Almost done?
We had another appointment with Dr. H yesterday. This was to be the boy child's third session of cognitive behavioral therapy for the outdoors/bugs issue. The plan was going to be to step up the boy's recess plan -- encouraging him to stay out for longer than 10 minutes and teaching him some relaxation techniques to get through it.
However.
When Dr. H heard how well the boy was doing, that plan was pretty much scrapped. The boy has been going out to recess every single day for the entire recess period and hasn't really shown any undue anxiety while out there (according to his teachers). Plus he's been going out on his own at home and having a great time. So obviously the recess plan doesn't need any modification, and the doctor doesn't want to get into the relaxation techniques because (a) the boy doesn't seem to need them right now, and (b) we're a little afraid the boy would perseverate on the relaxation thing and that would become an issue (you know, thinking he had to do his relaxation exercises every time he went outside, instead of just playing like he's doing now -- and I can totally see that happening, knowing the boy as well as I do).
And so, we don't have to go back to Dr. H until two weeks after school lets out (which is Wednesday of next week). Dr. H and the boy have dubbed his next appointment "Graduation Day". Because if, outside of the structure of his school day, the boy is continuing to go outside and enjoy the outdoors, then our work here is done, more or less.
There are some other issues we might need to work on at some point, and if we do, it's good to know Dr. H is around because we've been really happy with him. We are now very glad we followed our instincts and went to a psychologist rather than approaching a psychiatrist with a possible anxiety diagnosis. It amazes me that this absolutely paralyzing fear has more or less disappeared in just over a month with CBT, and it horrifies me to think that if we had approached this differently, we might right now be giving the boy psychoactive drugs for an anxiety disorder he doesn't even have.
However.
When Dr. H heard how well the boy was doing, that plan was pretty much scrapped. The boy has been going out to recess every single day for the entire recess period and hasn't really shown any undue anxiety while out there (according to his teachers). Plus he's been going out on his own at home and having a great time. So obviously the recess plan doesn't need any modification, and the doctor doesn't want to get into the relaxation techniques because (a) the boy doesn't seem to need them right now, and (b) we're a little afraid the boy would perseverate on the relaxation thing and that would become an issue (you know, thinking he had to do his relaxation exercises every time he went outside, instead of just playing like he's doing now -- and I can totally see that happening, knowing the boy as well as I do).
And so, we don't have to go back to Dr. H until two weeks after school lets out (which is Wednesday of next week). Dr. H and the boy have dubbed his next appointment "Graduation Day". Because if, outside of the structure of his school day, the boy is continuing to go outside and enjoy the outdoors, then our work here is done, more or less.
There are some other issues we might need to work on at some point, and if we do, it's good to know Dr. H is around because we've been really happy with him. We are now very glad we followed our instincts and went to a psychologist rather than approaching a psychiatrist with a possible anxiety diagnosis. It amazes me that this absolutely paralyzing fear has more or less disappeared in just over a month with CBT, and it horrifies me to think that if we had approached this differently, we might right now be giving the boy psychoactive drugs for an anxiety disorder he doesn't even have.
posted by Miss Anthrope at 8:43 AM
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