...was having a good day.
Albuquerque, NM
This week is Adam's last week of school and it will be a short week too since we're leaving for Huntsville on Friday for my niece's graduation. So out of the four days that he'll be at school, I'll be volunteering three. Apparently I couldn't muster up the word 'no' when it came to over-committing myself. His last day will be a field trip to his favorite kid's museum so it will be a memorable last day of kindergarten. The days are long but the years are short comes to mind as I realize that he's finished kindergarten. I have a six year old. How did that happen? I'm looking forward to the summer--as I do every year, hoping to do a bunch of things on the summer bucket list and hoping to maintain a balance between having fun and doing some academic stuff to stem regression. A couple of self-care goals thrown in there but in the past, those have been the toughest to achieve. Those will be icing on the cake if he accomplishes one of them.
posted about 4 hours ago
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...was having a good day.
Albuquerque, NM
After a harrowing week of dealing with the school district, it was SO nice to go to the Isotopes baseball game for Autism Night. The first pitch was thrown by a young man with autism. The national anthem was sung beautifully by a woman with autism. I met and talked with a father of a young man with autism and it was so inspiring to hear his story and the sacrifices that he gladly made for his son. He was there with a big group of friends and family, all wearing the same shirt and just having a great time. It really warmed my heart. They were also called out to the field to sing 'Take Me Out to the Ball Game.' Adam loved it and we brought his headphones so he wasn't bothered by the noise and for the first time, watched the fireworks at the end of the game with excitement instead of covering his ears and trying to get away. Only thing I was disappointed about was not getting to meet Lynne! I never found you! Hope you and Gillian had a fun time!
posted 15 days ago
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...was having a good day.
Albuquerque, NM
Another week and it's getting closer to the end of school. Hard to believe that Adam is just about done with kindergarten. He's very excited about going to his first baseball game of the season tonight. This weekend he has a birthday party to attend--a classmate from preschool. It's a pool party and he loves to swim these days so it should be a good time. I'm looking forward to seeing his mom who I only get to see on Facebook these days. Errands to run this weekend but hopefully we'll get them done soon enough to have enough 'doing nothing' time. Excited for our three day getaway next weekend for Mother's Day. Sometimes I just have to get the heck out of town to clear my head with some different scenery. Hope everyone has a great weekend!
posted 16 days ago
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...was having a good day.
Albuquerque, NM
Hey Albuquerque folks! This Friday, May 4 is Autism Night at the Isotopes. Come out and support our autism community and meet other families!
posted 22 days ago
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...was having a good day.
Albuquerque, NM
I am so slacking on my posts! Seemed like a week of drama over at my house. Some of it I can laugh about now, for example, last weekend, I picked up food for an Autism Society brunch and when I went to take it out of my trunk, (it was Mexican food), containers of salsa, cheese and lettuce fell out of the car, onto the front of my dress and landed in a pile in the loading zone of where we were having the brunch. I looked like that scene out of Carrie. The screaming came from the salsa getting into my contacts. Total horror movie scene. Luckily, I was rescued by the other folks who were there to help set up but I smelled like salsa for the entirety of the brunch. And when I got home, Adam said, you have salsa on your legs. I'm not sure if thats better or worse than having spinach in my teeth. There was a very nice ending to the Saturday food disaster, I was asked to be the new Vice President of the Autism Society, as we changed our board at the brunch and we have new members and members leaving. Monday I was asked to sit in on a meeting between a speech therapy provider here in ABQ and an insurance company. I came away from that meeting outraged and just pissed off at how they were justifying decreasing their coverage of speech for children with autism. Tuesday I volunteered at Adam's school and observed Adam being bullied. I confronted the kid and then I wrote to his teacher, telling her that every kid in his class had been bullied by this kid and no one was speaking up because everyone was afraid of retaliation. The kids were not saying anything. That same night I received an email from his teacher who agreed with me that this child was disruptive and that she would speak with his mother and I heard from Adam today that the whole class talked about how they were going to help this kid stay "out of the red" (which is their class punishment system' if you will). It was good to get it off my chest and to feel like I was walking the talk since I post anti-bully articles on my Facebook page and how could I let this happen, not to just my kid but knowing full well that other kids were being bullied too. I'm sure most of you know that children with autism almost all experience being bullied. As parents we need to help the schools develop plans to teach the children in the classrooms what it is, without singling any particular child, and providing a safe way for them to talk about it.
So, I really would like to end with an uneventful, boring Friday. I'm all for boring tomorrow. No drama, no feeling mad, sad, etc.
I know there's a lot of new folks coming on to myautismteam everyday and hopefully this weekend I'll have a chance to say hi to some of you! This is a great site--look, I just vented my week and I already feel better.
posted 24 days ago
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...was having a good day.
Albuquerque, NM
Happy Friday everyone! Hoping everyone had a good week. I won't bore you with the litany of stuff I had to do. Wishing Adam and I were in the Bay Area this weekend to see my husband compete in his annual Sea Otter Classic Mountain Bike Race. Had too many commitments that I couldn't back out of :( But it gives Adam and me some Mom and son time for the next couple of days so I'm going to make the most of it. He's coming to help me with our Autism Society Appreciation Brunch tomorrow which I'm coordinating. In hindsight, probably shouldn't have said yes to doing it a couple of months ago when I volunteered. I had no idea that April was going to be so jam-packed.
Adam is excited about planting (I bought some bean seeds since they grow super fast) and an upside down tomato plant (As Seen On TV!) on Sunday (in honor of Earth Day!) and we're planning on going to Explora, our local children's hands on museum. I dread going there because he stims for what seems like a lifetime in front of the gigantic marble run exhibit in the entrance but I've decided I'm going to just let that go. We may never make it to the first exhibit but he'll be happy so who am I to deny it that?
This week his class had a field trip to the local hospital and they came home with a hospital cap, face mask, plastic shot dispenser (sans needle), and other miscellaneous stuff. The first thing he did when he got home was get his stuffed animal and proceeded to act out giving the stuffed animal a flu shot. It was the first time EVER that I've seen him demonstrate pretend play at that level. He talked to the animal and comforted it, gave it words. I was so ecstatic you'd thought I'd won the lottery (ok, not that ecstatic but close). I had only wished I could have taped it. He did it again on me and on my husband too. After years of therapy and parent training on how to encourage pretend play, this was so huge.
Just participated in a webinar this morning put on by UNM on how to talk to your child about their diagnosis. It was very interesting and it eased my own anxieties about when I should tell him more than I have. The bottom line was to not worry about the when. Finding the right opportunities in a safe environment is key. Adam hears the word autism so much in our house because of my involvement in various activities that he "seems" to accept that its a "normal" part of our life. Hard to tell if that's true at his age but I have tools that I learned in the webinar that I will use to engage him in finding out how he feels and empathizing with him if needed and providing him the opportunity to talk about it and ask questions. Emphasizing the positive and explaining the differences between him and other people will be a work in progress and that's something I also took away from the webinar. It's a process.
Long post because I haven't been on here for probably over a week with the exception of posting Adam's race pic. Hoping to have more time in May to sit down and meet some of the new faces I see on this site :)
posted 30 days ago
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