Visual

We’re going visual.

We’ve had two peaceful nights and a successful couple of days in getting my daughter back on an even keel after phantom night-pirates hijacked her and temporarily left a small banshee in her place.

Thankfully, she seems to have been swapped back.

A decision to use more visual aids and prompts in an effort to focus her thoughts and answer her questions seems to be helping.  

People with Prader-Willi Syndrome don’t have very a good short term auditory memory. So a long discussion about why she shouldn’t behave in a certain way and what she should do instead is going to lose her attention before any important points have sunk in. To be honest, I haven’t got PWS and I nearly nodded off before the end of that last sentence, so I can kind of sympathise.

So, at the suggestion of her teacher, we’re making cards and pictures and visual representations of IMPORTANT STUFF. Things like how tall my daughter is in relation to her friends. How many teeth her cousins have. You know, the usual things a 14-year-old obsesses about. Well the usual things this 14-year-old obsesses about.

The Tooth Count Card, in particular, is going to be well-thumbed. I suspect it may have had more than a little to do with my girl’s recent wayward sleeping patterns. Because yesterday we had an orthodontist appointment, and my daughter was told she will have to have four teeth out and braces fitted. 

I was pretty pleased with her calm reaction to bad news. Although we already knew this was probably what the orthodontist was going to say, it was still news that my girl didn’t really want to hear. I’d had a chat with the orthodontist beforehand and asked if she could use pictures and visual images to explain everything to my daughter, and she couldn’t have been more patient, or more clear. My girl was miffed, there was no denying it. “I’m not very happy,” she said, looking not very happy. But we kept things simple, kept things calm, and told her that if her teeth were just left to continue growing wonky, then she’d end up only being able to eat soup. Sometimes you just gotta use the food thing. The dentist also provided a picture showing which teeth are going to be taken out. It's there in black and white if Josie asks the question: "Do I have to have any teeth out?" or "How many?", which she will. Many times. 

So I’m ringing round tonight, to get all her cousins who have had braces fitted to tell me a) if they had to have any teeth out and b) to count up how many gnashers they’ve got left. This will provide the raw data for an artwork which won't win any prizes but just might save my sanity.

Blondie - Picture This

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