Matthew's Check-Up

Just wanted to do a quick little post about Matthew's trip back to the neurologist yesterday (Tuesday). I was so tired that when I laid down with Jacob so he would go on to sleep, instead of wollering the bed to death, I fell asleep. I had my list of things that I wanted to discuss with the doctor, that Matthew happened to get a hold of in a bit of a temper tantrum and tear, and he was more than willing to listen to all the things that I have noticed that were bothering me. I really like this doctor! He thinks that most of what I was talking about is probably side-effects of the medication that Matthew is taking. He said that unfortunately, you can not pin point the things that you want to target with the medication. Of course the dangerous self-injurious behaviors is what needed to be targeted, but along with that comes and overall sense of Matthew being tired, unable to move as well, lots of drooling, the non-giggling, not acting like the old Matthew, etc. I also mentioned to him that it now seems that when he hits his head, he actually seems to feel it and know that it hurts. He said the medication has made him aware that it DOES hurt when he hits himself. (I guess that's a good thing!) He said there are more medication options and that it will really be a trial and error type thing with Matthew. He said that one medication can affect different people in different ways. He said that ultimately the burden was going to lie with me. I told him that I knew and that I would deal with it. My main objection in the visit today was to determine if he felt there could be an under-lying medical cause for Matthew's sudden onset of behaviors. I know that the autism can be the culprit, but this is the situation I face...Matthew is unable to tell me if he is hurting in any way. He cannot come to me and say, "Mom, my head hurts." (wouldn't that be awesome?) SOOOO, I have to pay attention to Matthew's behaviors and reactions and take note of anything unusual. I could choose to consider some of the behaviors to be insignificant, but what if that is the very clue to lead us to an answer. Gotta be on my guard at all times. What if the one thing that I choose to "ignore" is in result to something major going on in his little body. I could tell the doctor would LOVE to be able to answer that for me, but it's hard not knowing what's going on inside Matthew's little head. Dr. Zhu asked if I thought Matthew would be able to go through a CT scan. Well, I never know on any given day how he'll do with anything. He said that I could stand right beside him and that we could give him a valium to help calm and relax him. Okay, we'll give it a try because that will make me feel TONS, TONS, TONS better just to know!!!! He said he would give me the order for the pill and that I should crush it up and mix it with something to give to him an hour prior to the scan. Well, the girls out front were feeling on the ball and scheduled the CT scan for right then and there! SO, we headed to the pharmacy to get the pill. I'll admit I was just the 'tiniest' bit excited about the thought of a valium-calmed Matthew :) The pharmacist gave me the pill and said to give it to him an hour prior to the scan time and I said, "I'm supposed to give it to him now! The doctor said to crush it and mix it in something and I don't know what to do with it." One of the little assistants went to the administrator's lounge, got a yogurt and the pharmacist fixed it up for Matthew!!! Now how GREAT is that?!?!?!?! Oooooo, I like that little pill...15 minutes and Matthew was chillin'! We let him get good and relaxed and thankfully the tech was a gal from down home that I grew up with. It made me MUCH more relaxed to have someone I knew doing the scan. I just didn't know how Matthew would do. Jill suited me up in the nice weighted apron and I plopped Matthew on the table. (Plopped was pretty much it, since the meds was in control and he wasn't movin'!) I held his head under his chin and stood right beside him the entire time, which thankfully was only about 2 minutes! Matthew did SO good!!!! WONDERFUL...yes, he earned the grilled cheese he'd been asking for since Graves-Gilbert Clinic came into his view! I kept waiting for him to fall asleep because of the valium, but it was around 8:00 before he ever drifted off! (At least it didn't affect him like some meds did me when I was little...the dentist told mom to give me this pill prior to coming in to have a tooth pulled, so that I would be more relaxed...WRONG!! It reacted on me the wrong way and I was climbing the walls by the time we got there!)

I should find out the results today. (Matthew will go back to the doctor in a month, but Dr. Zhu gave me a card and said he wanted to have weekly phone conversations with me so he could stay updated on Matthew's situation. How awesome is that?!) I pray that all is normal and we can just attribute this to the autism. I am glad that the CT scan was performed though...I NEEDED that for my own peace of mind! The not-knowing if it could be something wrong has about took its toll on me and I feel a bit lighter now that it's over. I will post the results sometime, but it may be at a later date. Today is a special day and I have a special post planned for later :) I want today to be one of happy memories and I hated to even post this, but I needed to for my own record. It helps so much to have this blog and be able to go back and find out when certain things happened. Plus, I know some of you guys that knew Matthew had the appointment would be looking for this post. Thanks for remembering us!