I'm so worried about my 7yo DS and am looking for any advice or reassurance.
He is delightful, well behaved at school, loving and affectionate. He has a great wide vocabulary and field of knowledge. However, he is behind in a lot of ways. His reading has been an ongoing saga....I first raised concerns with school in reception and he is now about to go into y3, although obviously yrs 1 and 2 were very disrupted. He still struggles with what should be simple words, eg were, could, their, and his decoding isn't great, eg sometimes he will say the wrong vowel sound in a word like "sent" or say no for on etc. His writing is pretty indecipherable.
He failed the eye test in reception and he then started to wear glasses. He has v poor vision in one eye and had to wear patches for almost 2 years, to strengthen his weak eye. During lockdown we missed kids of appts with opthalmology and they did telephone appts where they recommended phasing out the patches, only to find when we went back that his bad eye had massively regressed so we had to start patching again, but once he was 7 they said the patch was unlikely to be effective anymore and he was discharged, and since then the opticians have said his bad eye has regressed.
He was referred to an Ed psych by his y2 teacher and she said he had no signs of dyslexia and is above average for cognitive ability, and his reading issues are linked to his eyesight issues.
But he also struggles in other ways, eg he went to swimming lessons from
Birth until covid (now on waiting list to restart) and he could never really swim a proper strike except doggie paddle. He can't ride a bike despite us trying to teach him, can't tie his laces.
Today I was reading with him and he started to cry talking about y3 and how they will be expected to read things themselves and he "feels sick" because he can't, and he says there have been times when he has got upset at school and had to take "time out" because he has got upset about not being able to do the work and his throat feels constricted and he feels sick. School have never mentioned this.
I just feel so sad and worried about him, he is just an adorable little boy but is 8 in September and the oldest in his class. His older brother is all round high achiever both in terms of academics and sport so it's hard for him to see him do things effortlessly when he struggles.
I'm really at my wits end with him and not sure where to turn. Any ideas?