I had a long talk with my son’s teacher last night at conferences about reading and math and wiggle breaks and how much I value my son’s kindness and heart above all. After that we spoke about much he is motivated by doing activities with his dad. I sorta smiled. And snickered. See, I’ve been noticing that too in his school work. His creative writing stories and drawings all include Dad and ice fishing and hockey and baseball. His teacher said, ‘trust me Kate, I know how much mom’s do.’…
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It was freshman year of high school. I was sitting in English class and I overheard someone calling their friend retarded. Yes, almost 20 years later, I still remember every detail of this day, down to who the person was and what he was wearing. “Hey find a different word!” I yelled at my classmate. The class got quiet. Waiting to see what would happen next. As a high school student, my approach wasn’t the best in advocating for those with disabilities. “Why because your brother is retarded?” the freshman…
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What I learned from a nonverbal young lady at church… I entered quietly and slid into my regular seat. I prepared myself for worship to begin. That’s just how I usually do things. Routine. Perhaps, even mundane. Dull. It was how I was raised I suppose. You entered. Your presence was known from the back of the room. Your boots clunked down the center aisle, somewhat vocal as you walked carrying your snack. Your mom followed closely behind you, trying to direct you to a row towards the back of…
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Our 5 yr old won an award at school. He goes to a public school and is in a special needs room. The school was having a breakfast today to celebrate the children for creativity and my husband and I were so excited to attend. It’s hard to go to the events at school because it’s confusing for him but we do our best and do lots of prep work. He first saw us and panicked….no no no. He was confused as to why we are at school. He thinks it’s…
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Here is me. I am Jack. Here is me, and here is my autism. See, I am a boy and a diagnosis tangled together like so many vines climbing a tree. I am the rustle of paperwork, and small white pills in a vial. I am honesty, and tenacity, and a body in motion. I am a boy trying to hide. I am downcast eyes. And a hopeful heart. I am repetitive behavior. And special meetings in an overheated conference room. I am letters on paper—a statistic., a number, a…
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In horror movies, the silence often lets us know something bad is about to happen. We tense our bodies, pull the covers up in preparation, and anticipate the worst. We do the same in special needs parenting, or in my case, being the mother of a nonverbal autistic son. Sometimes I feel like there is so much silence that it could consume me whole. It’s not just the moments when I look into my beautiful son’s eyes and try with every cell in my body to will him to say…
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Today, I failed you. I yelled. You cried. I cried. As we were doing our normal morning routine, fighting about putting your jeans on, I was already anxious. Worried about how school drop offs would be, worried if you were going to get upset as I walked down the hall to leave the school… all the normal morning anxiety. After the jeans debacle, you were finally dressed. Not without a little negotiation, of course. “First jeans, then bunny socks!” Harper has some socks with a bunny on the side… he is…
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I have a secret for you. Most of the time I don’t know what I’m doing in the world of parenting. Nor have I ever claimed too. I mean I obviously know to brush my kid’s teeth and feed them fruit once in a while. I know to put sunscreen on them, hug and kiss them a dozen times a day, and not giggle when they say swears, but beyond that, I am mostly just winging it. Especially when it comes to my first born. I joke that my autism…
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Today was a really big day in our little world. Huge really. This morning Cooper went to his brother’s school to have his school photo taken by Lifetouch. See, these two boys should be in school together. They should be in first and third grade and riding the bus to and from school together. But they are not. It is what it is I guess. This was a big deal for both of them. We’ve been talking about it for over a week. A new shirt! A fancy haircut! A…
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There is always next year… At age two we went to a restaurant for the last time. We started early intervention and learned how different our son was from his peers. At age three he was diagnosed with autism and we were told all the things he would never do. At age four we locked our house down. Three locks on every single door. Window alarms. Fences. We realized we couldn’t go places outside of our home. We started having aggressions and self injuring behavior. At age five it got…
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