The First Year

It's already November. We are at the tail end of our first year with a dx and the first year of therapies. I think the year prior going to Dr. to Dr. was worse. Now we have our little group of Doctor and therapist and Roger is comfortable with them.
Back in January things were a little overwhelming. Roger was about to turn 12 and now the doctors are saying well we should have done this years ago like when he was 3 but it's not to late. They rattle off the list of suggested (that's the key word here)therapies and like most I initially thought we had to do them all. Just cost alone I would need to work 6 jobs and then the time he would have no time to be him. Every new doctor we went to added to the dx list. Trust me I would be here for days trying to list them all and their idea of what therapies will work. Eventually I realized I don't have to follow them all so we prioritized what were the most important speech and OT so that's what we went with. Almost a year in and he is doing great.
Sure when we lost our first speech therapist and he started OT we had a little regression but it ended up being a good thing. Now instead of going clinic to clinic all his therapy is in one clinic and the therapists know each other and work together.
Roger hasn't changed he is the same child he has always been. What has changed is the anxiety is lower. He now has help in place at school and instead of the frustrated c student we have a calmer A student. He transitioned into middle school smoothly. As his speech improved and he became more confident he is self advocating more. Now he will tell the doctors what is bothering him, I don't have to guess as much. We still have bad days. There are still days where all he will talk about is legos but hey he's talking. We have chosen to focus on all the positives and the good days and not the bad. Even with Autism he can still do great things.