky to figure out what we were doing with behavioral therapy.
Were they here to help with school or were they supposed to take him somewhere?
We've never really figured it out.
Every day was an adventure.
I can only imagine.
Yeah, it was hard.
And of course, we didn't know is school going to start in April again or is it going to
start May 1st or nevermind, it's not starting at all.
It was just so hard to plan ahead.
It was rough.
But the good thing that did come out of that time is he had so much time with his sisters
that he actually learned how to play pretend.
Oh, what a big deal.
Yeah, it was a really big deal.
He's never really pretended before.
And so to see him playing their games with them, it was really cute and it was really
good for him.
We ended up deciding to homeschool in the 2020-2021 year.
Because our elementary school was going to every other day and rotating Mondays.
Oh, no, you've seen that before.
I already know I hate the schedule.
We're not doing that.
So we homeschooled, which we all learned I'm terrible.
The joke is that we discovered I'm more suited for administration than actual classroom teaching
because I could make a chart and I could plan out what we were going to do.
But when it came to actually teaching my kids anything, I was like, I don't know how this
works.
So it was an interesting year for us.
We can only imagine.
Yeah, but because we did have a little extra time, I was like, you know what, I've wanted
my son in speech therapy for a while.
I just haven't felt like we've had the time for it.
And so I got him into speech therapy about that time.
And that was really good to get him doing some speech therapy and just kind of working
on like he could talk, but just kind of working on more like the parts of speech that he needed
to work on and stuff.
So that was good.
And then in 2020-2021, in the fall, we went back to our school.
And I was really worried because I was like, okay, we never quite had this fully figured
out in second grade.
And now we're going to start fourth grade after a whole year of him being able to eat
corn dogs and have fun whenever he wanted.
So I was really worried.
Fortunately, the school had changed principals and the new principal was really accommodating.
And so I emailed her before school started and I was like, okay, here are all my concerns.
I don't know how my kids are going to handle going back to school.
And she had him come over and she gave him a personal tour of the whole school and reminded
him where the lunchroom was.
Yeah.
And had him meet his teacher.
And you know, it was not back to school night.
So it wasn't crowded.
It wasn't busy.
Like it was just perfect.
So we got off to a really good start in fourth grade.
And then fifth grade was also really good.
So it was kind of rough starting at that school.
But when we restarted, I think everything was really well.
And really that's kind of where we are right now.
We finished speech therapy not too long ago.
He started occupational therapies and then finished that not too long ago.
So we're still doing behavioral intervention stuff.
And even that I'm kind of like, I don't think we need this as much as we used to, but I'm
hanging on to it because I don't know what middle school will bring and what puberty
will bring.
So I'm like, we'll keep our spot here.
The transitions never end.
Yeah.
So I'm like, we'll probably need this even though at the moment things are good because
now he's matured a lot.
So he can be left alone in a room for a while.
He doesn't fiddle with everything.
He can interact with people and they understand what he's saying.
He can be in loud places.
He self-advocates like, oh, I need to remember to bring my headphones.
Wow.
So yeah, it's really...
I look at this child that I went into the doctor's office with when he was three.
And the doctor was like, have you considered autism?
And I think about how difficult that three-year-old was.
And now I look at my 11-year-old and I'm like, yeah, we still have the autism, but we've
learned how to live with it and how to behave correctly.
And it's very good.
Would you say that the early intervention really played a pivotal role in that?
Yes.
Like, I can't imagine if we'd just done the whole wait and see thing like, oh, well, maybe
he'll outgrow it or, oh, this is just a phase.
I can't even imagine because yeah, it was so critical to have him in all the various
interventions that we had him in throughout his life.
Because they helped him.
Yeah.
I always say, I'm like, therapists are miracle workers.
They do amazing things.
When he learned how to tie his shoes, I was like, are you kidding me?
I never thought he would tie his shoes.
I thought we'd just do Velcro or bungee cords his entire life.
And then within just the few sessions, the occupational therapist taught me how to do
it.
When you're the parent of an autistic child, the milestones that you celebrate really change.
Yes, that is very true.
I remember when we first were getting into the therapy when he was in first grade, the
lady who did kind of our goals and everything, she asked, what is your, what is a long term
goal?
What do you visualize?
And I remember I said, I'm like, I would love for all my kids to be able to walk to the
park without ending up on the news, you know, somebody getting kidnapped or somebody getting
hurt or something.
And, and at the time I was like, I cannot even imagine that.
Like that feels high in the sky.
Well, on Sunday, I took a nap, my husband took a nap and one of my 12 year old girls
and my son went to the park and came back.
I didn't even know they went.
My husband knew they went.
I didn't even know they went until they came back and I was like, wow, it happened.
So yeah, because of all the interventions and stuff, and I'm only one person, I can't
do everything.
Like, yeah, I'm the parent, but there's things I can't help my son do.
And so to have another adult that comes in with skills and kind of with a different relationship
to, because I'm his face to face, I can't push him as well as some other people with
a different role in his life can push him.
And so, you know, like one of his things, I taught him how to tell time on a Facebook.
Like I couldn't do that.
We didn't have that type of relationship, but he could learn from somebody else.
So yeah, all the therapy, all the intervention, I'm all for it.
So that's kind of our story.
I don't know if you have any other questions.
Oh, I also, I have one more.
I'm curious.
I know your son was very young when you were kind of doing your tour, your tour of the
United States, but I'm curious if there was a big difference in services from state to
state or if you didn't really feel that because those weren't accessible to him at that time.
I don't know.
I was so new to everything.
Like even when I went to my first IEP meeting, I was like, what are we doing?
I just had no clue what was available or what the processes were.
So I didn't notice a ton from state to state.
And really because we moved right as he aged out of infant toddler, I didn't know.
Like I couldn't compare those.
The one thing I did notice, Utah, like I was a little, the fact that they didn't have a
developmental preschool at every school district, like super accessible.
Let me rephrase that.
They had one in every school district.
They didn't have one at every school.
And that was different to me because I knew like it was just very nice in Texas and in
Alabama that they had pre-K as just like a standard.
And then to go to Utah and Idaho where it's not a standard, that actually was kind of
an adjustment.
And I think a lot of parents, I know I did before I learned differently, that I just
assumed that the services that are in Idaho were available in every state and vice versa,
that we were all the same and we're not.
Yeah.
And so, and like I never went through whatever the equivalent to children's VDSs in Utah
because I knew we weren't there, going to be there very long.
So I couldn't tell you what that process is.
Like, so I just, I guess in every state I kind of had a different need.
So I never, I never really compared.
I do have to say that it is nice that there are services like the infant toddler program
throughout each state.
I don't know what they look like in every state, but it is really cool.
Like no matter where you are, that does exist.
And then the IEPs, even though they're like, they don't transfer specifically, we just
have to redo them when we move, but they are legally binding.
You know, I could show up in Utah with his Alabama IEP and be like, hey, we got this
thing.
And they were like, okay, yeah, we know what that is.
We know that he's going to need services.
So it was nice that those things do kind of have like some standardization.
Right that there's continuity.
Yeah.
So I wasn't going to each state being like, so how do we do it here?
So I do appreciate that.
Well thank you so much everyone for listening in.
If you're in Idaho or planning on moving to Idaho and have any questions about systems
or services for children with disabilities, please reach out to us on our website at ipulidaho.org.
That's I-P-U-L-I-D-A-H-O.org.
Be sure to come back next time.
Until then, I'm Allison and it has been a wonderful experience talking with Valerie.
And this has been Unlimited Parenting.
Thanks for listening.
I hope you enjoyed this video.