Category Archives: Family

Over at Woodstone Prairie, Maura wrote about the discrimination of the mentally disabled, as well as the common word usages in the same category used flippantly to describe negative attributes.  Interestingly, both just recently were part of a conversation as well as an experience today (again).

I was gone for the weekend with four of my children getting to enjoy the camaraderie of fellow unschoolers at a weekend camp at a sound on the coast of North Carolina here in the state we live.  It’s a group called Families Learning Together that has been around for a while here in North Carolina, and for which I have become a part over the past few years.  They have two camps a year:  one in the fall and one in the spring, at various camp locations across North Carolina (usually YMCA types or church camps, etc., where you can rent the entire facility).  They are starting to add a winter gathering.  There are usually around 100 people of all ages and this past weekend, there were four families with children with autism there.

I had a particularly good time connecting with a mother of two, Carissa, in which we enjoyed sharing similar experiences of many attributes of our families being “different”.  One particular conversation I had was about the idea that it’s the mentally disabled that are the most discriminated about strictly for the fact that they really have no voice.  As an example, I brought up the realization that before the Jews were persecuted during the Holocaust, all the disabled people were killed.  But nobody talks about that, or for them.  Though it was horrendous what happend to the Jews, they have a voice to be remembered and seek consolation or vindication.  Anyway . . . I agree with Maura on this point.
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And, just this morning, during an early morning scripture study class, some of the youth referred to each other or themselves as “retards”.  I like to take the opportunity, particularly with this age group, to create awareness on their part, as most of this language is just said without realizing what they are actually saying.  I’ll say something like, “You know, one should think about the words they use, because they may be in the presence of someone who has a mentally retarded child.”  Since they all know about Adam, they usually quickly apologize, and I hope, find more awareness.  I think change begins with the youth . . .

I try not to take it personally, but educate.  But, sometimes, it is tiring to always be in that role.  So, again, I’m there with Maura on this one.

Here I go trying to get my blogging habit going . . . again. Only time will tell when my efforts will stick 🙂 I thought it would be fun to target various children in my focus for my posts if I don’t have a personal inspired thought for the day. Today, I thought I would start with Adam because he did something we all dropped our jaws over the other day. In fact, I had to laugh because my instinct was to tiptoe around the situation, pretending that if I didn’t put a spotlight on it, it would stick around a while longer . . . LOL! So, what am I talking about.

Adam, who is 15 years old, and struggles with autism on a minutely basis, has taken to withdrawing from the family for the most part over the past several or more years. He is very comfortable around his father and I so will hang out between his own bedroom (one of the few with their own) and our bedroom, connecting on a consistent basis. As for most of the other children, he avoids them . . . the younger ones because they agitate him because he can’t predict their behaviors, and the older ones, because they are usually around where the little ones are . . . LOL! So, to come out into the main family area during peak hours is rare. Instead, he peeks his head out his door to request food every so often . . . thus, why his nickname became “His Majesty” . . . LOL! . . . or to request a parent or older sibling to do something with him.

It would take a lot to explain the ins and outs about how and why things happen, but just suffice it to say that Adam and Alex (13 years old and living with autism) are autistically at odds right now. It happened when they were about 2 and 4 years old, and started again around 12 and 14 years old. Probably another year and they could be through it, with a little help from me. And, that’s what I started the other day. Alex has come a long way in understanding his own and others’ behaviors, including Adam’s, with a LOT of talking and explaining from me to him, and a lot of talking through relaxation techniques in order that he doesn’t go into a meltdown himself over their behavioral differences.

So, Adam doesn’t want Alex to be outside when he is, and lately, Adam has taken to wanting to be outside more since moving to the country, and so has Alex. Naturally, Alex doesn’t want to be dictated whether he can be outside just because his brother does, so I decided to implement a plan that entered my mind. I explained to Alex that although he is the younger brother, he has more abilities than his older brother, and in order to create a different relationship, he would need to be the one to initiate a rebuilding of their interactions as he proved to Adam that he could be trusted through maintaining his composure no matter what Adam says. Alex seemed game, so we rehearsed what he could say, and what Adam might do in reaction behaviorally, and how Alex could respond.

So, Alex approached Adam who was waiting on the trampoline for his sister, and sure enough, Adam closed his eyes and started insisting that Alex leave. Alex courageously and calmly stood his ground and waited for a silence and initiated, “Adam, I want to be your best friend.” Hhhmm, he added “best” in the suggested sentence . . . interesting 🙂 Alex had to repeat this a couple times for Adam to really hear him since he will often shut down all his senses when he feels like he might become overwhelmed in someone’s presence. I helped Alex keep his composure through Adam’s ignoring and other behaviors and Adam dared to peek and see that Alex was being calm still. Then, I leaned over and suggested that Alex ask Adam a question about what he was wanting . . . “Do you want to bounce with Abbey?” Adam replied calmly, “Yes.” And then Alex stated he would go inside now so Adam could bounce with Abbey.Such is native to some Asian look here cialis prices countries like Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

Alright, I figured that was a good start, and if we do something like that every day, maybe their interactions would become less suspicious of one another and maybe they could start being in the same room together again. So, what to my wondering eyes did I see a few hours later? Adam came downstairs (after returning to the house and to his room, as usual) and sat down in a chair and watched his oldest brother, Eric, play video games in the main room of the house . . . during prime time peak hours! Happily! With Eric (who has a similar history with Adam, who couldn’t tolerate Eric’s voice for several years before he left for a year, which seems to have broken that pattern to a large degree, thanks to some things Eric did when he returned to help lessen the previous effects, bless his soul). Adam stayed there for about a half hour! And Alex walked in, and he was fine! I was shocked. Everyone was shocked. We walked around like you would when you see a deer in the woods and don’t want to frighten it away . . . LOL!

My hubby arrived home from work and I met him on his walk in and prepared him for a surprise, but warned him not to be too shocked or “scare him away”. He walked in, saw, and his jaw dropped. I even went and got a picture. I know! Sounds silly, but unless someone lives with autism to the degree we do, you have no idea 🙂 Here’s the captured moment!

We’re moving to the country at the end of this month! I’ll post some on that another time. However, we need to downsize a bit . . . in a good way. So, I’ve been trying to put some of my newfound desire to throw things out into effect . . . not typically part of my past nature . . . and it feels good. But today, I was going through my armoire/bookshelf unit in the family room, which is where I have kept my ABA therapy supplies I used with my two boys with autism in the day that they were intensely learning to speak, for instance.

We stopped most formal therapy back in 2002. Though, ABA principles are how Adam (15) still learns today. In this middle cabinet are shoebox sized clear storage containers with oodles and oodles of cards. Adam LOVES to match, so I would make cards for everything! I came across the word cards we used when he learned to read . . . tossed them. Ah, there are the color coded question cards with verbal/visual matched answer card for the 100 questions he learned when he had a short foray in a public kindergarten, and I wanted to prove to the administration that a child “like Adam” could successfully participate in their fund raiser (he was one of only a few children in the whole school who answered 100% correctly). What’s funny is he still remembers those questions. The thing I’ve discovered about Adam’s autism is that he never deletes anything, which would make it difficult to make room for more important things, one would think. Kinda like my hanging on to these cards.

I found the conversation cards we used; I decided to keep those. Same with all those emotion cards that Adam loved so much. With the advent of the Internet, where, if you want any type of picture, all you need to do is google image and find a hundred to choose from, all of my meticulously acquired visual pictures of various objects are deemed obsolete. But, how can I just throw them away after literally hours upon hours of scouring magazines for just the right pictures to use to help Adam or Alex learn the word . . . in double, no less. And, I hand lamanated them with contact paper . . . hundreds of pictures.

Times sure have changed. What a blessing for those who are helping their children with autism today! But, one can’t replace the individualized photos I have to bring the words alive in his own life. The picture of his chair, or his blanket, or his hammer set, or the alphabet puzzle he loved. Or how about those emotion pictures of his siblings, his father (and my hubby), and myself. Look how young we were! And, yes, I even have photos of Adam pointing in the grocery store, his sister waving in McDonalds, and my hubby pumping gas at the gas station. So, if you see a strange woman taking pictures in public places where you don’t normally see a camera, she might just have a child with autism!You will certainly not feel bad for view address cheap cialis filing the Propecia lawsuit.

I did toss quite a bit. However, nostalgia and sheer bittersweet memory had me hold on to quite a bit. The likelihood is that some of my children may have children with autism themselves. My oldest son and daughter have asked me about this. I’ve said that they can take one child at a time and see what happens. The bottom line is that they will have a grandma (me) who knows a lot about helping, and she’ll have a bunch of cards to start them out 🙂

I kept the buckets to six. Maybe as more time passes, I’ll be able to throw out more. But, for now, they stay as a reminder of where we’ve been, in order to remember to enjoy where we are today.