Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Crystal-ball, anyone?

I had to giggle a little this morning.  Yesterday's post has now hit my 5th most popular post.  Actually, if you take out the 2 posts that I think someone bookmarked, it becomes number 3.  Drama certainly does draw attention.

On today's agenda....the kids' conferences at school.  As a PTA board member, I am up at the school all the time, so in general...I already know how they are doing.  No surprises today.

However, one thing on the list of things to talk about with Bossy's teachers (because at conferences....we have a HOARD of people)...is his future planning meeting.  This was brought up in February, and it is time to revisit it now that testing is over (stupid state testing....). 

Most parents seem to wait until their special needs child is almost out of High School to do this.  And then they freak out that their almost adult child will no longer be covered under certain things, and OMG, we have no idea what to do now.

After a lengthy discussion with his teachers, we decided that we (as in his parents) are ready to do this.  What does this mean?  Not much.  It is a fluid thing....we can plan for things now, but when he is 13, 15, 17...it may be different.  The idea is to at least set a basic path for him, and we can change it as we go.

But our goal for him is to have as independent life as possible.  Maybe live in a supported house (as in, there will be someone who helps monitor things), have a job...maybe a cat.  Academics are such a struggle for him.  We need to change the focus more towards academics that have real world applications.  This will be the first step.

What does this have to do with money....ALOT.  Our future planning has to include HIS future planning.  If we are going to be largely supporting THREE adults, we need to know that!  Again, this is all fluid, and this is just the first step.  But knowledge is power.

Happy Wednesday!

6 comments:

  1. You area brave woman and I am glad you are approaching this now. It will be more fair and provide him with a much happier useful life. Which is what we all want for our children.

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  2. Good for you! I think this is a wise approach! :)

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  3. We will be having this meeting in June. So far it looks like T will be heading to main stream Kindergarten with an aide and ST & OT during school hours not home school like now. I have a "rough-draft" road map of our future planning for him but of course anything and everything could change at a moments notice.

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  4. It helps so much when you have teachers who honestly want the best for your kid and who can help you through the planning stages. I wish the best for you!

    I don't know what it is - there must be some kind of springtime bug that brings out the worst in commenters. I've seen it on several blogs in the last two weeks and it's making an appearance on mine - and my blog is so new that very few people even are there.

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  5. Your kids are blessed to have a Mommy who plans these things in advance and is looking out not only for their best interests now but also in the future! :)

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  6. We too think about the future for our Andrew and our goal is his independence. So far, everyone is on board with our vision (his TA says her goal with every child she has is to put herself out of a job), and our vision is much like yours. He's only 8, but it's so important to look ahead. You're doing the right thing!!

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