Its been awhile...

And this time it was on purpose.

I had to keep quiet. I needed to think and I didn't want to share too much without certainty. Now we have certainty.

This past Tuesday I took Beth to see a psychologist for a psychological eval. I picked a doctor who had never met my child, had no prior access to her medical record or educational records, and therefore could form no prior opinion. I brought with me 3 solid years of IEPs, evals, and other diagnostic records. She spent 3 hours with Beth doing various testing.

She called me yesterday to let me know that she was diagnosing Beth with very early onset schizophrenia. This diagnosis is incredibly rare. This was a decision made with a lot of careful consideration. She spent hours reading the documents I brought her and going back over her own notes from the evals. In the end, its the only one that fits.

Obviously we knew this was coming. It still stings a bit. The doctor was talking about the possibilities for the future and how this may get significantly worse around puberty. She was discussing medications and the utter torment the voices can bring. It shook me, badly.

Now we need to work on getting a school placement that works for my girl. Public school isn't going to cut it. She's at extreme risk for bullying. Its all so much to take in at once, but we finally have our answer and now we can move forward.