It’s frustrating, sometimes, seeing the things that the Monster can’t do, compared to other children his own age.
Granted, it’s not like he’s fully non-verbal, or that he’s entirely incapable of doing things for himself. I do count our blessings on that regard, because it could always be much worse. (Though, for the record, “it could be much worse” is a horrible, self-defeating outlook on life.) Continue reading
One of the downers of being the parents of a child with Autism is that we feel like we can’t get out as frequently as other parents.
Now, I know that a lot of that is just our perception (coupled with the fact that the wife and I are probably too frugal for our own good). It’s hard to find a good sitter who can cope with both R – in the throes of the Terrible Threes – and the Monster, much less handle how the Monster’s not entirely verbal. So we’ve actually not had the chance to go out on date nights as frequently as we should like. Continue reading
A few weeks ago, the Monster had his every-so-often appointment with the neuropsychologist. We got the report this week, and the wife sent it on to my email account for me to read.
Aside from my want to quote The Princess Bride at it… the report didn’t tell us anything that we didn’t already know.
A while back, I wrote about how the Monster’s starting to have his adult teeth come in (see Well That Bites), at least the front two on the bottom. We’ve been watching the baby teeth in front of them get more and more loose, and trying to figure out what to do when he gets to the point of losing one.
Last night, he let the wife tie some floss around the more loose of the two and pull it free, since it was just barely hanging on. Continue reading
One of the few constants about children is that they need to eat. (It’s that, sleep and poop, honestly – the big three.) And despite being behind verbally, he does let us know that he’s hungry, if not in the most elegantly phrased way, but by shouting ‘EAT!’ at us.
As I’ve talked about several times, the Monster is a very finicky eater. We’ve not figured out if there’s a rhyme or reason to his choices for what he will or won’t eat, which leaves us frustrated more often than not. It’s not uncommon, from what I’ve seen looking around the community, but it is a giant pain in the ass. For more than a year now, his meals have been fairly fixed at home, with dinner being a slice or two of pizza.
So for a few months now, he’s been involved in a feeding therapy program every other week (it switches off with some behavioral therapy he’s getting). This therapy’s introduced the whole concept of “food friends” to try to get him to eat more, and it’s had some modest success – he’s been drinking milk again, as well as eating macaroni, albeit one noodle at a time. Continue reading
The dental visit went pretty well, all told.
Pro-tip: If you’re going to hold your special needs kid out of school for an early-morning dental clinic visit, call the school so they know. Otherwise, you get a weird, awkward phone call from the office, while his one-on-one aide is standing there, asking why he’s not there. Continue reading
Living in Maryland, the weather is the worst part of the winter.
Certainly, we don’t get it as badly as I did where I grew up, where we got hit with serious snow multiple times a winter. Nor are we getting it even as badly once as Boston has on multiple occasions this winter. But… let’s just say that Maryland is a little nervous when it comes to the white stuff – they seem to close schools at the drop of a hat. (I’m exaggerating, but only slightly.)
So… this week, schools were closed on Monday, and then closed early on Tuesday due to the weather. Continue reading
We frequently hear about how children with Autism are excluded from parties – I’ve written about the topic before, unapologetically. There’s also been quite a bit about how kids with Autism tend to be marginalized by not having a lot of folks come to their parties…
But one good thing in the world is family. You can have hundreds of folks out there who aren’t going to include your child, but your family will always, always include your kids, no matter what.
This weekend was my nephew Z’s birthday party… and I’ll admit that I’d been somewhat nervous about the idea of taking the Monster to the party. Continue reading
Last night was a PCAB meeting down at North Avenue, to allow for more discussion about the way that the PARCC exams are going to be administered next month. Most of our discussions have centered on whether or not schools are ready to administer the exams, whether our students are really ready, and the technology issues around the test itself, since parts of it are slated to be computer-administered.
Bear in mind that the Monster is not old enough yet to be taking the PARCC – he’s in first grade, and the test starts in third. But one of the things they tout with the exam is that it has features built-in to allow for accessibility for students. Continue reading
Before I left for Québec last week, R got fairly sick.
Now, I’m not talking “rush him to the hospital STAT!” level of sick – he was more snotty than usual, and whiny, and coughing, and running a mid-grade fever. But, of course, this was the last thing that we needed before I was going abroad for a week, and since I was at home (ie, the Monster was at therapy downtown), it was delegated to me to go take R to the doctor.
Fortunately, it turned out to be minor, but looked worse because it was two things colliding – he had a cold, coupled with an ear infection that was spiking his fever. But because he’s three, he can’t really accurately communicate what’s bothering him, and so it was touch and feel, and the doctor was quizzing me on what the symptoms were. Continue reading