Serenity Now!

So, Isaak’s defintely needing tutoring again. We’ve been here since March and haven’t had anything since then. I’m seeing more things we need to get back to working on. So, I hired a new tutor who starts next week. She is super qualified, and I rationalized hiring her at a bigger expense since I don’t have a consultant anymore. I *am* the consultant. Another set of qualified eyes on the programs will be a good thing to do.

Here are the programs he was just going to be starting before we moved:

Learning to Change Behavior. Isaak will make behavioral changes in himself by learning self-awareness, self-control, and by creating and following his own behavior plan. This program uses Worksheets for Teaching Social Thinking and Related Skills.

Understanding Personalities. Isaak will identify and understand personality traits (his and others’).

Understanding Perspective Taking. Isaak will understand ‘perspectives’ and ‘impressions.’ He will begin learning how/when to adjust his behavior so that positive impressions are made on others. This program uses Inside Out and the ILAUGH model.

Sizes of Problems. Isaak will understand that problems come in different sizes and that behavioral reactions should match the size of the problem.

Social Problems: Blaming Others. Isaak will understand when a problem is the result of a situation and not the other person involved. He will refrain from ‘blaming’ others for his problems.

And here are some new programs I will be creating:

Responding to Teasing. Isaak will be able to identify when teasing is fun versus mean and how to deal with each appropriately.

The Social Ballet. Isaak will learn how to enter, engage, and leave a new social situation appropriately.

Friendshipping. Isaak will learn to identify the differences between friend and acquaintance and learn to appropriately seek and develop deeper friendships.

More Stress Strategies. Isaak will continue to work on dealing with stressful situations in appropriate ways.

Jumping in. Isaak will learn to think of short, related stories to tell and to be able to “jump in” in social conversation.

Interesting stuff. Hope all the scheduling works out with school starting soon. Ack!

Boy, this is a first. Today was Isaak’s first day at school. Well, I knew it wouldn’t be perfect, but I never expected to find out that he had to be removed by security from math class! No joke. Thing is, he can get overly excited and obsessive about math (big surprise) and is easily triggered in that setting. In this case, a little something set him off, but because the staff didn’t know him or how to deal with such an upset (not a big one at first, mind you), they accidently fed the fire and he spiralled out of control. To the point where they had to call in a security guard to pick him up (still in his chair) and remove him. I guess they were both laughing at that point, so I guess it wasn’t a total loss. Anyway, what a miserable way to start things off. I went to school and shadowed him for a few hours, and although he was a little “touchy”, he was just fine. I had to intervene once with him on the playground because he was getting a little stressed in a 4-square game. Overall, he was fine. I gave some tips to his aide (who I really like) and chatting a bit with his teacher. We will have quite the chat tonight, and I will go in tomorrow to math class to make sure he’s back on track. I will also make him stand up in front of them and apologize for his atrocious behavior.

He can really be a jerk, sometimes.

It’ll be fine, I’m sure. I just hate it when these things happen. Little setbacks can really be depressing. Part of life, though.

There’s a darling toddler in my autism class, a little girl (we don’t get many of those, so the ones we get are quite doted on!). She’s the sweetest thing, but she’s very low-key and has a pretty flat state of emotions. It was great today. On Mondays, we’ve begun putting all the toys away and just having a social referencing day. We put out tunnels and the sensory table and do music and blow up balloons and the like. For this student, thought, we haven’t seen a big change in her emotional state. She pretty much still lives in her own world and does a lot of spacing out. She enjoys the activities, especially the sensory stuff, but she’s still not “waking up.” Today, we had the music going, and I just put her face-to-face with me and took her arms in my hands and started singing with the music and shaking her arms to the beat. Poof! That girl woke up! If just for a few minutes, but she was right there, looking at me, smiling and watching what I was doing. It was a marvelous sight and one that I will try to repeat with her.

Sometimes you just need a wake-up shake!

What a bunch of goofs!

There is a story behind this. These are the three boys (Isaak in the middle) that were together when our old school started a preschool ABA program (after some “coaxing” from some of us ). We moved away when they were in first grade, so it’s been a couple years since we last saw them. We just went for a visit last week. You would *never* have believed these are the same three kids that began that program those 5 years ago. All of them had little speech (one had none), had significant behaviors, had very obvious autism symptoms, and I guarantee would have remained significantly impaired and needing support through their school careers if we hadn’t intervened. Today, all three of them are mainstreamed (Isaak full-time, the other two for everything but some academic intervention), and two of them can almost pass as “typical.” One is still fighting the overt autism symptoms, but he is doing *light-years* better than I ever would have imagined.

When the two boys came in to where Isaak was and the teachers re-introduced them, they all remembered each other. They got down on the floor and started playing a game like no time had passed, but this time, they played with NO intervention from adults. They were just a couple of boys playing a board game. It was remarkable.

No one can tell me that early, intensive intervention is not worth every effort and penny that’s put into it.

Related to me by Dave:

Isaak (age ‘8′) was in the hot tub after swimming and chatting with some gentleman there. Dave wasn’t near enough to hear the conversation, but after they got out, the guy came up to talk to Dave. He said he’d just had the most amazing conversation with Isaak, that they were talking about Harry Potter and how this guy was reading it to his 4-year-old, and Isaak wondered why he had to read it to a 4-year-old, which took them into certainly, um, talents that Isaak has (I’m sure he was quite forth-coming!). This guy was quite impressed at what he could do and all, and Isaak’s response, “Well, that’s because I’m a high-functioning autistic boy!”

While I always use person-first language with him and around him (boy with autism, never autistic boy; it’s the current trend; ask me to elaborate if you want), it made it especially interesting to me that he chose to identify himself in that way. To him, autism is truly part of who he is. It’s something he’s proud of. He’s never shy to talk about it or bring it up. I think it’s fantastic. I wonder if more people were so open and unabashed about their differences if there might be more acceptance in our society.

Click here for more photos.

You’ll n0tice that I included ALL the categories for this blog.

I’m sure I’m PMS-ing. According to the calendar I am, but whenever I get to this part of the month, I think it’s all “real” and I’m really feeling this way and it’s not hormones and I’ll never feel better again. Well, here I am again, and I’m trying to remember that the calendar says it’s hormones and that I will not feel like this forever.

And yet, here I am, feeling overwhelmed and like I should put my head in the oven. Although, I think I’d just get really hot like that and then I’d be bummed about being so hot.

I have too much going on, as always. I have my last final tonight to close out this quarter (yay!) and I hear it’s a real bugger and I haven’t studied at all. Don’t much care, as sad as that is. Then, I have three weeks off, but, not really. In those three weeks, I have to finish my first draft of my thesis and get a student teaching notebook put together (big project) for the next quarter which begins the very first part of January. Oh, and then there are the holidays and tutoring and taking care of family. Notice how that one is last. How sad is that?

Isaak had a rough week last week. So rough, in fact, that we instituted the “Behavior Ladder” again AND we put him on the GFCF diet (basically no grains or dairy). Dh is very skeptical, but he’s being very supportive. I’m just desperate. I hate to see him struggle, and I’m willing to try anythingto help him.

The Behavior Ladder is sorta sad but very effective. He lists all his favorite things (computer, Game Boy, etc.) and then prioritizes them into what he loves the most, and then I put them on a ladder and he has to earn them all back, one per week. He has certain goals he has to meet (like controlling his temper), and if he does well for one week, he steps up one on the ladder and gets that back. I don’t like to do it because it seems extreme (everything is taken away to begin with), but he actually seems to enjoy it! He doesn’t complain about not having anything. He sees the whole thing as a big reward system, even though I took all the things away to begin with.

What a good kid. And he’s really trying. It’s a lot to deal with in his little mind. I can’t imagine what it’s like to try to control a runaway brain.

Anyway, I’m just feeling a bit down and overwhelmed, but this, too, shall pass. In fact, in another couple months, I’ll be home free (literally).

In one of my classes last week, the professor emphasized how important it is to remember that our kids with special needs are “normal” kids and to not hold them to a higher standard than we would our typically-developing children. We sometimes think our kids have to be “perfect” and that any bad behavior must be stomped out immediately. They are expected to sit perfectly in class, and any movement away from that is addressed. They are expected to spend recess engaged with friends each day, each recess, the whole time, or they’re reminded. They’re expected to complete their home- or schoolwork without argument or else. All that when if our typically-developing child occasionally engaged in the behavior, it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Isaak got in a tiff with a kid after school the other day. My initial reaction was BIG (not at him, but internally). After I thought about it, you know what? Typically-developing kids sometimes get in tiffs, especially boys. It’s not a pattern. It’s not something that happens every day. In fact, it’s the first time ever. So, I decided instead of addressing it as a problem behavior, I would get as much information about the incident as I could, and talk to him about it, and not make a big deal of it.

He IS “normal.” I need to remember that sometimes, and give him the lee-way that I would any other kid.

I went to a great conference by Tony Attwood last month. There’s always debate going on about the relationship between high-functioning autism (HFA) and Asperger Syndrome (AS). According to the official diagnosing criteria, the only difference between the two is that HFA has an early language delay and AS does not. So, when people ask me, “Is Isaak becoming AS?” I say, no, he had an early language delay, so he has HFA and that doesn’t “turn into” AS.

While that is true, Attwood made it real clear what that relationship is.

That makes sense to me. Isaak’s early development definitely look more “autistic”, but as he hit 5-6 years old and his language caught up and his social and behavior delays were less pronounced, he began to look like the kids with AS that I knew. Looking at this chart, I can see why! While he doesn’t have AS and never will, his development now will follow that same trajectory.

Just some FYI to share!

In one of my classes, we were asked to write down some of our “hot button” words. People had a variety of things like “retarded” and “Mongoloid” and “autistic child” as opposed to a “child with autism”. Some of them I shared the feeling with, but others I didn’t (I don’t care if you use the term “autistic” or “with autism”).

What I wrote down was “disability.” The teacher asked me to explain. I mean, we use the word disability all the time. In fact, I’m going to school to be a teacher for children with disabilities. Still, the word has always bothered me. I said, “To me, ‘disability’ infers the ‘in’ability to do something–that the person is less able. I don’t believe that’s true. Sure, they may have limitations, but I see them as differences, not as less able.”

I was reading in one of our books today, and a mom wrote the same thing. Speaking of her son with Down Syndrome, she wrote, “Through trial and error, we’ve learned some principles that have helped us in parenting a child with a difability, a term I prefer to use because it reminds me to look at Casey’s different abilities rather than his dis, or lack of, abilities.”

I like that.

So, every few months I’m asked to come in and talk to some parents who have gone through a parenting workshop at the therapy clinic my son goes to. These are usually newer parents whose children have been recently diagnosed. They want to talk to a more “experienced” parent (although I scoff at that idea!), and they have a variety of questions from “How did you potty train?” to “How do you handle sibling issues” to lots of “What did you do when…?”

One question got me thinking tonight. “What is something that your son accomplished that you never thought he would?”

It got me remembering what life was like just a few short years ago. My answer? Everything. Calling our name. Having a conversation. Being potty trained. Caring about his sister. Asking “why” and really caring about the answer. Showing genuine affection. Brushing his own teeth. Eating a decent dinner (although that’s still in the making!). Knowing his own emotions and how to regulate himself.

My mental list when on and on. It was then that I realized that there are, today, many things that I can’t imagine him every being able to do. Drive a car. Go on a date. Write a coherent essay about a historical event. Care more about people than his video game (or whatever is the obsession-of-the-day). Go on a mission. Get married. Have babies of his own.

But, I remember where he came from and how much I could never imagine him doing, and yet, he does it. Sure, the road is not clear, but I need to remember that only God knows his potential, and He will be the one to determine his true path. I’m only here to assist as best I can.

And what a fun journey it is!