Parent conference is later this week and we'll address it then. I fear my wife was spoiled somewhat by the previous autism center and nothing will measure up though.
This new school Tristan is in is kind of spoiling me. The special ed teacher uses an app called Class Dojo, which she uses to message me during the day. Today, for instance, they started trying training underwear. She shot me a message right after class started about him making a fuss putting them on, and I let her know that I talked to him about it before getting on the bus, and he was upset just talking about it. Later she asked me to bring some pants to the school, and I was able to get over there a few minutes later. The communication with this school, or at least this SE teacher, is worlds beyond what I'm used to.
Bruises on the legs, unless they're severe, I'd probably chalk up to a new environment. Multiple new bruises every day, I wouldn't expect each to be documented, but I'd expect something mentioned at some point (IE, Tristan keeps hitting legs on table, or keeps falling on playground, etc). Then at least I know they're paying attention, and it's just him being clumsy. They can't stop him from hurting himself at all, but if they don't know how they're happening it'd be a huge red flag for me.
For what it's worth, my daughter shows bruises on her shins a lot. I think she gets them from sitting with her knees up when she's at her desk.
They don't seem to bother her, so we don't worry about them.
Gewy, I know how you feel. It's the kind of insensitive comment that shows some people have zero empathy, no perspective. Drives me right up a wall.
Glad the parent conference went well though.
So sorry, Gewy. Any chance a family member or services could help out for a bit so you can get a breather?
Aside from that, a safety lock might be your only choice, but I fully understand it's not one you would feel comfortable with. If you think it's cruel to leave him stuck in a dark room, maybe a night light could be an option? Does he use light switches at all? I know my eldest is quite adept at turning the light on if he so chooses, even at 3am.
My thoughts are with you.
Should he have the freedom to get out of his room at 1 am...?
No. That I can answer pretty comfortably, but I'm not sure what the best option would be for stopping him. When my kids were younger I very rarely went in to comfort them when they woke up in the night. I'd listen to them cry, then calm themselves, then drift back to sleep. After a while the amount of time spent doing this became less and less. I can't remember the last time one of them actually woke me up at night. Then again, they weren't nearly as active as yours is, and if they did leave their room, it was normally to come crawl into ours.
Letting him roam around is going to give him ways to stimulate himself. Going in there with him will give him stimulation. IMO, limiting the stimulation is the only thing within your control. As for the kitchen, you might want to go with paper plates and plastic utensils for a while. Not the best idea for long term, but until you have something better in place, there's only so much he can do with a plastic knife and a paper plate. He'll make a mess ripping them up, but better to clean up the mess than clean blood off him. Best of luck to you. If you ever find yourself in the VA Beach area, PM me, and I'll watch him for a night or two so you can get a break.
Tristan is mostly out of diapers now. I still have to put one on at night, and he goes in it every night, but during the day he's in underwear. Losing the ABA therapy wasn't the end of the world, as the special ed teacher he has now is absolutely amazing. Took her less than a month to get him out of diapers during the day. I still need to set ABA back up for after school hours, and at this point I've more-or-less resigned myself to driving for Uber just to bring in some extra money to keep us afloat financially. With all the appointments, and my wife getting pulled for CVN-73 (with the expectation that she'll get pulled again and again, for weeks at a time, she just got back from Haiti), I just don't feel comfortable getting full time work with set hours.
Study offers potential breakthrough in care of children with autism https://www.theguardian.com/society/...
Study offers potential breakthrough in care of children with autism https://www.theguardian.com/society/...
I'm having mixed emotions about that. It's basically exactly what I've been doing with my kids, and we've been having a lot of success with it.
I do feel sad that people seem to need the blessing of people in white coats before they love their kids and try to engage with them on the kid's terms. Especially considering how much trouble came from the last time the Lancet became an oracle for parents of autistic kids. Do we really need a Lancet study to tell us to treat our kids like people?
Considering that previous attempts at dealing with autistic children involved electric shocks until they stop acting so damn weird (which is still going on in some "modern" clinics), I'd say this is a positive step in general, even if the language of the article is basically "here's how to get your autistic kid to stop being such a brat."
I'll agree with DoubtingT on this one. Doesn't seem like much of a breakthrough to me either. Understanding your child, how they function, what they need and respond to is one of the first steps to nudging them in the right direction. But I guess it's always good to have studies that scientifically show what we've suspected.
Ouch Gewy, that's really rough. I honestly can't fault that mom for getting her son placed in residential treatment. Even though it's something that I can't do for mine, I can't help but wonder if it might come to that one day. Honestly, don't apologize for "another woe is me post". These situations are so hard, if you can't tell this kind of thing to random anonymous internet posters, who can you tell it to?
I hope you are getting enough sleep. I wish there was something I could do to help, but if you need to vent and talk things out here, have at it.
This weekend has been difficult. So tired of the screeching and the hitting and and destroying everything he touches and the rest.
But then he goes and does something like peeing in a cup during shower time and trying to drink from it.
**sigh**
If you have Netflix, you all owe it to yourselves to see Aspergers Are Us, a documentary about the titular comedy troop made up of four people on the spectrum.
The leader of the troop also has a TedX talk (that I haven't watched yet but my wife says is very good) that explains what the life of an autistic person is like.
More people need to see stuff like this. People who aren't Neurotypical deserve to be considered people too.
Thanks for the heads up, DoubtingT! Looks like it's on Netflix France and downloadable too. Yoink!!!
Edit: shame it's all guys. =\
Great NPR article about using improve to help autistics children read emotion and body language.
In regards to my son who is now 22 months and still not verbal, ABA seems to be making some difference. It's not the drastic improvement I was hoping for when we started it back in August, but I may have been setting myself up expecting too much too fast. His Physical and Occupational therapy are improving through the roof at least.
It's still hard for him to keep eye contact with my wife and I but it's definitely getting better. What hurts me the most as a parent is calling his name and not getting any response or reaction. He just completely ignores it, I know my wife wants that to happen really badly as well. It's hard to connect with him since he is always in his own space bouncing around from toy to toy. Now we have family members and friends who we haven't told "he's autistic" that are starting to dig into that. They would constantly says "Angelo" "Aaaaaangeloooooo" over and over. With that and the hand flapping, when he gets excited people are starting to get suspicious and ask us questions.
We aren't ready to tell people that he's autistic yet because we are still holding out some hope it will break with ABA. Plus he won't be officially diagnosed with it until he turns 3. There are a lot of red flags that can't be ignored but we are just trying to hold on and hope ABA does the trick or at least marginalizes it so he is high function.
To tell the truth, TempestBlayze, you have to be patient. Little tyke isn't even three yet, you're doing early intervention, there isn't much more you can do but nurture your child and give him what you can. He'll find his way.
The fact that ABA is making any difference at 22 months is actually a pretty good sign, IMO. Tristan was still non-verbal at 22 months, and didn't really come out of his shell until he was nearly 3. Now he can be a little chatter box.
As for telling people... not sure what to say there. I told my relatives and his caregivers outright when we got the diagnosis (which was early, he was diagnosed at 18 months). It might be a little different since I'm fairly certain I'm on the high functioning side of the spectrum myself, so I just rolled with it and figured if something changed I'd update them accordingly.
Tristan came up to me the other day as I was telling silly knock knock jokes, and laid this one on me....
Why did the chicken and the turkey cross the road?
I don't know, why did they cross the road?
TO BREAK THEIR SOULS!
My son used to like writing jumbles of letters on a page and laugh uproariously at my attempts at "Dad, what does this say?"
Have any of you used Agape vitamins? One of our therapists told us that a lot of parents with autistic children sware by it.
Have any of you used Agape vitamins? One of our therapists told us that a lot of parents with autistic children swear by it.
With my son on the spectrum, I get bombarded with an incredible number of treatments and "cures" - it takes a pretty sharp (Occam's) razor to cut through sales pitches that are being hawked to me/us.
I am not a doctor:
Sounds like snake oil/magic beans, to me. Most recent research shows that vitamin supplements show benefit that only equals placebo effectiveness - in other words... not effective, at all.
Now, if your doctor has diagnosed you with an actual deficiency, then that's an entirely different story (iron and B12, for vegetarians is very common).
Maybe it's real... Maybe it's not... but I know I don't have $60/mo to blow on a placebo. (I have plenty other things to waste my money )
My position on all dietary based autism "cures" is to take them with a big pile of salt.
From what I can tell, most of the improvements people see in the behavior of autistic children comes from alleviating digestive pain that the kid can't describe. It's not so much curing autism as it is making the child not so overloaded. That's a worthy goal, but you have to keep it in perspective, especially when there are still people out there claiming that dosing your child with bleach will cure autism.
Too many buzzwords for my taste. Sounds perfectly crafted to weasel people out of their money. And her biographical information on her own site doesn't make me feel any better about it... From everything I see, my opinion of her (which I admit could be entirely wrong) is that she is likely scum that looks to profit from those of us that just want the best for our kids, many of which are intellectually delayed or disabled. And I don't know where you're getting $60/mo from, it's $97 per bottle and the site mentions that it lasts just over a month. Which for an autistic kid means about a third will be spilled or spit out, so probably closer to 2/3 to 3/4 of a month.
God... the more I look at the site the angrier I'm getting. Agape, Unconditional Love. Agape, Pure Love. Apparently love costs about $3 per ounce.
Well, I *am* a doctor, and honestly, all those supposed cures, those dietary supplements, diets, and other stuff... None of it really works, because there's no scientific basis. It's not evidence based medicine. Some of those don't really do any harm, they're snake oil, but some of it is downright dangerous. Not to mention ludicrously costly.
And really, when you read "gluten, dairy, corn, soy, food dyes, and artificial sweeteners", you wonder what's left. XD
Bullsh*t. That's what's left. I'll stick to my Flintstone vitamins for Tristan.
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