Private Services for Families

This week Marcus and I had our regular Tuesday session, two hours at home and at the neighborhood court.

Marcus met me at the door already wearing his shoes, which is new. Three weeks ago, getting out the door was the hardest part of our session. We started with our usual check-in and he picked the order of the afternoon from the three options I gave him: basketball first, then the card game, then our wind-down. Having the pick matters to Marcus. When he owns the order, he moves through transitions without the stalling we used to see.

At the court he lost a game and handled it with one big sigh and nothing else. I named it for him: "You lost and you stayed in it. That's the thing we've been working on." He shrugged, but he heard it. During the card game he brought up a conflict with a classmate on his own, and we talked through what he could say next time instead of walking off. He landed on words that sound like him, not like a script.

One thing to watch: Marcus gets quieter when the subject of the school break comes up. Nothing concerning happened, but changes in routine are still where he wobbles, so I will keep the next two sessions predictable and will preview the break with him before it arrives.

We closed with our breathing routine. He led it this time.

Next session: Tuesday the 17th, same time. Feel free to call before then if anything comes up.

Marcus and I met four times in March, all regular Tuesday sessions.

The month's headline is frustration tolerance. In early March, losing a game or being told "not yet" could still cost us twenty minutes. By the last two sessions, the same moments passed in under a minute, usually with one calm cue and sometimes with none. The structure is doing what it should: Marcus knows the order of our sessions, he gets real choices inside firm limits, and we end every session the same way. Predictability is not a trick with Marcus; it is the ground he stands on.

His strongest moment this month came during a board game on the 23rd, when his tower collapsed two moves from winning. He said, unprompted, "I want to go again," and rebuilt it. Six months ago that moment would have ended the session. I told him exactly that, because Marcus does better when his progress is named out loud, and he is old enough to hear the true story of himself.

The area still needing work is transitions he does not choose, especially leaving an activity he loves. My approach remains the same: preview what is coming, offer a choice about how (not whether), and hold the limit calmly. This is consistent with the structured, low-drama limit-setting I use across my practice, and Marcus responds to it more reliably every month.

For April I plan to hand Marcus more of the session: he will set the order himself and lead the wind-down. The goal is for the regulation to be his, not mine.

Questions any time. Our scheduled call is April 3rd at 7:00 PM.

Deja and I met Wednesday for one hour, focused on her reading comprehension goal and the organization system we started last month.

We opened with the binder check. Deja had used the assignment tracker four out of five school days, up from two last week, and could tell me exactly which day she skipped and why. I care less about the perfect streak than about her knowing her own patterns, and she is starting to.

For reading we worked with an article she chose about sea turtles. Her decoding is solid; the work is in slowing down enough to hold the meaning. We used the mark-and-return method: she flags any sentence that "goes blurry," finishes the paragraph, then goes back. She flagged three, went back to all three, and explained each one in her own words. When she retells something in her own words, it stays with her, so that retell step is doing the real work.

The strength I want you to know about: Deja asked to extend the reading block five extra minutes to finish the article. Persistence with a text she chose is the doorway; the next step is carrying it into texts she does not choose, which is what her school reading demands.

Suggestion for the week: have her read anything of her choosing for ten minutes, then tell you one thing in her own words. The retell is the exercise.

Next session: Wednesday the 18th. I will check the tracker again, and we will start her science study guide together.

Ms. R. arrived ten minutes early with a packed bag: two prepared bottles, wipes, a change of clothes, and a blanket for the grass.

Amara reached for her mother as soon as she saw her. Ms. R. spent the first stretch on the blanket letting Amara set the pace, following her attention rather than directing it. When Amara crawled toward the walking path, Ms. R. redirected her with a toy instead of pulling her back, and the redirection worked both times she used it.

Around 10:45 Amara began to fuss and gnaw at her fingers. Ms. R. read the cue correctly and had a bottle ready before the fussing escalated. Amara took about four ounces and settled against her mother's shoulder. Ms. R. checked and changed her diaper on the blanket, thoroughly and without prompting.

The strongest pattern of this visit was anticipation. Ms. R. did not wait for Amara to need something; she watched for the cue that a need was coming. That is a meaningful skill with a child this age, and it appeared consistently across feeding, sun exposure (she moved the blanket to shade as the morning warmed), and the wind-down before pickup.

Amara showed no distress at any point during the visit. At noon, Ms. R. packed up while narrating what she was doing, and Amara left calm.

Every visit summary I write records what happened, names what it shows, and explains my reasoning. Summaries like this one go to you after every visit.