feel like I'm drowning in paperwork, am I doing it wrong?

[elliejjtiny]

I'm finding the quantity of paperwork that comes with my dc's overwhelming at the moment. I've got 5 dc with various different SN and I can manage the DC ok (apart from the stress of operations but I've got another thread about that) but really struggling with paperwork. At the moment I'm trying to do 1 blue badge application, 1 DLA form, 1 family fund application, 2 home to school communication books and a visual timetable.

All the forms seem to want copies of various forms of proof that I'm telling the truth. I've been trying to file everything in the right order with a different folder for each child and for each year. I've got to admit it's helpful and I no longer panic when the school or dr surgery ask me to bring in someone's birth certificate, or someone else wants our family fund number or the details of an appointment from 2 years ago. But the organising takes so long.

Is it supposed to be this hard? Are there any quick ways of doing this stuff? Will the preschool be expecting a nice book of photos with detailed descriptions or will a few photos stuck to an A4 piece of card with a sentence under each one be ok? It's so the staff at preschool can talk to my non verbal dc about what they did in the holidays or at the weekend. It sounded like a good idea at the meeting but now I'm trying to do it it's taking forever.

Well, I feel I'm drowning under the paperwork of two dc with sn, so I'm not at all surprised you're overwhelmed. I operate a similar box folder system, but everything is starting to get a little blurred and I lost an impt letter from cahms to go for our dla form . I also find the pressure of coordinating all these appts pretty overwhelming - just the logistics. I think photos stuck on paper with a sentence would be fine. If pics are stored electronically, would it be easier to do on computer and print out???

I think having even one dc with special needs is equivalent to starting up and running a small business. There are endless forms and rules and regulations to deal with. It takes ages to get things started off, then life can be much smoother, but still hard work, for short periods. There are some predictable but severe increases in workload plus regular crises and unforeseen problems to resolve.

I have several large files of information/records/letters regarding the health of family members (I suppose you could say we're an unhealthy family).

Every so often I do a one page summary of what's happened to date. This is great for medical appointments when you see someone new as they won't have time to go through the huge file of notes your dc have accumulated and they want to know, succinctly, what the main points are. If they need to know anything else they'll ask.

I also try (but don't always succeed) to do something similar for education. No-one has time to read several pages of info so a one sheet summary and an invitation to request more if they need it is usually good. My GP says she tries to never go over one page of A4 when writing supporting letters for the same reason.

Now I only have one ds who is under 18, so it's "just" keeping up with his situation. I still do some notes at times for oldest ds as his health issues are a bit complicated. I've also kept all my records of a particularly difficult time in his life, medically, as if he has kids he may pass his health conditions on.

And I've kept information about fb ds as he died when he was little before we got a dx of what was wrong with him. Again I'm thinking it might be useful if any of the ds's have their own dc.