Are YOU on the spectrum??

If you’re a teen, young adult or parent of a child on the spectrum and you’re reading this, could you give me some advice?  M is in 3rd grade and so far… we’ve pushed.  We’ve pushed through projects and homework and presentations and school events (as he was able).  Now we’re really really having to push.  Homework is much harder, therapy takes more work, everything is so much more effort.  I don’t mind it, it seems to (slowly) be taking hold and he is indeed getting the work done, but it is truly a monumental effort on his part.  So my question is this.  Did your parents/caregivers push you “through” your school work and through your therapies?  Did it work?  Was it worth it?  Are you thankful or did you notice?

We recently had his homework load reduced to an “as he is able” basis.  Sometimes he can do more, sometimes he can’t.  It was like walking through molasses.  We received permission to use dictation software to help him with tests where writing was involved so that he could meet time requirements without worrying about his motor skill abilities.  He uses headphones to handle noise when he needs to.  He uses lists in his folders to remember what he is supposed to be doing without having to ask repeatedly.  The supports are helping.  I just want him to do the very best he can, but I don’t want to push him beyond his capabilities if that makes sense.  Any thoughts anyone?

I haven’t posted lately because ever since M had that verbal assault on the playground from a parent, mentioned in my last post, I have been rather shook up.  I am trying to come out of it.  There are other things to do – too many balls in the air to fixate on just one.  In any case, I may be a bit all over the place here.  Just hang on.  That’s what I do!

I would like Miss S to join Daisy Scouts next year, but there isn’t a younger scout troop at the school, so I am volunteering to be a Daisy Scout leader since I will no longer have any littles with me during the day.  I’m actually really looking forward to it!  I loved scouting when I was a little girl.

#BeFierce  #HangOn

#IamAFierceMom

Kelly

Playground Antics

I have got to grow thicker skin.  Or home school.  One of the two.

My boy M.  He gets the short end of the stick on the playground so often.  When he was younger, maybe 5 or 6, he would get pushed around at the park sometimes because he didn’t understand how to interact with children as well as others and sometimes they made fun of him.  He didn’t realize they were making fun of him and that made them mad!  So eventually they would resort to physical pushes and punches which he understood hurt, but not why he was being hurt.  Eventually he learned to push back and punch back.  It was a big milestone for him!  And also, the beginning of hard knocks on the playground.  He’s a kid, it’ll happen.  Well, in our “everyone’s a bully society”, the parents jump first and ask questions later.  I admit, I’ve done the same thing – we’re all worried about our own children.  Its a safety issue.  The problem is that many children never learn to fix their own problems.

I am so angry.  A dad on the playground today verbally assaulted M like he was an adult.  He was raving at him and M didn’t know how to respond.  He just started screaming.  He’s 8.  I RAN over to where this was happening and tried to redirect the man’s anger towards me.  The dad kept repeating himself over and over and eventually I said that we needed to either call the paramedics, an attorney or let it go.  After everyone calmed down we eventually had the children talk about how hitting was not appropriate behavior for the playground.  M apologized 3 times, tried to fist-bump and shake hands with the boy and the boy refused to participate.  Those are huge social milestones for M.  He even called the boy a “little dude”.  SO much progress.  In the end, it wasn’t the dad that went to the school to make a report.  It was me.  M is currently so afraid of the dad, he doesn’t want to go to the playground.  I am sure we don’t have all the information.  Still, stress.  Over a playground.  ::headdesk::

Ugh.  Its stuff like this that makes me want to home school.  Stupid politics.

Playground Life Lessons

Growing up is so hard.

My middle son, my neurotypical child, is a lot like a first-born child to me.  Or rather, we go through many “firsts” that my oldest child has not gone through yet and some, as an ASD child, that he may never go through at all.  Mr. A comes running  up to me on the playground sad and nearly in tears that there was a small group of children “talking” about him and his friends and threatening to put something on FB about them.  You know, he has mentioned this problem and even this particular group of children before and I just didn’t take it seriously because 1) Generally younger children don’t have smart phones with internet access and FB accounts and 2) younger children are prone to more “outlandish” threats and finally 3) I just hadn’t seen it happen.  Well I saw it that day on the playground as I was watching the children play and chatting with a friend of mine.  After Mr. A came to tell me what happened a boy drove his bike over to where we were and again made the threat to my son… in front of me.  How bold is that?  Then he biked over to his small group of friends.  I had so much information hit my brain at once I felt like I was on one of those Bugs Bunny cartoons where I had steam coming out of my ears from an overload.  These children were older.  “Big kids” from the middle school.  They did have smart phones with internet access.  After realizing this I walked over and addressed them, trying to use my best parental voice and sound emotionally-even and mature instead of freaking out that my babies had been threatened.  It was difficult.  Afterwards we left the playground and went to another nearby play area.

Later on I tried to explain to my son that people only talk about you when you’re important.  They talk because you have something they want, or they want to be like you.  Possibly, they may even want to be your friend, but they may not know how to express that.  He was still a little blue, and we’re working on it.  My oldest son, my autistic child, has the gift of irrelevancy.  If something is not immediately important, especially in a social scenario, he is not concerned and may not even remember that it happened.  If he does happen to remember, he is so unconcerned with it, it might as well have happened to someone else.  DH and I are often curious about what it must feel like to be him.  In some ways, it must be pretty awesome to not have to carry all your emotional baggage with you!  Talk about taking a load off!  In other ways, he may be so bogged down with other racing thoughts he just may not have the brain space for all of the social nuances in every day life.  Who knows?  Maybe one day he’ll tell us.

Be Fierce.  #DiscussIdeas

#IamAFierceMom

Kelly