Joy's Autism Blog

When I got a booklet of local community classes I thumbed through it mostly looking for classes for my girls. Since they’re homeschooled we try to get them in outside activities. When I came across a class called “Dancing Through Autism” it really caught my eye!

Adrian took his first class last Saturday and he did really great! Adrian has always been a “ladies man”…seemingly gravitating towards attractive blonde women Haha!! His class was no different, there were 3 teachers and he seemed to gravitate toward the blonde teacher.

Surprisingly there were no other kids with autism there. There were however 3 little girls with Down’s Syndrome there. It was so fun to watch the kids. They did a little bit of tap, a little ballet, and then some floor gymnastics.

Adrian really enjoyed it and when we got home Glen asked him how it went and he said “I exercised…can I go play on the computer?”

Maybe check with your local dance studios to see if they offer special needs dance classes! It was great connecting with the other parents as we watched our kids too!!

I’ve been MIA since November…possibly my longest break from blogging since I started. Anyway I wanted to share a quick little update since a few things have happened.

First and foremost, our sweet baby girl was born on February 12, 2013. She was 7 pounds 7 ounces, beautiful and perfect. Her name is Charlotte Caroline. The kids have all adjusted wonderfully to our newest little bundle. They are so loving and gentle with her.

Here is Charlotte (or Charlie as we usually call her) on the day she was born:

This is the day we left the hospital (Valentines Day 2013):

And this one is a bit more recent, one of her first smiles:

Adrian had a first today, I heard him compliment his sister which was pretty awesome. When he got home from school he came in and told Nevaeh “nice dress.” Wow. That made me smile.

Sanura and Nevaeh are doing well, we’re still homeschooling and it’s challenging but good.

Lincoln is progressing. We have his transitional meeting for kindergarten next week. I can’t believe he’s going to kindergarten. It seems like he’s still a baby, it’s going to be tough. I’m curious to see what everyone thinks his plan should be for kindergarten. Nervous.

Glen and I are great. Same ol’ same pretty much. I’ve shared a little bit about my weight loss journey and that is still a work in progress (as it always will be for me I think). I did well with my weight during pregnancy and I have about 8 pounds to go to get to pre-pregnancy weight. Not too shabby for only being about 8 weeks postpartum. Then I will continue working and losing. I have a couple fitness goals and a weight goal in mind for myself and it’s so exciting to make these changes.

On Wednesday morning I had my first meeting with Lincoln’s new teacher. I had him in a good mood and I had him fully clothed which is a rare occurrence when he is at home. When they got here it was his new teacher whom we only met at the open house the night before and the teacher aide who he had in his classroom last year. He was excited to see her. She asked him if she could have a hug and he jumped right up on her lap and gave her the sweetest hug.

Ok, I was happy because Lincoln doesn’t usually like people coming in the house, we’ve had some major meltdowns when teachers come to the house.

It was all going well until the teacher aide asked Lincoln “Did you go swimming this summer?” I bought the kids a little kiddie pool and it was on our patio. They swam a lot this summer and Lincoln loved swimming. When the teacher asked “Did you go swimming this summer?” Lincoln heard “Lincoln do you want to go swimming right now?!” And he started tearing his clothes off excitedly ready to go swimming. He took off ALL of his clothes and started looking around for his swim trunks. You’d think I’d be embarrassed, I wasn’t at all. I figure they’re used to seeing toddlers strip down and I wasn’t concerned.

I convinced him to at least put his boxer shorts back on but he was mad at that point and was beating on the patio door trying to get out.

His teacher seems nice and I’m hoping it will be a good school year for him. He starts on Monday.

Adrian has a new teacher this year too. It’s been really good so far. I’m still feeling out how it’s going to go but I feel good about it right now.

Adrian did so awesome with his tooth extraction yesterday. He was so calm and held so still while they did his work. It was amazing.

We were at the park the other night with the kids. It’s funny how Adrian will run into people he knows and the rest of us don’t know them because they are people from around his school. I’ve met his teachers and some of the aides but apparently not everyone because a lady I’ve never seen before started waving and saying “Hi Adrian!” and I had no idea who she was. It was pretty funny. I talked with her for a few minutes and she asked if he saw the Spiderman movie because she knew he was asking about it constantly. Then we went to his school open house all of the teachers knew that he had seen his movie so she must’ve told them about our little visit.

While the kids were playing on the playground a dad brought his son over to play. I could tell almost immediately that there was a special need involved with this little boy. I believe he had autism. Lincoln was very interested in him and they were about the same size, I think the boy was a little bit younger than Lincoln. Well this little guy started kind of squealing pretty loudly and Lincoln did not like it at all, he was covering his ears and getting upset. He started trying to cover the boys mouth which did not go over well. He started screeching louder which agitated Lincoln more. Of course I ended it right away and told Lincoln to keep his hands to himself or he wouldn’t be playing anymore and I apologized to the dad. Not long after we decided to let the kids swing in another area of the park, which was the plan from the beginning because Sanura only likes to swing these days and we’d been playing for a while.

I felt almost like I wanted to say something more like that I understood or something. I wanted to be encouraging in some way but nothing felt natural to say. Hopefully he didn’t think we left the park because of his son, that wasn’t the case although I was feeling nervous about how Lincoln would react to the boy.

I guess even families dealing with special needs sometimes don’t know what to say or do when they’re around another family who is dealing with special needs.

Adrian did so good! The office knew that he had autism and they were so patient and sweet with him. They actually got xrays and got a good cleaning in. It was amazing.

The front teeth issue was interesting! As soon as she looked in his mouth she said “Well he’s got an extra tooth in there!” So…the tooth that is completely sideways that I thought was his front tooth is NOT his front tooth. It’s an extra tooth that is blocking the way of the real permanent front tooth. Adrian has to have that extra tooth extracted so his real front tooth can come in. We are going in to get the tooth extracted a week from Thursday. I’m really nervous for him but he did so well at the appointment this morning that I’m feeling a lot better about his ability to handle the next appointment!

It’s too bad he has to miss his 3rd day of school to do this but it is really something I want to take care of sooner rather than later so that’s the plan.

First the shameful part. I haven’t found a new dentist since we moved to our new state. I “meant” to do it all this summer but morning sickness, exhaustion, and crazy schedules overtook and I didn’t get around to it. The plan was to start scheduling appointments now because I’m feeling better.

On Saturday Adrian came up to me and asked me to pull his tooth out. The problem? He was asking me to pull out a permanent tooth. Upon closer examination I spotted another permanent tooth coming in almost directly on top of the other permanent tooth. Sadly both of the teeth are almost completely sideways. His teeth are so crowded and just…well a mess frankly, turned every which way. They’re clean of course and he’s never had a cavity but they’re just extremely crowded and crooked.

So I’m sure this tooth coming in is causing him some discomfort so I had to find a dentist ASAP.

I did a lot of searching on line for dentists trying to figure out who would be special needs friendly. I decided to go with a pediatric dentist and I got them called this morning. I asked her if the dentist is comfortable and/or experienced in working on a child who has autism and she said “Oh yeah, it’ll be fine” So that really put me at ease.

Autism just puts on an extra nice layer of anxiety and worry when you’re trying to find new medical professionals.

So Wednesday it’s off to the dentist to figure out what needs to be done with this teeth situation. Prayers for a smooth appointment and not too much pain for my boy would be greatly appreciated.

When you have children with special needs like our family does I think it makes the decision to have more children infinitely more difficult. Our chances of having another child on the autism spectrum, I think, are extremely high. Frankly, 75% of our children have issues. I’m almost positive Lincoln will be diagnosed on the spectrum, Sanura very mildly on the spectrum, and Adrian very much on the spectrum. Our chances just aren’t that great to have a neurotypical child.

So I’m sure there are some people, perhaps many people who want to ask but are too polite to ask “Why would you have more children when you have children with special needs?”

If there is anyone who understand the seriousness of autism like Adrian’s autism it’s me and my husband. It’s terrifying. I don’t know what his future will hold but then again, no parent knows what any of their children’s futures hold anyway.

I find myself thinking about the new baby, hoping it’s a girl so our chances are better for not having autism to deal with, or at least hopefully having a higher functioning autism to deal with. I find myself thinking about all the things I can do to “prevent” the autism. I’ve found myself much more emotional about autism whether that’s fear that the new child will have autism or if it’s hormones I don’t know.

I can answer why we’d want more. Each of my children have been a blessing to me. I love getting to know each of their little personalities. Autism hasn’t made my quality of life low, it hasn’t made Adrian’s quality of life low, it hasn’t made Sanura’s quality of life low. Adrian is a happy boy, Sanura is a happy young lady. Does autism present me with difficulties? Of Course! Does it make me feel depressed at times? Of course! As a mother can autism break my heart? Of Course! Is Adrian worth it? Without a doubt. Is Sanura worth it? Without a doubt. Will the new baby be worth it if there is some disability? Absolutely.

The Lord will send me exactly the child I was meant to have and God doesn’t make mistakes.

It’s been one of those very emotional weeks for me.

Now I’m no developmental pediatrician or psychologist but to me Adrian is showing some signs of OCD. Maybe it’s just the autism but these are new things that he’s doing that have been very hard for me and they seem like OCD symptoms to me.

Adrian loves Spiderman, there is a new Spiderman movie coming out in July. Adrian knows about this and is extremely excited. This is not an exaggeration…he literally tells me 50+ times per day “Amazing Spiderman in July”. I can’t just not say anything to him when he says that or he will continue to say it over and over until I respond with either “yes”, “ok” or if I repeat “Amazing Spiderman in July” and then he will stop for a few minutes. It’s been so difficult because that can start to really wear down your patience by the end of the day. It seems obsessive to me.

The other thing he’s doing that makes me wonder about OCD is he will “check” the bathroom door every time someone uses the downstairs bathroom. He has to go and make sure they’ve put down the seat and lid and then he opens and shuts the door a couple times. Sometimes even when nobody has used the bathroom he goes and checks it.

In the grand scheme of things these behaviors aren’t that big of deal over all. His other issues are going to be far more debilitating then the recent issues but they have been things that are hard for me to deal with in some ways I guess.

Then also this week I got a report from Lincoln’s school and I wasn’t very thrilled with some of the stuff in it. It’s an old report though and much of what was in it was from data that was collected almost a year ago and he’s come a long way in that amount of time but it was just hard to read so many areas that said his functioning was “moderately low”… lots of tears and fear this week.

I saw a comment, of course online where any coward says whatever nonsense comes to their brain that any “brat” is labeled as autistic or adhd.

It’s so shocking to me that people seriously believe this. Spend about 15 minutes with my son and you’ll know autism is real.

Just had to vent it somewhere

Adrian started summer school this week. He was so happy to get back to school. His nightly routine when I say it’s bedtime is to ask “school tomorrow?” and the couple weeks he had off were kind of confusing for him. Summer school doesn’t last long though so we’ll see how he handles it when we’re back to summer break.

Our first year of homeschooling the girls went really well and I’m glad we did it. We are going to continue on with the girls at least for next year. I would love to bring the boys home and homeschool them but with the special needs involved I’m just not sure I have the energy. At least for right now that’s not in the cards.

Lincoln has really come along speech wise. I think we’ll still end up with some kind of autism diagnosis for him, probably PDD-NOS I’m guessing but I’m impressed with him. His new thing is asking “Where’s Daddy?” or “Where’s Nevaeh?”, this is especially impressive because for quite a while I could get him to repeat basically anything but as far as him coming up with his own stuff to say it was slow going. Asking questions like that is pretty awesome to me.

And Glen and I have some news, we’re expecting baby number 5. We are absolutely thrilled!