Mollie

Catherine with Molly


Catherine has been hard at work the last 6 months. For those of you that are not familiar with our family, Catherine has struggled with food since her birth. Over the years I have been told many different things by professionals, friends, and family. Most of which are myths or the norm for 97% of the children out there. (Turns out Catherine is not one of the 97%. ) For some crazy reason I got it in my head that Catherine's food issues needed to be resolved by her 8th Birthday. So in February I got real strict on feeding, this made meal times a nightmare. Catherine and I would both leave the kitchen in tears and dreading the next encounter with food. I quickly learned that I needed to find a better way. So I considered a GOAL. While trying to find the perfect GOAL Catherine came to me and asked me for Molly Doll, a quick phone call to Eric to discuss the GOAL (Molly Doll) and our plan for action and we were a GO. The GOAL was basically try 3 bites of something not liked and then eat the rest of the stuff you do like for 100 days. I bet your thinking that so that sounds like a LONG time, and that seems too easy!!!! Guess what, it was anything everything but easy for Catherine and yes 100 days is a very LONG time!!!
A few weeks into the GOAL I quickly realized that we had a REAL problem and it was bigger than us. And we needed BIG PROFESSIONAL HELP! So I did what any good Christian Momma would do I prayed HARD to find a Doctor that could figure out what was happening. I also asked a few professionals I know, who they thought might help. I got the same name from all of them. So I tried to locate the doctor, it turns out that she left town but in the process of phone calls trying to track down the Doctor "that left town" I talk to a receptionist and she thought that one of the doctors in her building could help. I quickly booked an appointment and rushed Catherine in.
I tell the Doctor Catherine's symptoms, she checks Catherine over......then she says she knows what is wrong!!! I was a astonished that in a matter of seconds, she could diagnose Catherine. We have been to several doctors over the years and not a one of them had any ideas. The Doctor said," Catherine has Sensory Processing Disorder." (SPD) Then she took several minutes to explain the disorder to us and some of the things I could do to help her. I was very skeptical at first, but I was starting to come around before we left the office, the Doctor new about other symptoms that I was wondering about that I had not yet discussed with her. She explained how it all connected to SPD. Once home I did do an extensive research on the computer and the Doctor was accurate in the diagnoses.
Because of the difficulty eating food Catherine's tummy was the size of an egg. So for a few weeks we got to have soda with our meals to stretch her tummy. That was an easy fix. Man I wish everything could be that easy!!!!!!
So now I knew what is going on with Catherine, but I still need help to turn it around. It just so happens that Scottish Right the place I take Trevor for Speech Therapy has a therapist named Mollie, that knows about SPD and is also a feeding therapist. Mollie is AMAZING, she has helped Catherine so much. Mollie has taught me how to make eating much easier on Catherine and at the same time we have increased in the number of foods Catherine can eat. Catherine meets with Mollie once a week for therapy.
Catherine has met all the goals that we set for her so she could earn Mollie. Achieving the goals was extremely hard work and she did have days that were very rough but she would think of Molly doll and do it for Molly doll. Catherine is a trooper, I am very proud of her diligence and hard work.
At this point Catherine still has a long ways to go but she is showing drastic improvements. I believe that she will always struggle with SPD but at least we now control SPD! SPD no longer controls us.
I am so grateful that Heavenly Father knows Catherine and our family. He knows our needs. He knew that I needed to Home school Catherine to be able to get her the help that she needs and also that I would need to be able to help her one on one everyday all day. I am also very grateful to Scottish Right and the wonderful staff to help me help my family free of charge. If you think you or someone one you know might be struggling with SPD here are a few websites that I found to be helpful for me.

http://www.sinetwork.org/about-sensory-processing-disorder.html
http://www.sensory-processing-disorder.com/sensory-processing-disorder-checklist.html