Tess came into our life in March 1999. She is part of a big family that lived in Africa. In 1999, Tess’s mum and dad were killed. The circumstances are not important. What is important is that in the blink of an eye, Tess lost her mum and dad and, after coming to live with us in England a few months later, her home, school, friends and country. Her world. Tess was 12 at the time. The loss was doubly confusing because she wasn’t able to comprehend what had happened.…
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When you get to a page this size, I’ve learned that a lot of people speak for me. Which comes with the territory I guess. And honestly, there is nothing I can really do about it nor do I actually care. But I always shake my head when a few of my ‘beliefs’ are spewed back at me. The curing or fixing autism is the one I shake my head at the most. You won’t hear me talk about it. You won’t read my words about it. I consciously choose…
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I want to take you back a year ago. To a different me. When it was a much darker time. Where I was the mom who is spending more days crying than not. A mom who felt hopeless. Who looked at her son, and wanted to do everything within herself to help him, but didn’t know how. Who didn’t want to anything, anymore. A person who was depressed. I typed in the google search, ‘therapists near me.’ So many options came up. I’d look their profiles over, and they all…
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This post was shared anonymously and is about all the children and families that struggle with the daily life of Autism, Special Needs, and Mental Health issues. This is the view from my personal window. I Can See It I could see it all so clearly, like a movie playing in front of me. A curious child. A clever child. An autistic child. He is crawling out of bed in the middle of the night. He never has slept much. It was a pretty spring day earlier, and he wanted…
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As a parent, we have hopes and dreams for our children. I would lay in bed, watching my daughter sleep and smile just picturing the woman she would one day become. I saw an independent career woman, an amazing mother, a loving wife—I saw her living life to the fullest—enjoying every moment. Autism changed those dreams overnight. When Kya received her autism diagnosis, a flood of emotions washed over me that my mind and body could simply not handle. As the fog slowly began to clear, I was tasked to understand…
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When I became pregnant with my first child in 2007, I had no idea the journey I was about to embark on. I felt that I would be like every other mother I knew and have that ‘normal family’. It didn’t turn out that way and honestly, I could have never imagined the hurdles that we would have to go through over the last 11 years. My daughter was born in 2008, health and happy. For the first two years everything was perfect. One day, I noticed a small tremor…
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Hello friends! I am so excited to do a quick video this morning. I’m going to cover two topics. Moving and Slander/Cyber Bullying. Both topics are equally interesting and I recommend you watch through the whole video. As many of you know, our family is moving once again. Many of you have asked questions about how Cooper handles moving and how we prepare him for a positive transition. This is Cooper’s fifth move. He is surprisingly resilient and handles the transitions very well. As his parents, we also do everything…
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My ah-ha moment really has nothing to do with my son or his autism. But more about how moms in the special needs world view and treat each other. About three years ago, I met one of the most important people in my life. My close friend Carrie. She has a little guy who is 4 ½ and has nonverbal autism. My autistic 6 ½ year old is verbal. So, they are basically opposites. Carries lives pretty far from me, so we don’t get to see each other often. But…
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I have two absolutely amazing little boys. One is 7 and one is 5. They are both blonde. They are both happy. They are both silly. I gave birth to them both. They are two years apart. And that is where their similarities end. My boys are like night and day. Personalities, likes, dislikes, fears, hopes, dreams, etc. All different. And that’s okay to say out loud. I’m not afraid of differences. Not anymore. In the beginning yes. I’m human. And differences can be scary. But time helped all that.…
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1 in 189 girls are diagnosed with autism. Today, my girl officially became the 1. I pictured her soaring in with a superwoman cape and “saving” all the other little girls from this fate. But as we know, it’s not a choice like that. I’ve never worked so hard for a piece of paper I didn’t ever want. The piece of paper saying my daughter has a chronic disability for which she can never be cured took nearly a year of constant phone calls, evaluations to submit, i’s to be…
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