Yes. My model car is 50% of the way there in Europe. Stefanie

I'd make sure the two barns teach the same things before comparing. When I hear saddle seat, I think of gaited horse shows and not dressage and jumping. They are very different approaches to riding and handling horses. Stefanie

LOL! I found bird feathers in one of my dog's preferred eating places yesterday. She's quite the bird catcher....although I'm not sure how she is fast enough since she's fairly obese. This is also the dog that would go fetch turtles out of the pond. I'm sure my two have caught, and eaten, their fair share of birds, squirrels, rabbits, and cats. Stefanie

Ugh....I had that happen to me in a pet store. I was walking my newly blind dog out of the training area, and some dog just runs up on her. Owner just didn't get it and kept insisting it was 'all right, his dog wouldn't bite". I was like, you obviously don't get it....MINE WILL! And then my dog would suffer you being an idiot. And to prove my point, we were waiting outside for my ride and two girls walked by talking at a distance. My dog spun around and started growling at them. She was a very alpha type personality and was losing her place as top dog. She didn't take it very well and was very reactionary outside the house. Stefanie

My DH has one kid that has rejected the family. He had the nerve to tell us that we owed it to him to make him a 'kept' college student (as in we fork over cash for all of his needs and whims in addition to paying the school) but he couldn't be expected to maintain a basic family relationship with us because we were just too abusive and controlling. Any contact is met with venom or an air of 'I'll make you do what I want you to do." That defines rejecting family to me, a nasty and punitive reaction to family expectations. In some ways is is about not fighting with them and just letting them go and learn the hard way. And of course you don't pay for it just because they want it. If even a simple Happy Birthday text to your child came back with the response of F- you, would you be giving that child a b-day gift? Paying for that child's car? Their clothes? The 10 day cruise to Hawaii they want to take over spring break with their college buds just because they want it? Would you think very highly of someone else who did? Stefanie

I admit, I do stop my kid short over that attitude (not that you haven't). My DD is only 8, so she isn't expected to do things on her own with the current horse (he's too tall for her to groom/tack up properly) but she is expected to help. She's told every lesson that the horse works very hard for her to be able to ride so it is her responsibility to work very hard to take care of him properly by both myself and our instructor. Show barn or not, the attitude that the students are not responsible for the horse is a bit of a deal breaker for me. If a working student option isn't available, you might try bringing your concerns to the instructor and see if there are other small ways to increase some of the responsibility. If most of the lesson kids are boarding their own horse the care aspect maybe is just a bit overlooked. Can she get there early to help catch and bring up the horse for the lesson? Can she stay a few minutes to pick the stall out after lessons? Can she help turn back out? Sometimes you can get a lot of extra in just by expressing an interest of "anything you want some help with?" Honestly, I'm not very keen on the lesson structure you describe, but I've never ridden in semi - private lesson so it may be standard. It might be worth a trial with another instructor. Stefanie

I'd look into 'working student' options at your local barns. Most offer work for lessons too. My daughter and I have both been taking lessons from a lady for the last 6 months and for her students who are looking to move into their own horses she teaches them horse care as a working student. We are frantically working on building a barn and learning horse care this summer because my instructor is downsizing and she offered to have us take our lesson horse home. DD got her first lesson in stall mucking yesterday. Stefanie

Keep in mind, I'm practically living this situation. Mentally ill mom who is/has been "suicidal", years of therapy and never quite stable was not only severely neglectful of the kid but did made a direct threat of harm against the kid. Child was removed from the dad because he refused to acknowledge the potential danger his wife posed to the kid. While most won't...when it is the life or safety of a child at stake, do you want to take the 1% chance? I personally won't ever take that chance. CPS and the authorities won't take that chance. I strongly caution anyone in this situation to be very careful about the situation and to act as if it is a real possibility while in the crisis. It is better to be safe than sorry. Stefanie

My DH started calling every few weeks 6 months out to make sure his CS was going to turn off on time. Every other change in CS he hand delivered the new orders and made sure the CS person in payroll made the changes in the computer in person. We never had a problem with the CS office. When DH was out when my daughter was born, we contacted them before the payments dropped off his paychecks to find out how to pay until his checks picked back up. But the guy who owns the horse I'm riding payed CS on three kids long after two of them should have dropped off and didn't catch it until a few months before the third kid graduated. Stefanie

None of that justifies keeping a kid with a parent they don't want to be with, usually for VERY good reasons. Or relieves a parent of their financial obligation to support a child when the child chooses to live with the other parent. Scarlett's SS has his reasons for wanting to change the custody arrangement. Don't belittle them because you have to move mountains to change custody against kid/mother's will at the age of 16. It isn't the kids job to be his mother's paycheck. Stefanie

This is extremely concerning, especially since the mom is so concerned with control. Considering a 2 y/o and 6 m/o, this is severe neglect. If CPS were to somehow get involved the kids would be yanked from the dad as well unless he was prepared to distance himself from mom. You all need to realize that the mom is not likely to ever improve in regard to caring for the kids. This kind of indifference from a parent over their childhood leaves worse scars than the physical neglect. My DIL and stepson are this situation. DIL is too unstable to raise the kid and my stepson is too co-dependent to stand up to her and put the kid first. Hence, three years later the kid is still with us. In this situation, the wife is the adult and the kids need to be put first and protected from their mom. If she can get better, great, but if not, then it's sad, but they need limited exposure to her. Stefanie

Yes. And it is a reason to keep the kids from a parent indefinitely. If dad gets caught up in it, he'll be collateral damage unless he's made effort to distance himsel. Stefanie

We have custody of a grandkid for these issues. This is very serious issue. Dad needs to put the kids first while dealing with this in case things go wrong and he gets penalized by being with the mom. Someone might need to go to court for some kind of temporary guardianship until things can get worked out. Stefanie

She still has a speech articulation issue that needs an SLP. I also got a lead today for someone who is a former ps person who will be able to do officially recognized dyslexia diagnoses. It seemed the speech uses the CTOPP differently than to treat dyslexia (?)because I asked about it even though I know they don't diagnose it. She felt the same as I do, just doesn't quite see dyslexia. Once I see the actual scores and the report I'll know more. Stefanie

Okay, so evals done. On the GS, the parents did show. Turned out exactly as I expected......low end of normal and just watch for the next 6 mo - 1 year to make sure he continues to progress. For DD, she did a CTOPP. She didn't even run the supplements, just the core, because she saw enough frustration to tell there was enough for treatment. Says the problems were all over the place with no real pattern. R's were a problem but she said there were a ton of ways to make the R sound and DD made some of them and not others. Plan is to work on things for a couple of months and get to know DD and reassess for exploration in other areas (audiology/dyslexia diagnosis). The bonus, they do multidisciplinary meetings about each child in treatment so she's going to talk to the OT/PT about possible referral for eval or at least some specific exercises to work on at home. Stefanie

He was not adopted, but he was very much RAD through years of severe systematic parental alienation by his mother (yes, it does exist). The reality is that the OP is not in a position to attach strings to this child or even give him life advice; the attachment isn't there and it isn't the right developmental stage of the child to be trying to create it. Placing a burden to meet a list of requirements where you are checking up on them is a big no. It is just seen as coercive to a child that is making it pretty clear they think you have no business being their parent and having any say over their lives. And then, when the kid eventually doesn't follow the "rules" you are stuck having to follow through and further damaging the attachment. The big tenets of RAD is limit the battles and not rescuing them from the consequences of their actions. Sink/swim IS the natural consequences of eschewing the safety net of family. He wants to be independent and the OP needs to let him be, with consistent reminders that he has a place to come back to if he needs it. Whatever help the OP gives should be about enabling him to be independent not designed to bring him back to the fold or keep him on a straight and narrow. Stefanie

My BTDT advice, drop the strings. It makes things worse and doesn't do anything for the better. Figure out what you want to do and do it because you love him and not because you are trying to coerce a relationship. Focus on sending him a weekly email/text/phone call keeping him up to date on what is going on and extending invites to things. We had the exact situation with my husband's youngest son that you are describing. Doing everything he can to move out (even tried a CPS report to get removed) and wound up graduated early and placed in college/dorm at 17. I probably wouldn't do monthly money as it is too easy to abuse and is too enabling. I'd focus on giving him the tools to be independent (car/place to live might be hard at 17) until he turns 18 and then letting him sink/swim with everything else. It has nothing to do with being cruel....but it you want to eschew family, then you better be about the business of living your life without your safety net. You can PM me if you want more of the gritty details of what we did, both right and wrong. Stefanie

My gut is leaning toward APD issues because of family history. We have no family history of hearing issues, but on dad's side she has two cousins with autism and related issues. APD is common with autism, correct? So, most likely its APD related than hearing loss related. But, well see what the SLP says. Stefanie

Her WISC-IV scores indicate a non-verbal profile. But while she reads/comprehends well, but she breaks down at the phonogram level there as well. Her reading scores on the WISC were all over the map honestly. There are issues with her hearing words correctly and saying words too. If I say brownie, she may inquire about if I said grownie. She'll often add sounds as well. Stefanie

OhE, It is long an complicated....and I'll be brief. GS was removed by CPS at 1 month of age for mental health/drug issues in both parents (mom's being severe and ongoing since she is trying to get on disability). You know that post partum depression checklist that you look at and question who in their right mind says these kinds of things even if you might think them sometimes....well, yeah..... The parents are essentially strangers in his life. His first 3 months with completely open ended visitation, they spent less than 6 hours a week with him. In the last year and a half they've spent on average only 12 hours per two weeks with him.....He will be 3 next month, 3 1/2 by the time we actually get around to seeing the judge. The problem is they have unrealistic expectations of his speech. One particularly heartbreaking visit, he threw a ball over his baby gate to get their attention. He said, 'mom ball and a slurred please' and pointed over the gate at the ball. For 20 minutes she refused to go get the ball until he said to her "Mom, go get the ball please." She expected that exact sentence and directly stated she wouldn't go get it until he said it. Court is essentially to remove the language that defines a plan working towards returning the child. This is not the make or break issue for our case. There is a long standing history of neglect/abuse. The speech issue actually is pretty negligible. I just didn't want his eval to turn into this. I wanted it to be honest, not smeared with lies for the sake of court. Stefanie

Okay, I could just cry. We just told my GS parents about the eval because we are court ordered to. And the first reaction from his mom was to look over at the GS and say, "I hope you have a bad speaking day that day." I know that she is going to come in and try to tank this eval to make it a court issue because it's the only thing they have that they think they can make a stink over to paint us as unfit parents. He really is *fine*. They just can't understand him because they don't spend any time with him, and the little time they do spend they don't focus on him. I just hope the SLP doesn't get swayed by their BS. Stefanie

OhE - we'll have a full 2 hours per kid to eval (4 total hrs with the SLP). As for the GS, he's an easy keeper. He also needs to go second because I don't want his parents tainting the SLP if they show up before she has a chance to do my daughters eval. They've made it a court issue so I'm sure they'll show up and make asses of themselves. Story girl - it is a private eval. My husband is a hospital employee so it is through his employer's outpatient rehab services. She is also so ADHD you can't miss it.....extreme hyperactivity in addition to nonstop talking and inattention. I spent 45 minutes with a screener discussing my concerns when we made the appointments and she said she was taking notes for the SLP to review and formulate a tentative plan prior to the actual eval. I do want to get an audiologist screen, but nothing sticks out on our insurance listings. Our pedi is great, but he is new to the area so he hasn't quite gotten a full reference list for some of these evals. I'm hoping the SLP may be able to direct me somewhere since they are closer to that field. Stefanie

I've been waiting 4 months for DD's eval and 2 months for GS eval. They are 8 and almost 3. Finally got the scheduling call today and we'll be doing the evals next week, back to back. Is there anything I need to be aware of to ask about/bring? I'm honestly not too concerned about GS's eval. I only asked for the referral because while I was at DD's ADHD appt with the pedi my gut was screaming at me to do so. We are currently in the middle of a custody issue and his speech came up (How is that for intuition?). He really is fine though, maybe on the late bloomer side of things, but since I've put in the referral he's picked up by leaps and bounds. He finally started saying the long e sound just last week. DD is my main concern. She has lots of trouble with spelling. She reads/comprehends well, but doesn't seem to really grasp the phonograms. She'll sound out the words correctly but put down the wrong letters when writing. She likes things loud and she talks loud. She'll mix up hearing blends. She has a hard time making/hearing some of the sounds, especially r. I was told to bring her WISC scores for them to look at. I'm hoping I can get some answers for the spelling difficulty and if not a better idea of where to go from here than the pedi can give me. Stefanie