It's official - cross post

The evaluation went well today, and M was diagnosed with "presumed fetal alcohol exposure," which I believe translates into FAE or "fetal alcohol effects."

My husband and I are feeling strangely good about everything. We now know, and can stop searching for reasons or explanations to explain M's wide array of delays.

The bulk of the evaluation was set up as a "where do we go from here" session with the doctor, who was able to answer all our questions about M's prospects, likely outcomes, and best interventions. He repeatedly told us that we are doing everything right and only suggested a few additional things we could pursue, like social skills therapy and having another educational evaluation done after the school year's over to see if how far M's come with the interventions we've tried to date.

The doctor believes that M's learning disabilities will likely be his biggest challenge, and strongly recommended we have genetic testing done to see if there are any other contributing factors to his difficulties. He believes that we will likely have to guide M into a vocational track when he reaches high school, which is something that we were already thinking about.

Since M is pretty much in control of his behavior now and isn't suffering from uncontrollable impulses, he doesn't foresee any major behaviorally-related or criminal challenges ahead for us. We did talk about the possibility of behavior issues which might arise if he recognizes how delayed he is and loses confidence in himself, believes he is stupid, and/or gets depressed.

We will arrange for annual follow-ups with the doctor to see how M's progressing. At those meetings he will help us brainstorm about any necessary changes to how we are handling things. Most comfortingly, he will always be available to us if we need advice on new behaviors, issues, or patters we see emerging.

So, now we are figuring out how much of this we are sharing, and with whom. We've decided that we will not tell the school, and aside from my parents, who knew we were pursuing the evaluation, we aren't telling anyone that this is related to fetal alcohol. For our families and anyone who needs to know details, we will share that he has a congenital brain abnormality that is causing his learning disabilities, and that he's not likely to ever catch up to his peers. For friends and other close people, we will say that dealing with his delays will be a lifelong process, and that they are most likely due to a lack of prenatal care. And for people who work with him but don't really need to know details, like his football coaches, we're leaning towards just explaining that he isn't capable of understanding abstract concepts, but will likely understand if the information is presented in a much more simplified manner. Basically, we are avoiding sharing anything that can get back to M and might lead him to making the connection that his first mother did this to him through her drinking.

Other than that, we're feeling pretty good tonight. We have the comfort of knowing the parameters of what we are dealing with and that we can address it through a multi-faceted approach for maximum affect. He's still the same sweet, loving boy he was yesterday and a few months ago. Now we just have more information about how to best help him. Come January, we'll look into the genetic testing, and then we'll schedule another educational evaluation in the Spring/Summer. Other than that, we're back to our regularly scheduled program....