Castle of the Immaculate has some good tips on Therapist Strategies.
I have been keeping a notebook on and off since Aidan’s infancy. While he was in the hospital I would note lab results and medication schedules. When he went home I kept an informal flow chart — temps, how he acted, feedings — which I reactivate whenever he’s going through a medical issue. It’s VERY useful when calling a doctor to have symptoms, concrete numbers, time frames.
I also kept a food log when I was trying to get him to eat more by mouth.
Now that his medical issues are in abeyance for the time being, and he is formally at school age, I have been devoting the record-keeping energy to writing down how his therapy sessions go and writing out the home exercises and activities suggested by the therapists.
What I HAVEN’T done yet is plan out specific times of the day and a routine for doing the exercises. Presently it’s a matter of tucking them into pockets of the day, which means, sometimes some of them slip.
A SUGGESTION: I have just started taking photos of Aidan’s clinic visits and therapy sessions. I try to get a photo of him doing the various activities. That helps me decipher my scribbled notes (what did I mean by “pull broom up behind back??”) and also hopefully provides a running record of his development. Anyway, so far it seems easy and effective and no real negatives. It might be a “Captain Obvious” idea to some but it hadn’t occured to me before to do this, so maybe it will be new to someone else.
