I had an evaluation meeting for him today. Despite the fact that his first and second grade teachers and his after school program teachers all believe his motor skills are far below average and definitely below the skill level of his peers, he was evaluated as average and thus, not eligible for any assistance or services that might make a world of difference to him. I was told I could put him in bike camp for a week in the spring. Never mind the last time he got on a bike he took a fall so hard that we took him to get his arm x-rayed it was so swollen and bruised. (Part of speech delayed kids is other motor delays, including a lack of protective reflex when they fall...they don't put out their hands to catch themselves, they fall on their heads...literally.)

I think about the time they started making inferences that it was my parenting or lack of it that made it so he couldn't meet the requirements of some of the testing and I about lost it. I've busted my butt getting him in soccer, swim lessons, working on his speech and reading and even working out a deal for him to get his homework before the weekend rather than afterwards, so that Mike and I have more time to help him and so he has more time to complete it.

I must have failed miserably not to have played catch with him. I'm sorry, but you knock a ball off your kid's chest enough times and occasionally bonk him in the face with it, and amazingly enough, catch isn't a big draw for either of us.

The final straw was when I was told how sad it is that kids like this fall between the cracks. I said,"Isn't this the reason we're meeting? So he does NOT fall between the cracks?" Which was met with sighs and shrugs.

He's starting to exhibit behavior that demonstrates his frustration. If he doesn't get help, he's going to suffer for no good reason and these people have it in their power to NOT discourage him from school and participating, but so far, they choose to classify him as low-end of normal. I don't know if that's normal for the country or not, but it's certainly not normal compared to his peers or other even younger children.

I'm beyond ripshit. I've reached a new dimension of ripshit. I've got calls into the school district offices already. There's gonna be a buttkicking when I'm done.

The school district office person (SDOP) called me from home at home. She listened patiently to me as I ranted and raved. I ranted that Russell only exceeded the bottom end of their normal range by a measly 8 points and that his teachers all thought that they were insane to have denied him adaptive P.E. I mentioned that I thought it was rather odd that in a normal play situation that his after school teacher, a coach of 7 years thought he swung a bat as though he were swatting a fly, but the adaptive PE teacher said that he hit the ball she tossed all but once. That the contrast of the two seemed odd and that perhaps she wasn't representing "normal" play conditions.

I suggested something about an "independent educational evaluation" which they could be held financially responsible for and she squirmed notably. (Yes, ma'm I read my Parental Rights handout.)

I said I wasn't overly impressed by the fact that my parenting skills had been brought into question in the meeting. The SDOP said that perhaps I'd misconstrued that and that she was sure they only meant to be offering suggestions, only I was there and I saw the way that woman looked at me and I saw the depth of explanation and experienced the phrase,"I know that I, as a parent, have done..." as if I hadn't met my parental responsibilities. No, I definitely don't believe I misconstrued that, thanks. Somehow I think teaching my child to say his whole name and his mom's whole name so that a stranger can understand him is far more important than whether or not he can catch a damned ball. Funny thing that. When the Sunday school teacher called him Roger for the bulk of an hour because Ru-huh could have been anything, I realized he was in horrible danger if, for example, he and I became separated at the mall or something. He was too incomprehensible to strangers to be able to help himself by saying, "My name is Russell S. and my mommy's name is Wendy S." We spent months perfecting our names when he was 4. His kindergarten teachers when he was 5, still didn't understand him and suggested he might be retarded.

I also said that the mention of the bike camp seemed unreasonable to me because we had taken Russell to get x-rayed after his last fall because he's fallen so damned hard and because I was sure it wasn't cheap and that my husband is a full-time student and I support a family of four on a fairly meager income. I explained I work full-time and that I was a single mom until Russell was about 3 or 4. I explained that my income is only a couple hundred dollars a month above the cutoff for the school lunch program and that surely, if I had the money to pay for private services that I probably would have already provided them to my son and that bike camp and some of these other things were simply not within my means. I explained, I am in the process of trying to get Russell signed up for Tae Kwon Do and that probably Daddy will take the class with him, if we can financially swing both of them.

If I had money, I would throw all of it into anything my kids needed. Okay, I do throw all of it into anything my kids need, but there's a limit to my resources.

They brought up,"Why can't his dad do this and that?" Daddy isn't athletically inclined and is more computer-inclined and thus, Russell is, too, because of that whole role model thing. Daddy does go out and roughhouse with him outside, they play tag and soccer. Russell rides his scooter and digs in the dirt with the twins a lot. We often take nature walks on the weekend. I explained that I also severely limit Russell's computer time. Apparently, it's not enough.

The SDOP said that the money thing probably hadn't occurred to the IEP team and that it should have. She made serious points for that.

She said she understood the frustration because she'd been on both sides of the IEP table.

She said that there were going to do a occupational therapy evaluation, which would probably be easier to get and that she'd call the Adaptive P.E. person. She said she'd call me before the school break on Friday and let me know the progress and then reestablish contact after school break and we'd keep working on things.

I feel like I understand "going postal" ever so much better, but the depths of the feelings involved here are definitely new and frightening to me. I want to kick asses all over the county. I want to cause trouble and make people pay for not helping. Most of all I want to get a big jumbo container of caulk and seal up all the cracks in this system that would let a beautiful, bright child with a disability bang his head against the proverbial wall of ignorance rather than have equal access to an education. What's more I have talked to parents who've gone through this and I want to find them and band together and share info and then collectively go out and kick some butt.