Radio Silence

     Well, after a false start in December, I think I am finally ready to start blogging again. For real this time (I hope LOL). I wrote in December about suffering from a bit of burnout. I had immersed myself into the world of autism and of trying learn all I could to help my son. And while I didn't slow down in my quest to do what is best for Jake, I did take a step back from the blogging world. I thought I was ready to return, but I guess I needed a bit more time. I think there were a couple of reasons for my silence. I will touch a bit on them, and then move on with my blog.
     When I first started this blog I had visions of writing a tremendous success story. I had read many blogs written by parents who watched their children suddenly thrive once they had therapies in place. Their children went from being nonverbal to gaining language and communication skills. Improvements were made in all areas, and everyone was amazed with their sudden progress. I also read several blogs written by parents whose children didn't reach this level of improvement, but I chose to focus on the "success" stories. (Not that ALL of the children didn't have successes of their own, but you know what I mean here). I was convinced that once we had all of J's therapies in place that we would suddenly see these marked improvements in his overall functioning. After sifting through the therapies available I came up with a plan of action, got his therapists in place, enrolled him in a pre-school 2 days a week, switched ST's, and waited. I waited to hear his voice. I waited for the day I could write my first "success" story blog post - the day J said his first word.  I continued to write blog posts and continued to follow along with my favorite mommy bloggers. As I waited I found myself wondering why. Why wasn't J seeing the improvements that these other children were seeing? When were his "words" going to come? Surely it would be any day now. So I waited a bit longer. And I am still waiting. And I eventually stopped writing because I think it was a bit hard for me not to be writing our "success" stories.
     But I realize that I need to stop waiting and relish in the here and now. Because J HAS had great successes. He has made many great improvements, and my pride in him grows every day. (And I owe him a nice big blog post about all of these amazing milestones he has reached) He is such a hard worker and such a little trooper for putting up with everything that we throw at him each day. I don't want to minimize the strides he has made and continues to make each day. And yes, I do realize that language isn't everything. And I understand that even if he does start talking it doesn't mean that all is suddenly right in the world. And J is an individual and it is not fair to compare him to other children. Logically I know all of these things. But sometimes I let myself lose sight of it all and get a bit wrapped up in my own head. I am going to make a conscience effort focus on the positives and on all of the strides my little man is making. Because, really, look at this face :)

My Boy

I am writing this post in response to one of my favorite bloggers over at Reinventing Mommy. She has a wonderful blog about her journey with her son as the navigate the world of autism. She wrote a beautiful post   at Hopeful Parents in response to the unspeakable tragedy that happened last week and the way that some media outlets are linking to violence to autism. You can read it here. She has called for us to share with the world the stories of our children and to show what wonderful little beings our children with autism are. So, here's my story :)

Cheese!

Here is my boy giving his "cheese" face :) He is barely 2 years old and was diagnosed with autism at 19 months of age. However, his autism does NOT define him.

He is one of the happiest little boys you will ever meet, and he has an infectious smile that lights up the room. He enjoys puzzles, cars, blocks, and he loves playing with his animal toys. My boy is a whiz on his iPad. Each day I am surprised and amazed at the way he navigates it and is mastering the various educational apps. And he LOVES playing the educational games :)

J loves the Bubble Guppies, Little Einsteins, and Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. His favorite parts are the music sequences. He loves to dance along to the songs and does the motions with the characters. Recently he has been enjoying music videos from the Mother Goose Club on youtube. He's also been known to watch some of his cartoons in foreign languages on there as well - maybe he wants to be bilingual?? :)

We have random dance parties throughout the day. He loves getting down to some Old Macdonald and often requests to put on some Moose A Moose videos so that we can dance to the songs. If he hears a few beats of the Fresh Beat Band on the television he runs over for me to pick him up and dance with him. He enjoys when I sing songs to him and he will follow along with the motions to songs such as Wheels on the Bus and If You're Happy and you Know it.

Speaking of which, when he's happy you WILL know it! He emits happiness and excitement from head to toe. He will do a little bounce with a subtle flap of his hands and hop around the room with a huge grin on his face. Sometimes he will lay on his stomach and do a little belly bounce, while his hand and feet circle with excitement. It is hard not to smile yourself when you see how happy he is.

mid bounce

He has never raised a hand in anger or frustration. If something upsets him he may give a sound of disapproval, but is quick to recover. He has been pushed or hit at play dates and had other children take toys from him, but he has never struck back. He may seek me out or simply walk away, looking a bit confused as to why someone might want to hurt him.

He is currently nonverbal, so we are waiting to hear his voice. That doesn't mean he can't communicate with us though. He may not be able to say "I love you", but he shows it with his actions. He is quick to give hugs and squeezes, and will sometimes give little "love pat" on my shoulder when hugging me. If I am making dinner or otherwise occupied while he is playing, he will only go a few minutes before finding me to check in. He will give my leg a quick squeeze and go back about his business, only return a few minutes later.

He also communicates with us using pictures. He has a little book filled with pictures of some of his favorite food and toy items. If he wants or needs something he brings the picture to us. I love hearing the rip of the velcro as he tears out a picture, followed by his little footsteps padding over to find me. He will also grab our hand to guide us where he wants to go, and has picked up some basic signs and will use them as well.

He loves watching his reflection. I will often find him practicing his signs or doing the motions for different songs in the mirror. But really, can you blame him - look at this face

J LOVES fruit. Apples, grapes, strawberries, nectarines, plums, you name it. Especially bananas. He will usually sign for a banana as soon as we put him in his chair for a meal. He is a great eater. I am often surprised by just how much he will eat!

He has begun to find enjoyment in art. He will paint, color, glue, and loves to play with play dough.

J has taught me to truly appreciate the small things. Every new skill he learns or accomplishment he makes is cause for celebration. I don't take anything for granted with this beautiful boy. I know how hard he as worked for each and every milestone he has reached. He is such a trooper. He receives a total of 22 hours a week of therapy and has teachers coming in and out of the house all day. And he never complains. He meets each of them at the door with a smile, takes their hand, and leads them to his "classroom". I am in awe of him. He truly inspires me. 

These words can only begin to describe the wonder that is my son. Yes, he has autism. He is also loving, caring, happy, brilliant, innocent, joyous, funny, adorable, hard working, and the list goes on. This is what you should think of when you think of a person with autism. A little boy fill with joy and wonder who will melt your heart with his smile.

Finding a balance

When autism was first brought up in relation to J I made it my mission to learn all I could about it. I bought several books and started researching various therapies. I subscribed to many blogs by parents of children with autism, and started reading them from the beginning. Essentially I lived and breathed autism. As my husband and I wound down watching a TV show at night, I wasn't paying attention - I was too busy scouring the web for any information that I thought would be useful. While it is definitely essential to become educated and explore therapy options, I believe that I could have gone about it at a slower pace.
Around October I hit a wall. I would sit down to try and read a book and found myself rereading the same paragraph over and over because I wasn't absorbing it. I began to resent some of the stories I was reading in different blogs - their child is doing X therapy and getting Y results, why isn't J? I stopped visiting some online forums as frequently and avoided talking as much about ASD. I ignored my own blog. I was burnt out. Not by my son, but by my crazed quest to learn all I could in the shortest amount of time possible. I took a step back and let myself regroup. I still want to learn all I can about autism and do everything in my power to help J reach his potential. I just need to go about it in a more reasonable manner. I am ready to read and write blogs again, and I have a book that I am actually looking forward to reading. (yes, about yet another therapy lol) I just need to keep a healthy balance of seeking out information and giving myself some down time. And, of course, spending time with this awesome little guy.

J and his new Handy Manny doll. He doesn't watch the show, but hasn't wanted to put this guy down :)

Belated Halloween post

Well it's a week late, but as they say, better late then never :)  Last week was Halloween and I decided to take J out to do a little trick-or-treating. It was a cold night with rain on the way, so the plan was just to hit our immediate neighbors. Mostly so they could see how cute he looked in his costume :)
I wasn't sure what to expect. I know that at 2 most kiddos don't really "get" the concept of Halloween so I went into it with an open mind. He was ecstatic to be set free and ran up each walkway. The first house greeted us with an already open door. J took that as an invitation and thought they were welcoming him in. They put a candy bar in his bucket (which I was holding for him) and he promptly took it out and held it for the rest of our adventure. At the next house I knocked at the door and he copied me. When our neighbor held out the bowl of candy he grabbed one and put it in his bucket.  At the next house he tried giving THEM a piece of candy ;)  He quickly caught on with knocking on the doors and eagerly ran up each walkway. He could have cared less about the candy, but he enjoyed the process.
At one point we ran into one of our neighbors and their children. They have a little girl who is just 2 days younger than J. That was the toughest part of the night for me. She was carrying her little bucket full of candy and chatting away. It has only been about 2 months since we last saw her, and her language has exploded. She was also  running up the steps to the porches, a skill that J has not yet mastered. It was a big wake up call as far as just how "behind" he is to his peers. But instead of dwelling on their differences we continued on and had a great time. Everyone thought he was just adorable (how could they not LOL) and we even brought home a few chocolate bars for me, oops, I mean J.
Here's a few pics

Getting a feel for his costume

What is on my hands??

ok, let's get these off

chilling with the iPad

holding his prized Twix bar

getting into mischief

And looking pretty darn cute!

Pumpkin Patch Pics

I am WAY behind in publishing my posts. Not that there's anyone waiting with bated breath to read them, but I want to try to stay somewhat up to date.
A couple of weeks a go we went to a local pumpkin farm to get, you guessed it, a pumpkin :)  This goes back to what I wrote about in my Changing Expectations post last month. I am making a conscience effort not to go into our various outings/occasions/experiences with a predetermined set of expectations, or with a picture of what the "perfect" version of the event will be. Of course with it being Fall my Facebook feed had been full of pictures of my friends' children enjoying the various pumpkin farms - pointing at and riding the animals, picking out their perfect pumpkin, doing various art activities and painting said pumpkins, etc. I wasn't going to let these visions cloud my experience with J. Our visit to the farm might look a little different than those of others, but that doesn't make it any less of an enjoyable experience. I chose one of the smaller, less crowded farms that doesn't have a ton of predetermined activities. My goal was to visit the farm, let J enjoy running around and taking in the sights, and to bring home a nice pumpkin. And, of course, get some awesome pics along the way. I think we succeeded...

As soon as we got there he was off..

He checked out the sheep

...and apparently he had something funny to say

I think that pumpkin is a bit too big

much better :)

exploring

checking out the hay maze

All in all we had a FUN time :)

Evaluation results

Yesterday I finally had the meeting at the local Autism clinic to go over the evaluation J had back in the beginning of September.  As I stated before I didn't bring J in for  the evaluation because I thought he would get a different diagnosis. I was simply trying to get a more thorough evaluation than he had the first time, and was hoping that the doctors would point me in the direction of some good resources, along with some recommendations for therapies etc. As I wrote about here I wasn't too impressed by the evaluation. I was at least hopeful that they would provide some useful information. Unfortunately that wasn't the case.
I didn't tell them about the diagnosis he already has, nor had I gone into specifics about the therapy he has been receiving. I wanted to get an unbiased opinion and see what they would recommend.
Well yesterday I received a diagnosis but not much else. They pretty much told me he has autism, handed me a printout from the Autism Speaks website, and referred me to a parent support group (which I am already a part of). I asked if they would recommend a specific type of therapy but they just said I should 

pick the one I feel would be the best fit. I asked if they could recommend an area pediatrician that is familiar with autism and they said that no one had ever asked them that before and they didn't have an answer for me. The write up they gave me on J was pretty generic and uninformative. If I hadn't already done a ton of research I would have been pretty lost at the end.

 I was very disappointed. I guess I was expecting more since this is a clinic that specializes in autism spectrum disorders. As far as they knew I hadn't done any research yet and the diagnosis was completely new to me. I anticipated/hoped that they would provide me with more information as well as a bit of a plan of action. In feel that they are doing parents a bit of a disservice and missing out on an opportunity to educate a whole population of parents. To think I first called to make an appointment back in April. If we hadn't lucked out and had our service coordinator find us the place to get a J's initial diagnosis we would have missed out on 7 months of therapy. And had we just gotten the diagnosis we would just be getting on the wait list for ABA. After of course I did my research, chose a therapy, and found the agency.
They DID however say that they feel J is on the milder end of the spectrum and that he should respond well to therapy. He lacks so many of the behavioral issues that often accompany autism, so in that we are fortunate. it is also great that we are catching this so early.

It is definitely not easy to sit in a room and have someone tell you your child has significant developmental delays and to have him receive a "label". But it doesn't change the awesomeness that is Jake. Having the paper in hand will help to keep the therapies coming. I will continue to advocate for him and to learn all I can to be best mom I can be to him. He is already making great strides and I have nothing but high hopes and expectations for him.

iPad mini giveaways!!

I have been slacking a bit this week with my posts. I have a few started that need to be finished up and published. I will be sure to get to them this weekend!
In the meantime, check out this super iPad mini giveaway on SmartAppsForKids. It is an awesome website that features and reviews iPad apps for children. They alert you to free apps and host some great giveaways. Right now they are giving away 10 iPad Mini'!!. IPads can be excellent resources for children with ASD. I would LOVE to win one for Jake. It would be the perfect size for his little hands!

And now, the wonderful ladies at The IMums are also giving some away. They are going to have TWELVE giveaways!! If you haven'nt checked out their site yet, hurry up and head over!! Here are the links to the giveaways!
#1 is here
Here's # 3 and Here is #3
#4
#5
#6
#7
#8
#9
#10
#11
#12
#13
#14