Is this wrong of me? Gifting child's therapists

amother

OP ↓

Wed, Jul 31 2024, 6:07 am

My son just finished getting services through EI. He had two different therapists. One would text me to give me feedback and would tell me cute things he did, send me session notes. She would answer calls. The other did none of the above, the only time I heard from her was if she wanted to switch the day of his session. I tried calling her a few times with questions and she was very hard to reach and sounded disinterested when we spoke.

My question is, is it wrong of me to send a gift only to the first one. It's possible that the second was doing her job fully too but I really don't know.

amother

Almond

Wed, Jul 31 2024, 6:10 am

I can totally understand that and you would be justified. a therapist should be updating parents. However, it could be she had many students and it was difficult for her... I would try to still send something small or a card. (ps I do EI and a mother mentioned to me about not hearing from her son's OT....THERAPISTS!! TOUCH BASE WITH PARENTS ONCE IN A WHILE!!!)

amother

Apricot ↓

Wed, Jul 31 2024, 6:35 am

It’s funny to read this as there an awful therapist at work and we all see how she barely works with her students but she is great at reaching out to parents. Parents love her but all of us in the school would never let her service our own children.

amother

Moccasin

Wed, Jul 31 2024, 7:00 am

amother Apricot wrote:

If a school see's that the therapist is terrible they are obligated to tell her agency,boss about it. Shame on you and your coworkers for not bringing that to someone's attention. That child could have grown more. If she's terrible the parent will learn the hard way when they see the child didn't grow. But, what will happen is, the parent will think that they tried this form of therapy convincing themselves it didn't work for that child.(I know someone it happened to that way) please tell someone. Maybe the therapist could just update her skills.

As for Op I think your in the right. If you see your child's improvement and she seems to go that extra step why not go that extra mile with a card and gift. Positive feedback, how you noticed her going our of her way. The other therapist could get just a thank you card saying thank you for working with my son. Therapist doesn't have to know what the other one got. If she does, she will see that the other one went out of her way.

A therapist having too many clients to call each one is not the parents issue.

Edit for clarity

amother

↑ Apricot

Wed, Jul 31 2024, 10:44 pm

amother Moccasin wrote:

It was brought to the attention of the school many times. They continue to let her get away with it because parents are happy with her.

amother

Scarlet ↓

Fri, Sep 06 2024, 8:01 am

amother Apricot wrote:

If she barely works with her students, how does she have what to discuss with the parents?

amother

Pansy

Fri, Sep 06 2024, 8:19 am

amother Scarlet wrote:

If she barely works with her students, how does she have what to discuss with the parents?

That is not nearly as hard as you might think.

I am in a health care system and I have seen providers give minimal care and write beautiful notes and providers who go above and beyond and their notes look bare bones, like they do very little. In reality, I often find the ones who do less overcompensate with notes and the ones who are busy with pt care don’t have the time/bandwidth for notes.

That being said, how does your son feel about these two therapists? Does he love them both? Prefer one? What growth have you seen? (I don’t love that one doesn’t reach out, but it is one factor to not ignore, but not the only factor)

amother

↑ Scarlet

Fri, Sep 06 2024, 8:48 am

amother Pansy wrote:

Thanks for replying! I’m not the OP tho Smile

I’m a school based therapist too and that makes sense. Unfortunately I’ve seen special ed teachers do that too!

I maintain steady contact with parents, but idk how these people speak often to parents and manage to avoid sounding like broken records when they have so little to work off of in terms of discussing the child’s progress and what they’re working on in sessions 🤷🏻‍♀️

That being said, although it’s not ideal, not hearing as often from therapists doesn’t mean they’re “not good.” I’ve had times where I seldom heard from my kid’s therapists, but they were doing great work with him. Lack of progress isn’t always because of the therapist, it can be due to other factors (factors that can be hard for parents to accept).