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Sorry I know very little about this but hope someone knowledgable will come along soon.I think with 3 children already it might be very hard to cope with long term global developmental delay ... but those things are very personal. I'd be checking for how much more the medical advisor expects her to develop. Gap between chronological age and developmental age is not so huge now but will it continue to widen ? At this stage being integrated into mainstream I think says quite little - in my experience of local schools there are often children with severe delay in reception and year 1 but never in year 3 upwards.

children with even severe learning disabilities can go through mainstream school all the way to school leaving. but that aside being in mainstream doesn't tell you how disabled this small person is. I have seen children with microceaphly who are profoundly disabled and others who are only mildly disabled, its a spectrum of disability like most disabilities. my AS has down syndrome (and also microcephaly as a symptom of that), he is very much an 'average to low average' person with down syndrome and is academically working at between 4 and 8 years old but emotionally and physically is 16. with most children with a learning disability you will find that the gap between the ability of the child and of their peers will widen with age. some people see it as getting more disabled or 'plateauing' (hate that word) but it really is that they are just learning much much slower. they do continue to elarn throughout life as do the rest of us. for example my son would learn a new skill and where that new skill in his siblings would have meant they went on to learn another two or three skills for him it meant he had learnt one, isolated, skill and he could then learn a new skill but not neccessarily be able to link the two skills. so he might add 2+3 but adding 3+2 would be a whole new skill to learn. simplistic but you get the idea? My thought would be to see the reports from the ed psych (she'll ahve these with her statement), speech therapist, OT, physio etc (anyone who is involved), portgae if she has had it too. that'll give you a much better idea of what you'll be dealing with. the biggest thing really to deal with is the uncertainty for the childs future. I had to think about a 2 year old and what he'd be like in 20 years time, impossible. he is NOTHING like the young person i thought he'd be. he is far less able than I thought he'd be for starters, but does have a lot of independence skills. I had to consider the family history (his) of schizophrenia and come to terms with what I'd do and how i'd cope if he developed this. there is far more uncertainty with adopted a disabled (particualrly a learning disabled) child. but I have never regretted my decision to do this (well, ok, some days but we all have those don't we??!!).anyway, good luck with the researching and info gathering and hope things work out for you one wa or the other.

thanks so much for your replys its given me lots to think about & so helpful scoobydoo7

We had a little boy of 4 placed with us 7 weeks ago that has microcephally. He does have developmental delay but mainly to us in his speech and certainly not as severe as we were led to believe. The medical reports we received has him functioning at about 2.5 years for gross motor skills and cognitive ability, we do not see this! He can walk, run, jump, hop, walk up stairs properly, ride a bike and scooter all perfectly normally. Re. his cognitive ability watching other children of his age he seems to be age appropriate. So much that we put him back a year at nursery so he was with 3 to 4 year olds and the nursery suggested we move him to be with the 4 to 5 year olds as his understanding of nursery rules and imagination were way above the children he was mixing with. Also the older children would help him with his speech. Emotionally I would say he was younger, (to be expected) likes to be babied a bit, loves cuddles and being carried. He understands everything we say to him and is fairly independent in dressing himself, washing and is now starting to clean his own teeth. He uses a fork appropriately but struggles a bit with a knife. He knows his numbers to 10 and main colours. We are taking each day at a time and are having another paediatric assessment carried out in a few weeks mainly because he has moved LA and our LA want to assess his needs before making the appropriate referrals.I was terrified about microcephally and read lots on the internet and looked up some old posts on the boards which may be helpful to you. Our story so far has not turned out to be as bad as I was expecting but only time will tell what his full potential will be. BM has learning difficulties so he could also have some genetic problems. Please PM me if you would like more info or a chat.x

Sorry also meant to say that we have a BD who is 9 and who dotes on him and has been great in helping bring his speech on and has on most occasions got a lot more patience with him than his new mum!! x

thanks so much almond for sharing that with me its been so helpful

Hi scoobydoo 7, we were informed a couple of day ago that further genetic testing had been carried out on AS (we were not aware this was being done) original genetic tests were clear. However, it has now been identified that he has a small segment of a chromosone missing! We met with a genetic specialist yesterday but they could not really tell us much. They said that it is likely to have come from BM as she has learning difficulties and will also most likely have caused his microcephally. If he develops learning difficulties in the future then this would likely be the reason and as it is genetic if he has kids in the future then they will have 50/50 chance of having same or more severe chromosone issues. Unfortunately, there is no enough data on this to give us an indication of what the future will hold (is there ever) but they did ask us if they could use AS info as part of their research to help other couples in the future.We are not to worried, just taking everything day by day and listening to the nursery staff that are in a better position to see AS in a natural environment and compare him to his peers.Please pm me if you would like any further info.

Hi Scoobydoo,Sorry I've just logged in for the first time in ages and seen your post. I will try and pm you this evening.Almond sorry I owe you a PM and will also try to contact you this evening!Sally