Open, you are in the money that is wonderful. I’m not sure either, could school advise? I would also hope if you contacted a professional and said is this something you feel you can help with and how, they would give an honest steer on that before just taking the money.
Ahna, the lowest dose I thought for melatonin was 2mg this is the typical start point. As Open says, slow release (though that does involve swallowing the tablet whole.) I don’t think it’s uncommon to not sustain sleep in which case you have 3 options, 1. Move to slow release if you can (if it isn’t that already) 2. Up the dose 3. Couple it or replace it with another sedative which sustains sleep (melatonin is well known for inducing but not sustaining sleep.) We use a tiny amount of alimemazine as part of option 3 and it works amazingly.
Things have been quite tough here, I started with an awful vomiting bug that lasted 24 hours of constant vomiting then wiped me out for a week. DS then got it before I was well enough to be looking after him. We are now both OK but DS for some reason known only to himself has a new party trick of screaming/ screeching randomly and then finding it hilarious when I tell him off. He does it and looks for a reaction, the more I tell him to stop the more he is doing it and finding it just hilarious. It’s making leaving them house very hard. I asked if he’s doing it at school and they said no (FFS…). I do find it really really hard to have a child who is non verbal and non communicative (as in using a recognised system like PECS) but to have that on top of a child who is constantly screaming is unbearable.
Ahna I totally hear you, sorry if it’s un PC but no I’m not singing from the rooftops about the situation we have either. Not that DS is ND, that’s absolutely fine, but the specifics. Being non verbal. Not picking up PECS. Having daily toilet accidents. Not having friends. Not following many instructions. And now fucking screaming all the time. Not what I envisaged for DD either in terms of her having a sibling support/ friendship when we were planning DS as a second child.
I think Ahna rather than stressing about the SEN world it’s better to look at it like it’s a label/ description but so what… your DD is where she is now, as is my DS and they have their current benchmark. By sending them to a SEN school (which is just a term) you are placing them, hopefully, in the best environment for them to progress beyond that current benchmark. I for one have had DS in a ‘normal’ MS school for 2 years where he’s made no progress above that benchmark, he’s been babysat and stagnated. So yes, I could say happily my children both go to x school, our local MS but what’s he’s getting out of it? Zero. So whilst I don’t embrace SEN school either if it moves him on, I would send him anywhere. I hope that makes sense. I have another thread on SEN schools and progress and what can be attributed to the school you may have seen.
On a final note what I do find hard is the reaction of other people when I say about DS school. He gets the bus home now and we live in nosey neighbourhood ville. I can see the certain twitching when it pulls up. One neighbour pounced on me the other day, I knew why. She said oh!! I see DS has erm changed schools. I explained. She said ‘oh dear, I’m really sorry. There but for the grace of God is what I say.’ I mean how do you respond to that??!