what did we all do before the kids?

[lisad123isasnuttyasaboxoffrogs]

or until we had to make changes due to our LOs SN??
I trained to work with children and families. I spent 6 years in SS working on child protection and parenting assessments. I also used to manage a respite group for SN children and worked for 2 years in an emotional and behavioural difficultie unit for chidlren expelled from school.

what do you all do?

Don't be mean Santas - nowt to do with me. I am poorly paid and struggling the same as everyone else.

I was also a banker and blissfully and embarrassingly ignorant of anything SN related.

Have my hands full for now but am vaguely hoping to reboot my career in something a bit more family friendly and rewarding one day. Even though its a long way off I'm already trying to fathom whether its better to channel what you've learnt and do something very SN related, or go completely off at a tangent and do something random that could be more of a release.

I think about ds1s problems 24/7 at the moment and am pretty sure that isn't healthy but can't stop :(

Bloody bankers (don't worry, there'll be a tory along to bait any minute....)

(you get I am kidding right?)

I was a fine art student, a Visual Merchandiser..(window dresser) and a Pub landlady!...till the credit crunch!

Im am a full time Mum right now,Im not sure what the future holds, I may move into photography when I get around to training!

OOh yes, in fact I had Hep jab a few times as it would never take (refused to bother agin after third attempt IIRC)

Wasn't just that though, Grandad was a farmer and has ASD; Aunt worked for a big company in IT, AS; Mum paralegal, AS.

Too many genetics.

Apparently tehre's one theory about Welsh genes bumping your chances. Grandad is a Griffiths; I blame him

I worked in the medical lab at our local hospital, in cervical cytology. Like many of you I had to have Hep B jabs.

Dd's problems are different to many of your dc's on here, so are unlikely to have been caused by the jabs, but I have wondered whether the heavy duty chemicals that I worked with for several years did us any damage!

i was a computer programmer. I also had ME and spent much of the time feeling pretty ill with fevers and exhaustion.

It improved enormously when I had DD - just as well as she needs a lot of energy.

i also had awful fevers in pregnancy, aleays wondering if they affect DD.

Now i work as a dental receptionist part-time , it's OK but the public can be awful and I am still not really a people person.

if they AFFECTED DD, I meant.

That's interesting - I had Hep B jabs. I also had ME/CFS and have never really recovered. I get thorouighly exhausted if I have late nights. I am feeling quite weak right now (hence little posting here lately). Just don't have the energy to think and then press the keys to make a meaningful paragraph.

I got ME when I was 17 (1997), seemed to clear then got a virus when I was just Qualified, 3 months into my first Nursing job (2003). I was unofficially redeployed to theatres, which had a much more 'up and down' workload - full on then rest.

In 2005 I moved to NICU (Feb) and fell pregnant (March) - impressed they were not. I then had viruses at 5 weeks pregnant (signed off for 4 weeks due to CFS symptoms) went back to work and got another virus immediately at 9 weeks (signed off another 4 weeks) - didn't recover.

Awful pregnancy, never had any energy. Working 12 hour shifts in 30 degree heat pushing heavy incubators. Had to go to Occ Health and complain as Senior nurse refused to work with certain babies due to her pregnancy, but then assigned those babies to pregnant me!

I always wonder if my viruses cooked DD1's brain

Again I was another who's attention level lasted months after all the training and was in the job.
However I started off as a nursery nurse. Then went on to do overseas pensions for the government. Then to a factory making cosmetics etc. Then to a paper factory. Then I was a dancer in the cages and bars. My part time job while all these full time jobs were happening was a football coach.
As for the future, I have no idea!!

I was a chef, after i had dd1 i gave it up but still worked with food (as a baker), then when both dd's were diagnossed i gave up work to do therapy at home with dd2 and so i could drive her to her sn nursery, i would like to go back to work when dd2 is full time at school which will be after x-mas but not sure what i want to do yet (maybe work with children with sn's).

I suspect in reality ther isn't the one thing in PG that triggered it, but stress can.

I ahd hyperemesis and was on a drip and highly medicated, then developed pre eclampsia bad enough to be rushed in fitting, the placenta had been bdly affected and ds1 had lost a pound in utero from scans. I think the odds of such a pregnancy not having some effect would be limited- he was 5lb 5oz at term, at average length, not given a SCBU place and not born by CS becuase they lost the bloods every time (there's a condition related to Pre eclampsia called HELLP where if they do a CS you can bleed to death, and without the bloods they coudln;t know).

I did a study once and the more unsusual traits ds1 has- esp. the severe aggression- can be linked in terms of brain locality to the areas affected by SPD and yep, I do think perhaps he'd be more like Mum and I had he not had all teh problems.

Whereas ds3 I think would have been ds3 whatever.

I was a full time civil servant doing an interesting job and hoping to get promoted.

When I was pregnant I told DH I would like a carrer break to be a SAHM (I was brought up by a SAHM). DH was not so sure (his Mum had always worked). Decided that I would take my full 12 month maternity leave and see how the finances held up.

So I ended up a SAHM - no choice (as I'm sure others relate to.) Had my ML and a five year career break. Back to the same departn=ment but in a very part time, term time only role. No job satisfaction, no chance of promotion.......

Sometimes think I'd like to do something else but don't know what!!

But DS is first priority.

i was a publican, strange turn of events and career change means i now work p/time in criminal risk analysis

I was a carer in a residential home for young people with ASD and epilepsy. My pregnancy was faultless and genetic testing on myself and DP concluded that DD's dx of DS and congenital cataracts 'came from nowhere' (helpful!)
It is strange how many of us previously worked in jobs relevant to our home lives now!
These days I work part time as a behaviour management trainer, which is ironic, as I have absolutely no control over my own 15month old daughter - but fear not, I could teach you how to restrain a full grown man if necessary?!

I worked as a nursery nurse looking after special needs children under the age of 3, then relocated and set up and ran my own children's nurseries after gaining my degree.

I then sold up and relocated back home and got my dream job whilst preg with DS (my 3rd child)as a lecturer training nursery nurses.
Then DS was born and spent the first 2 years of life between hospitals and in intensive care. So bye bye career!

I am now finally capable of thinking about what I want to do next, can slightly see the wood for the trees.

However his ongoing nursing needs and episodes in hospital mean I would need a very flexible career and I am a perfectionist who hates to let anyone down. Think I might be a student again for a while.

high school teacher - English, History and German here in aus and in England. In fact I went back for a year when dd1 was 1. I am about to start doing supply teaching one day a week again - after 6 years.

Was: proofreader and copy editor, freelance, had started to study to be an archivist distance learning. Gave up when evenings didn't begin until after 11pm and DS not at school at all.

Now: I write a good letter! I bake and bake - the worse the day the more I bake

Neuroscientist by degree, did some research work then moved into computer programming. After ds2 born became self employed doing web design and software engineering in the evenings.

I was a teacher of children with SLD, PMLD, complex needs and ASD.

I don't know what to do now, teaching is favourite but I have moved home to NI and jobs are hard to come by in teaching.

Secondary maths teacher then assessment expert.

Was in charge of content of KS1, 2, 3 and Y3, 4, 4 and Y7, 8 optional maths tests fro England. Sorry!

I didn't agree with the tests, but wanted them to be good if they had to be done at all.

Might have to namechange now (again)!