Update

Well we saw the developmental pediatrician today. It was about an hour long evaluation of mostly just questions for us. She said that he is obviously speech delayed. Her concerns were his receptive and expressive. She said he tested above average on his cognitive. :) Also his social skills. She showed concern when we told her how he interacted (or lack there of) with kids his own age and she said it wasn't THAT uncommon for kids with speech delay to act that way. Obviously there is that link of understanding missing since he is delayed in his communication. It is like dropping us off in Japan. It would be overwhelming not being able to communicate any of your needs. Also his lack of eye contact during play time. When being praised for doing something right he doesn't look at us or the doctor for more praise or to show that he wants to continue doing it. he just simply tries to grab what he wants to do it again and that is all he was concerned about. He didn't look around for more praise like "hey look at me, look what I did."

She did give him a provisional diagnosis of being on the autism spectrum. Provisional just means that they are not 100% sure that it is autism, but that is there most educated guess. He is also too young to officially diagnose. She said they can't usually give an official diagnosis until 3 or 4 years of age. Obviously the spectrum for autism varies so much and we know that Alex is not very bad. Ye,s he has things he needs to work on, but with the appropriate therapies we fully believe that he will begin to strive and live a very normal life. If not, that is okay. It doesn't change anything for us. But that is what we believe. He has shown so much improvement over the last few weeks with his speech therapy and everyone is noticing a change in his attention span. He actually likes to play with his toys! This is kind of a first for him. Unless we initiated the play, he wouldn't be that interested in it.

She was very helpful with a variety of things. She told us we were very lucky to have the insurance that we do. Apparently they cover just about everything, which is great. When we explained JIMS situation to her and that he may not be staying in, she decided to go ahead and order a bunch of tests so that we could get it done on the militaries money! :) She ordered:
1. another hearing test
2. an EEG to make sure that when he is spacing off it isn't a seizure
3. we are being referred to an allergist to test for more food allergies
4. we are going to have blood work done to test for celiac disease, which is a food allergy to gluten, genetic testing, chromosome testing, and a bunch of other stuff.

We feel very fortunate that she was so willing to help us out and get as much done as possible before Jim is possibly discharged. Overall, the appointment was what I expected it to be. I am just anxious to get the tests back and see where we can go from here.

Thanks for all the well wishes we have received over the last few weeks. It has been an emotional roller coaster, but I am glad I had my moment of "freak out" before the appointment. I left there feeling very comfortable about what lies ahead for us.