It’s been a little bit since I opened up about some of the challenges we’re dealing with as an autism family. While life is definitely good, there are some new challenges that have come up recently and I want to talk about them.
It’s been a little while since I’m written here. There have been a great many changes in my life and all of them very positive. I’m obviously still experiencing some writing burnout and I just don’t always have the bandwidth to put my thoughts into words like I used to. That said, I’m really trying to push through that and get back into writing again because it is a healthy outlet for me. For the moment, I’m just glad to be writing this. There have been so many changes over the last few months, some I’ll talk about and others, are going to remain private for now, but all are very positive. Let’s start with Gavin. Gavin has been working with a job coach to secure employment. We’ve been working…
I want to remind all the parents out there to never lose hope. This will be very short and I feel like the picture says it all. My kids have been in a charter school for kids on the spectrum, since kindergarten. The idea of mainstreaming seemed scary and frankly, impossible at times. I always pushed the idea aside thinking I was doing what was best for my kids. I genuinely felt I was doing what was best. Fast forward to Elliott's sophomore year at the charter school and he became the target of bullying that was relentless and not handled well by the school at first. He decided that he wanted to transfer high schools, more than 3/4 of the way through the year. I wasn't very comfortable with…
Haven't done one of these is forever. Elliott and Emmett both had well checks today at Akron Children's Hospital. This was basically playing a bit of catchup as a result of COVID. Elliott needed a physical for school this year and Emmett just needed a physical because it was time for him to have a physical. They did great and both boys needed vaccines. Emmett needed both HPV and flu, while Elliott just needed his flu shot. Emmett claimed that the HPV shot hurts worse than the flu shot. This was his second HPV dose, so he has experienced it before. I was calling bullshit on that claim so we put it to the test. The nurse didn't tell him which shot was which and Emmett was supposed to tell…
Elliott's birthday was largely successful. I think it was anyway. After the boys finished class for the day, I got them over to see Lizze and we hung out in the driveway for about twenty minutes. Everyone was double masked and socially distanced. The boys were able to get hugs from their mom that's always a big thing for them. Like I said yesterday, this wasn't ideal and I felt a little uncomfortable but I also think we were both safe and smart about it. Sometimes, the emotional wellbeing of the kids involves limited and calculated risk. I ordered pizza prior to our arrival and timed it such that we would pick it up on the way home. It kept us on a schedule and it's what Elliott wanted for…
As you may or may not know, today is Elliott's 15th birthday. Today also marks the second birthday in row that he's celebrated on COVID lockdown. While Lizze and I are trying to make arrangements for the boys to go over, it's not a quick process. There's a lot of planning that goes into visits when you are in the middle of a pandemic and have high risk people in both households. Elliott is bummed because he wasn't going to be able to see his mom on his birthday. As bad as this is going to sound, I was excited to to hear that he was feeling this way. The reason for that is not because I'm a dick but rather it shows me that he is indeed healing and…
One of the things we've been working on during lockdown is life skills. I try to make the best use of all the time we have available to us and it's paying off. First of all, while Elliott and Emmett are both on the autism spectrum, they're incredibly high functioning. Aside from anxiety, SPD and ADHD, they do very well. The reason I point that out is because when I work on life skills, there's a difference between the way I approach the boys and the way I approach Gavin. They're two very different situations. For the last few weeks, Elliott and Emmett have been learning to cook. They never really showed much interest until recently and have picked it up very quickly. Elliott's big thing is scrambled eggs and…
Elliott had his first day back today and it went amazingly well. I say first day back because we moved both Elliott and Emmett back to their old school. They're remote learning instead of distance learning and the experience thus far has been night and day. Emmett is supposed to start Friday, September 4th but we're still waiting on some things to be processed. I'll call in the morning and see what's going on. Maybe he can still get started. The setup is very different than what we've been dealing with these past two weeks. Elliott remotely goes to school four days a week and Emmett will attend remotely, three days a week. The off days are for homework and extra help if needed. Elliott had a great day and…