Global Developmental Delay Support for mums

[learmond]

My daughter had a liver transplant at age 12months and 3 weeks, she has gdd, but has started kindy last week and is doing well, they are wonderful with her and are going to get an aid in as well to help but she is doing great. I am just so happy she is here and at kindy and smiling every day.

[clucky77]

that's good news.
i am just so sad adn anxious still, and need to seek help on how to cope with the wait. i can't get in for some help for another week or so, so it's just going to be a matter of coping with the anxiety myself till then

[Irene Mosley]

Hi, could you tell me what age your bub was when able to crawl walk talk etc.

I am a grandmother to a 20 month old beautiful little girl who was born 11 weeks early with many many problems, she is still on oxygen, nasal feed tube, just had her dislocated hip fixed, and many other problems but the one causing much much distress for my daughter is she has just been told she has sever global developmental delay and the way she was told was horrid more or less there isn't much hope for her, we live north of Brisbane and my daughter is a mess in tears every day not coping at all. The part annoying me is not knowing the outcome as we don't want to build up false hopes saying everything will be ok when it may not but I was just wandering are there sometimes success stories with global developmental delay? My granddaugher is so so happy and as soon as you speak to her she gives the biggest smile but that is about all she can do at the moment and she is 20 months old but had many medical problems and was so so premmie I guess we are all just at our wits end !
not knowing what the outcome will be. My daughter is really struggling with this diagnosis I suggested councelling but she isn't interested in that. Any advice would be much welcome and if anyone can point me to any success storeies also would be much appreciated.
CONCERNED NAN.

[Irene Mosley]

Hi, could you tell me what age your bub was when able to crawl walk talk etc.

I am a grandmother to a 20 month old beautiful little girl who was born 11 weeks early with many many problems, she is still on oxygen, nasal feed tube, just had her dislocated hip fixed, and many other problems but the one causing much much distress for my daughter is she has just been told she has sever global developmental delay and the way she was told was horrid more or less there isn't much hope for her, we live north of Brisbane and my daughter is a mess in tears every day not coping at all. The part annoying me is not knowing the outcome as we don't want to build up false hopes saying everything will be ok when it may not but I was just wandering are there sometimes success stories with global developmental delay? My granddaugher is so so happy and as soon as you speak to her she gives the biggest smile but that is about all she can do at the moment and she is 20 months old but had many medical problems and was so so premmie I guess we are all just at our wits end !
not knowing what the outcome will be. My daughter is really struggling with this diagnosis I suggested councelling but she isn't interested in that. Any advice would be much welcome and if anyone can point me to any success storeies also would be much appreciated.
CONCERNED NAN.

[MeagsnEva]

Irene your post takes me straight back to feeling this way & I really feel for both you & your daughter- how lucky she is to have you.

Your grandaughter has had a really hard start to life, with the oxygen, NG tube alone you would expect her to be struggling with keeping up her milestones. There are many stories of kids catching up in their own time but (for me) the most important things was to rule out any things that may be going on that might be causing the delay.

What is really hard too is that in talking with a councillor, from my experience, they try to get you deal with something where you dont know what the outcome is going to be. Talking to other parents you might hear a sucess story or you might hear one where the child receives a definative diagnosis - again you dont know what situation you will be in so its hard - which is no doubt why your daughter feels so hopeless.

If the doctors are passing off her dev delay on the fact she was premmie perhaps it would help to go to them and say you are not satisifed with that & would like them to search for some more answers.

I didnt give you any sucess stories, Im sorry! I heard alot in our case and although they helped me short term I wasnt satisfied until I knew what was going on with my daughter (and remember just because there was something going on with my daughter it doesnt mean your grqandaughter is the same)

All my thoughts are with you at this difficult time.

[monkeytoes]

I am trying to get my head around "Global Development Delay". Am I correct that any child under the age of 6 can be classified as GDD if they are delayed in 2 or more areas (not meeting milestones)?

Can someone please tell me what tests are carried out to confirm a diagnosis? Are the tests done by a Paedeatrician? Or is a done by a team of specialists (Speech/O.T etc)?

My DD1 (3yrs 9months) has been attending O.T for almost a year now. She is about 18 months delayed with fine and gross motor skills. She has just started going to Speech therapy as she is behind in receptive speech and has limited play skills.

We are yet to see a Paedeatrician. Does this mean she has GDD? Or is there further testing we need to do? I am feeling a bit lost and not sure what I need to be doing........

[MeagsnEva]

Most medical professionals classify GDD as delays in two or more areas. Paeds are more likely to diagnose from lack of obvious milestones & things like reflexes that are still present (like the Moro reflex etc). but the very important role they play is to discuss why this is happening? They might look at doing bloods testing initially to see if there is any medical reason why your child is falling behind?
With the actually milestones, there are online these yourself, there are also professional ones that the therapists often use - they may have gotten you to fill out one?? I have one somewhere, I will repost when I find out what the name is. They are horribly disconcerting & I hate filling them out!
In the end, GDD just a tag or a name for them to give your child until they know if there is anything else going on that is causing the delay.
Of course there may be nothing going on & your child will catch up on his/her own! They sometimes also use one like "Floppy baby syndrome" - again - a tag (and not a very nice one!)
Its horrible to feel out of control with your own child & their development. Sometimes you just have to scream & yell to make sure someone cares as much as you do and that is also draining.
I hope this stage passes quickly for you & get some answers & assistance!
Please feel free to message me if you want any more info about the types of testing they might look at, but as I said - your child might catch up on their own so try really hard (easy to say I know) not to let this consume you.
Hugs

[3BoysBlue]

both my boys have GDD

DS1 was finally diagnosed 6mths ago after me having concerns since he was about 2 1/2yrs old (his now 4yrs)
and being fobbed off saying his fine and wait until he 4
his now 4 and all this issues have came to there surface if they had listened when he was younger
things might have been better

where now currently awaiting an ASD assessmentand he has a developmental assessment in 2wks
he as language and speech delays, most likely sensory issues as well,
and some gross motor and fine motor delays

DS2 is 2 1/2yrs and has had gross/fine motor and speech and language delays
(caused by hearing issues) since he was about 8mths old
his slowly catching up his still a bit behinds others his age but his getting there slowly

both boys attend Early Intervention