What does early intervention do?

When Early Intervention works correctly it is suppose to work (and believe me, I have seen it work…just not for us). I think that our Early Intervention Coordinator thought that because AJ had been in an orphanage that he would just “snap” out of it, that he would grow into a little boy like he was supposed to.

Unfortunately, that has not been our case.

He has, for the best part, worked himself out of his Post Traumatic Stress and his Institutional Autism but he still struggles every day with SPD, auditory, visual, and communication disorders, many of these things that could have been addressed when he was two.

We tried to get AJ services, and we did get him private OT and speech for about a year but our funding ran out and our insurance refused to pay anymore. But, what is Early Intervention supposed to do for your child and your family?

Early Intervention is supposed to apply to children 0-3 who are at risk of having a handicap (or have one) or who have a developmental delay. The purpose is to aid families in lessening the effects of the disabilities and handicaps, as they can and often times can be devastating.

According to Kidsource, “Early intervention may focus on the child alone or on the child and the family together. Early intervention programs may be center-based, home-based, hospital-based, or a combination. Services range from identification–that is, hospital or school screening and referral services–to diagnostic and direct intervention programs. Early intervention may begin at any time between birth and school age; however, there are many reasons for it to begin as early as possible”.

Additionally, under IDEA, early intervention services are to be available to all infants and toddlers with disabilities 0-2 no matter their financial status, despite what Michigan told us. But, unfortunately, services can’t be the same in all places because funding is alloted per county and counties are all different. Because we lived in a depressed county we suffered. Now that we live in a much better county we get much better services…but AJ is way past the 0-3 age group and now Early Childhood picks up.

The term “infants and toddlers with disabilities” in the law refers to children (ages birth through 2 years) who need early intervention services in any of the following areas:

* Physical,
* Cognitive,
* Communication,
* Social or emotional, and/or
* Adaptive development.