autism
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Knowing how much to push
All week, J’s been really sick. I don’t know what it’s like for other kids with autism, but when J gets sick, it never knocks him out. When most of us just want to veg out and watch movies and sleep all day and check out when we get a sore throat, runny nose, and a cough that just won’t stop, J will still wake up at 6 am, still wander around the house looking for things to do, still want to be entertained, all while still feeling miserable. It’s really, really strange. Not even illness can seem to knock down autism and all of its obsessions, habits, and idiosyncrasies. In…
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Without the song and dance
I’m not going to lie. I’m sort of loving the fact that my kids are out of the whole “Holiday Spectacular” phase. When my kids were littles, I thought that I’d be heartbroken when the Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, Leprechaun phase (okay, maybe not the Leprechaun thing–I still don’t quite get why that’s such a big deal here, it wasn’t anything I grew up with) was over. But I’m not heart broken at all. In fact, I have this overwhelming sense of relief. Not to say that holidays aren’t still stressful for me. They are. But reduced amounts of holiday fanfare are helpful. I think it’s because I feel like…
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One year later
One year later and here we are again, the first track meet of the season! I was a hot, anxious mess at last year’s first meet. We had tried in every single way to prepare J for his first race. From the sound of the gun, to practicing a few times on the track, to schedule strategies we had thought of everything. And still, I wasn’t sure we were going to make it through that first track meet. J was a ball of anxiety himself that first meet. And not everything went exactly as planned (the gun didn’t go off TWICE!). But J made it. He ran the entire race,…
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The French onion soup incident
I should have seen it coming. It’s been in the making for weeks now. We’ve hit that funky winter twilight period here in Fargo–where winter just wants to hang on and not let go and you’re tired of the snow and rain and you just want some frigging sunshine already. Because you’re sick of it being dark by five (although with daylight savings and the tilt of the planet have made for more sunlight this past month) and you don’t want to run one more day out in the cold, snow, sleet or rain (which finally let up this week). You’re sick of kid’s homework (waiting for your daughter to…
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Some are born great
This week has been W’s week. W was “crowned” student of the week at her middle school (not really crowned–just a free t-shirt and vouchers for Buffalo Wild Wings), performed in a select orchestra concert Thursday night, and received 1st place in the music composition category in the PTA Reflections contest (again). A trifecta of achievement. The line from Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night came to my mind this week as we bustled through all of W’s events: “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.” In some ways W falls under all three categories. I’ve always felt like she’s been my miracle baby since day…
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Grown up lessons
I thought that I was over the whole “I don’t care what people think about me and my family” business, but apparently I’m not. When J was a toddler and I was in the throws of being introduced to the autism experience, I had a sort of crisis of confidence. Not only was my child not “performing” like his peers at peer play groups (and I was enduring daily every mom’s verbal gushing about how wonderfully smart and talented and, well, genius each of there kids were), but I was also struggling with the very public meltdowns. The crying and tantrums at Walmart if we entered the store at a…
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This changes everything
There are very few clear moments of revelation when raising a child with autism. As a parent, the autism puzzle is always on my mind. I’m reading constantly about autism. I’ve gone through phases of intense research on ABA and Stanley Greenspan’s Floortime approach. I’ve read about Temple Grandin, read things written by Temple Grandin, have heard Temple speak on Youtube, NPR, and in person, and while all of these sources have given me a better insight into J, nothing has been a “perfect fit” solution by any means. So when I went to the Lindamood Bell conference last week in Minneapolis, I wasn’t sure to expect. Because I had…
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J can do something most kids can’t
There are very few things that J can do that most kids can’t. In fact, there’s only really two things I can think of off the top of my head: the ability to remember the most obscure information and retain that information (like squaring and cubing numbers into the 10,000s, remembering dates and obscure facts of presidents of the United States, and remembering every exit number in ever state from North Dakota to Kansas). The other? running long distance. The party trick memory is fun for a little bit, but it’s really hard to engage with someone when all you can do is spew random facts at them. And it…
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It’s complicated
The drama on Wednesday started when both kids came running into the car in tears. To be honest, it really caught me off guard. The day had gone really well for me—I felt really productive work-wise and the weather was unseasonably mild–and all of a sudden my car is full of two children in their separate meltdowns. Because I was caught off guard, I didn’t handle the situation with much grace. J was in tears because he was stressed out about something—numbers, letters, and/or staying 2 or 3 minutes later than the bell because he wasn’t ready to get out the door and W was upset because all of this…
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When someone knows autism better than you
Outside of Steve, J, W, and me, there are three tiers of people who understand J’s autism. The first tier is made up of our close friends, family, special ed teachers/paras, and coaches who initially knew nothing about J’s brand of autism but feel a connection with J and ask Steve or I how to best interact with him. They often go out of their way to try to find out more information about autism and because of their interest and determination come up with their own ways of reaching and teaching J. I love the first tier. They make our lives so much easier. They help us bridge that…
