Today was supposed to be a relatively relaxing day. Emmett and Gavin have therapy this morning, well Emmett already had therapy this morning. Anyway, Gavin slept in as he is prone to do lately. When he woke up he seemed fine. However, from where I was sitting I only saw the right side of his face. Gavin started getting anxious and I wasn't sure why. I asked him if he was OK and he turned to look at me and this is what I saw. What the heck is this? When he came home from grandmas yesterday he had one little red bump on his jaw It just looked like a mosquito bite. However, clearly something has changed as this is definitely a problem much bigger then a simple mosquito…

With everything going on with Gavin I neglected to mention what was going on with Emmett. Next week we are meeting with the pediatrician. Emmett has been running fevers quite frequently and for no apparent reason. He wants to run some bloodwork and then discuss what type of specialist we need to see. These fevers last about a week and never seem to have a cause. We used to think he was getting sick due to being at school and sharing toys and whatever with the other kids bit it still happens and schools been out for a while. He has food allergies and maybe this is related to a new allergy? Does anyone else have issues with random fevers with no other symptoms? - Lost and Tired Post by…

I have referred to Autism's quirks on a number of occasions. So I thought that today, I would share one of Autism's little quirks with you. For this post, I'm referring to Emmett. I try to allow the kids in general to get as much hands on experience as possible. Sometimes it's sorting laundry or feeding Maggie. Sometimes is repairing a toy or something else around the house. Today, I had Emmett help make his dinner. He wanted chicken nuggets so I brought him the bag of nuggets and a plate. He very carefully and deliberately choose his nuggets and placed them in a very specific pattern. He was very particular about this pattern and he did his best to make sure that nine of the nuggets touched. Emmett hates…

I have been reciting the Serenity Prayer to myself all morning as Gavin is in rare form today.  He's not misbehaving or anything like that but he's talking about random things in a nonstop manner.  As terrible as this sounds (and I know it sounds terrible) Gavin is basically think to breathe anymore.  I don't know how else to describe it. I think Lizze said it best the other day.  She said,  "Gavin is chronologically 11 years old and emotionally 3 or 4 years old.  It used to be that It used to be that Gavin would mostly act 11 and sometimes act 3 or 4. Anymore however, Gavin is mostly 3 or 4 and only sometimes acts like he's 11.". Does that make any sense? At the risk of sounding…

  I haven't said anything about this until now because I wasn't sure exactly what was going on and I didn't want to say something until I knew for sure. However, today it actually happened. The Foundation for Community Betterment   Earlier this year I was contacted by a friend from high school, Denise. She had been following our story and had actually been helping me out with some logo art work. She is a member of an organization called The Foundation for Community Betterment. Excerpt from their website:  "The Foundation for Community Betterment is a national organization dedicated to community enhancement by creating an immediate, positive impact on the lives of individuals or organizations that share our philanthropic vision, but who currently lack the means to succeed."  The recipients…

Childhood disintegrative disorder: Bad News I spoke with Dr. Mitra the neurologist from the Cleveland Clinic  that evaluated Gavin this past Monday. She explained to me that they have not seen anyone like Gavin before and so they don't know what to tell us.  She said that Gavin's symptoms don't fit any known degenerative neurological disorder or disease. This may be some exotic or extremely rare degenerative neurological disorder or disease. She also said that they have not ruled out  childhood disintegrative disorder either but that we will need to see someone else for that.. This was literally like a kick in the gut and I immediately felt sick to my stomach. I was hoping beyond hope, that we were going to get good news but this was not the case. We are once again left with…