Collette Graduates

As of one week ago, Collette officially graduated from Early Intervention. Last Thursday, Sebastian and Collette had their reevaluation. After talking with their case worker (who has been with us since the beginning) and Sebastian's SLP, who also monitors Collette, albeit unofficially, I was fairly certain that Collette would not qualify for services and that Sebastian would. Even Sebastian is borderline, as its mostly pronunciation that is the problem. Of course, I can understand him well enough and so can his SLP because that's her job. But she had to evaluate him more objectively because most "lay people" would have no clue what he was saying most of the time.

So, I only have to pay for one kid now (woo hoo!!) but still get the same kind of support I was getting before. The one dilemma that we now face is with their drop-off play group, or "school" as I like to call it. Collette is now considered a community child, which means she can still go to group and be a role model for the kids that are in Early Intervention. Wonderful. However, our group already has the maximum number of community kids in it so they're not sure what to do. Obviously, I cannot sit outside in the next room (where the parents wait while the kids are in group) with Collette and Matteo and chitchat with the other parents - Collette would flip her shit not being allowed in. So, the options seem to be:

1. break the rules and let her be in the class anyway
   
2. move us to a different day where there is room for another community kid - not sure how likely that is since we waited a while to get into this class and it was my last choice, day of the week-wise.
3. Let me leave the parenting group so I can be out and about with Collette and Matteo, hopefully softening the blow.
4. Get a babysitter for Collette.

If I had to rank these choices, it would go 2, 1, 3, 4. 3 and 4 really suck because I think Collette's presence makes Sebastian feel better, even when they aren't playing together. Luckily, our case worker (who is also one of the teachers in their group) agrees and is trying very hard to work something out. So, we'll see. Needless to say, I'll be pretty upset if Collette can't continue. Fingers crossed that it doesn't come to that!