Preschool Years

Hunter first started school in Ida and his teacher was Tammy Castiglione and she was amazing she helped us so much.Hunter then moved to Summerfield for his 2nd year of preschool his teacher was still Tammy and I was so excited because she was wonderful and then we met Miss Michelle and I couldn't ask for a better teachers aide EVER she has been Hunter's support system from day one.He has given her alot of trouble but she just keeps on going you will hear more on Miss Michelle throughtout the years.So the 2nd year of preschool was a lil better.He was 3.5 and we had our doctor appointment for his diagnosis it was about 6 hours long of evaluations and activities and then the doctors conferred and called Cliff and I in the room for what they had diagnosed and we got the news it was Autism his label was mild to moderate.I just knew we could finally get him all of the help he needed because his current label was just speech delayed.We tried alot of things over the years with much family and friend support we tried ABA(applied behavior anaylsis)a very good program but Hunter needed one on one 24/7 to make it work we started with such a good support team,My best friend Laurie started a candle fundraiser for us ABA is not something covered by insurance it is out of your own pocket and just to have the first appointment would cost us $600 and every visit after was $70.We raised around $1300 so we knew it wouldnt go far but we tried anyway.Cliff,Laurie,Tammy his teacher and myself got very intense training on how to do this and Laurie and I attended seminars with Kim Renner the ABA instructor it turned out to be very hard for all of us to keep up with it since we all had full time jobs and it seemed Hunter was not getting what I expected.During that school year Hunter was granted a scholarship to take a class for a month called the CHIPs program we drove him everyday to Toledo for a month and he attended school just on Friday that month it was great he was with a couple other children at his same level they had a routine just like school with a lot of coping mechanisms and there was an observation room where we could watch the whole day if we wanted without him seeing us.