Kindergarten

It's been a good, long while since my last update.

Mr N loves Kindergarten and is progressing more quickly than we could have ever hoped for, my son who was once lost has not only been found but is doing so well my heart soars. He started off Kindergarten with a full time one on one aide who was by his side all day to assist him, he also was pulled out for forty-five minutes a day for help with writing, speech therapy, and occupational therapy.

By the end of the first trimester of school, they reduced his time in the special ed room to 15 minutes a day for speech therapy only and he no longer has an aide. There is an aide in his class a good bit of the day, but Mr N is not his/her primary focus, it is another child.

Watching my son grow and learn so much and so quickly over the last five months has been incredible. He started off the year unable to write his own name, unable to identify his letters and barely able to count to ten. Fast forward to now, he recognizes every letter and knows their sounds; as well as read many sight words. He can count to 100 (and well beyond) with ease and does quite well with addition and subtraction; he writes his name with only mild complaints about it's length. Mr N is quickly closing the gap between his peers and himself. I'm so excited to see what the future holds for him. Tomorrow we do his annual IEP update, so we should have an even better idea of where he stands.

While Mr N brings us so much joy and happiness (along with his amazingly talented sissy), the unkind comments from others are heart wrenching. I thought that four years into this journey I'd be better equipped to handle rude remarks from others, or even the unintentional insults. It still takes tremendous restraint to bite my tongue and walk away, I'd be lying if I said I was successful every time.

I can't imagine my life without my son, the happiness and joy that he brings are endless. I am a better person because of him. My compassion and kindness that were hard to come by, are now abundant. I am more empathetic towards everyone, knowing that everyone is struggling with something. Visible or not, we all have challenges that we face and being kind to everyone we meet costs nothing.

I would not trade my son for anything in the world. I'd rather have a son with Autism than no son at all, shocking as that may seem to some. I wish for his sake that he was not riddled with a disorder that is so difficult to understand, the challenges he faces, the hurdles he has to overcome. The extraordinary effort he has to put in for ordinary tasks is still painful to watch, but the look of satisfaction on his face when he accomplishes a goal is well worth it. He's amazing.

Mr N is not the only one to bring me so much joy and happiness, my sweet E is an absolute joy. Her sweet, caring personality is so endearing. She never hesitates to help out her brother, whether it be helping him read or teaching him a new game, she's always by his side.

When Mr N started Kindergarten I returned to work full-time much to the dismay of many. While it had always been my intention to return to work once both of my littles were in school full time, I never expected to hear so many negative comments regarding my decision. My heart goes out to all mommy's (and daddy's) who deal with such unkindness upon returning to work to support their family financially. Every family is different, every family's needs are different; different doesn't mean wrong. Instead of making judgmental comments towards others, especially those we call our friends; how about offering a little support. How about considering the thought that maybe the decision they made for their family maybe was difficult for them? Maybe, just maybe, that mom that just returned to work misses her kiddos and already is experiencing mommy guilt without any help from anyone else.

My life is filled with so much love for my children and amazing husband; who has been so incredibly supportive and helpful throughout the transition of me returning to work, I don't know what I would do without this incredible man. I'm so grateful to have such an awesome partner, friend, husband and father to my beautiful babies.

This, that and the other

Saturday afternoon we took a stroll through our local downtown. At one little souvenir shop Mr N insisted "I want to get this" stuffed wolf, after repeatedly telling him no and walking away, he came to me again "I NEED to get this" to which I again responded no. He then more firmly said "I need to get this for Sissy". My eyes filled with tears because the extent of his sweetness knows no limits, I handed him my credit card and steered him towards the checkout. He proudly paid then handed Sissy the wolf he just bought her. This amazing child of mine didn't ask for anything for himself, he only wanted to get his sister a stuffed wolf, which she loves, he knows her so well.

Let me back up a few hours, we started our afternoon at the library trying to get new library cards so we could check out some books. However, they require seeing something with your current address on it, which we did not have with us. The kids were disappointed so the librarian directed us to the books for sale where we bought four books for them. Then we headed to a thrift store where the children scored five more books. E began reading when she was four which has resulted in her being a very strong reader at seven, Mr N is really beginning to love books, even likes to look through Sissy's chapter books. His favorite books, of course, are dinosaur books. By Sunday afternoon they had finished the nine books we bought the day before so Monday morning we again headed to the library for a library card. Mr N got one monster book, one chapter book and E got two chapter books that she wanted and one chapter book I insisted she needed to try. Thankfully, E loved all of the books she got so we'll be heading back to day for more.

As the school year fast approaches, my anxiety and nerves start to rise. We had completed the IEP process at the end of the last school year but we still should have at least one more meeting to discuss Mr N's needs for Kindergarten. I'm anxious to know what Mr N's school day will look like, what will he do at school, what will be expected of him, what is he capable of doing? In Kindergarten they count to 100, know their ABCs, recognize their numbers, begin basic addition and early reading. What does this mean for Mr N? Is he capable of all of that? How much help will he need to accomplish these things? His sheer knowledge amazes me as we read books he identifies the animals in the pictures, but will he able to keep progressing at a higher rate than his peers to ever catch up to them?

One of the things that impressed Mr N's teachers the most last year was his determination to be understood. If he said something he would repeat it until they understood what he said without getting upset. They said it's not often that a child has such a determination to push through instead of getting frustrated.  For me, I get irritated and frustrated when I have to repeat myself when my husband doesn't hear or understand something. Mr N will repeat himself many times over and over until he's understood. He's speaking so much better that it's rare now that he has to repeat himself. However, last week he said something that we couldn't figure out, we never did understand what he was saying and it ended with him in tears. It's heartbreaking to see him putting forth so much effort then not being understood.

My son is amazing.

Mr N starts his day every morning cuddling with Daddy, he stumbles into Daddy's office rubbing his eyes and climbs into his lap to cuddle. His sweetness is unprecedented.

I find myself at times being surprised when Mr N acts autistic, for lack of a better way to word it. He's progressed so much, is so friendly, easy going and happy most of the time that when he starts to have a sensory overload, starts with the echolalia or any kind of stimming it's a shock at first. Stress seems to bring on echolalia in a big way, he hasn't really done it much in the last couple of years so when he recently encountered a very stressful situation we had to adjust to keep him from getting too stressed. At meetings he still gets overwhelmed, sometimes holding him tight and cuddling will get him through, other times it's a trip out to the car to relax.

I don't think I've posted about Gabby, our golden retriever we got to have trained as a therapy dog. She's been through an obedience class but no therapy training yet. Mr N is still pretty rough with her, lays on her, shoves her foot in her mouth, pushes her ears back to make her smile, etc. She takes it all in stride and doesn't seem to mind.

Kindergarten

Kindergarten roundup is Thursday. I'm full of anxiety. I don't know how this all will work. I know Mr N will love kindergarten so that's not a big concern, but what should we expect academically? I feel like there are so many unknowns. He can count to 10, but doesn't recognize his numbers, doesn't know his colors, shapes, ABCs. These are all expected in K. What will Mr N be doing? Will he just always be behind? I want him to learn and grow academically but these seem like huge steps forward. He doesn't write, but can hold a pencil or crayon. He doesn't seem to be able to discern how much pressure to apply when trying to color/write. Will he be allowed to use his iPad for writing? Will he have alternate school work?

How will his academic performance affect his social interaction with his peers? His speech is still extremely delayed, he will have another speech evaluation before he starts K so we'll know how delayed. I still think he has low muscle tone, how will this effect him in PE and recess?

We meet with the development center along with the school in a couple of weeks to begin the transition process, I'm hoping that will answer a lot of my questions. However, the anxiety, fear, and stress are taking over. I want my little boy to succeed at school and be happy. He's so sensitive and sweet, I worry. Even at home he'll hide or bury his head into us if he's embarrassed or scared or hurt.

In other news, Mr N broke one of the training wheels on his bike a couple of weeks ago so we ordered him news ones, which arrived yesterday. So he spent part of the day riding his bike around in the house yesterday, he's doing so much better at pedaling. When I picked him up from school yesterday he was on the big trike and was actually pedaling rather than just using his feet to push himself along. I think that bike riding will help build his leg muscles and endurance, with the warmer weather coming we should be doing lots of riding.

Names

Mr N recently reached one of his social skills goals at school so we met to do an amendment to his IEP. His new goal involves using the names of people he knows, he says "mommy, daddy, sissy, grandma, Gabby" but he's never called our cat by name and he refers to everyone else as "him". I mentioned Mr N not calling our cat by name but calling him "kitty cat", he's always called him that. At some point I mentioned our cat's name is Elephant which is probably why he refuses to call a cat "Elephant".

Yesterday, Elephant came up the stairs to tease Gabby when I referred to him by name to which Mr N replied "kitty cat not elephant". Clearly this is not something he'll understand for quite some time, but does explain why he refuses to use Elephant's name.

Last night at dinner I gave the kids their food and Mr N said "I need a spoon", I asked "do you mean a fork", since they were eating noodles. He said "yes I need a fork". He then proceeded to use the fork, for the first time. Ever. Correctly. Like he'd been doing it his whole life.

Today it was beautiful out, I took Mr N to the park while hanging out with a couple of friends while their mom volunteered at the school for a bit. A classmate of his was also there and another child that I'd never seen before but as soon as Mr N saw him he said "oh hey you're back" so I asked Mr N if he knew the kid and he said yes, the kid referred to Mr N by name, so apparently they know each other. I'm guessing he just goes in for therapy at Mr N's school but doesn't attend the preschool with him.

After playing in the park we arrived home to see the guy still working on filling in the hole he had dug in the intersection by our house,  using a backhoe. Mr N was quite excited to see it, so we pulled up a piece of sidewalk near where he was working and watched for a while. He finished using the equipment then got out to get a shovel to get some dirt and rocks off of the curb which was simply amazing to Mr N. The man must have noticed his excitement and talked to Mr N for a few minutes, he was all smiles. The man said "what's your name? my name is Ryan". Mr N was tickled, he gave his name then turned to me and said "his name is Ryan". So the work he's been doing in class to use people's names must really be helping. We watched until it was time to pick sissy up from school.

Once we got home from school we got the bicycles out of the garage, E took off down the sidewalk showing she'd only gained confidence, speed and strength since her last adventure on a bike. Mr N was just as excited to try his out, until he remembered there were pedals. He began to cry as he only wanted to use his feet to walk the bike around but the pedals were in the way so he couldn't. I put his feet on the pedals, told him he was a big boy and could pedal now. It wasn't long before he was pedaling down the sidewalk all by himself. I was blown away. I could NOT believe he was able to do it so quickly after struggling so much last summer and being so frustrated when he started out.

I still am overwhelmed with emotions when he speaks in full sentences, when he says things like "I sure do" when he could just say "yes". Just watching him think and speak blows my mind. At one point I thought, if he can just communicate enough to have his basic needs then we wouldn't have to worry so much. Then the other day we had the most amazing conversation. He was sitting in my lap when he said "I don't want to go in a volcano, because then I'd be dead" then went on to talk about many volcano related things and how he didn't want any of his family in a volcano. So we scratched Mount Saint Helens off of our vacation list.  But seriously, just listening to him talk about random things is so incredible.

His teachers are very impressed with his progress in the last year, they can't believe how far he's come in just a few short months. They said he leads the class, when the teachers give a direction he's the first one to do it then all of the other kids follow his lead.

Here is a little conversation from the car ride to school last week. We saw two sand trucks with snow plows, I explained that they plow the snow and put sand on hills.

E: wow those guys are really nice to do that
N: those aren't guys, they are trucks
E: I'm talking about the guys inside that drive the trucks, they are super nice

A few minutes later we dropped sissy off at school, I gave her a hug and kiss then got back in the car.

N: did you kiss sissy?
Me: yes
N: that is so nice, I want you to kiss me at school

I could not be more proud of my son.

School, school, school

Mr N loves school, he is chomping at the bit to get out the door on school days and begs to go to school the days he doesn't have school, even Saturday. He is doing awesome, he is counting to 10 accurately quite frequently, he's recognizing and naming his colors and he recognizes his name. Every time I talk to Lesley, she seems astonished by how well he's doing. I'm so proud of him.

Last week they learned about fire safety, the firetruck went to their school and handed out hats, crayons, coloring books and tattoos. He loved it! This week they worked with pumpkins, cutting them open, feeling the seeds, counting the seeds, making projects with the seeds. He really likes the pumpkins and counted them for me. He is counting really well from 1-10 but when he sees something like the pumpkins he'll say "three pumpkins" then "two, four, six, seven" to count them. So we are still working on getting him to start at one each time he counts. He correctly counts the 3 and knows there are three, but when he counts aloud, he's not always starting at one. So we still have some counting work to do.

Lately, Mr N has been very interested in cooking, no matter what I'm doing in the kitchen he is there to help out. He pulls the chair over, climbs up and watches or helps if it's safe for him to do so. Today we are going to make pumpkin bread, so he will be excited to start that project.

Yesterday he was playing so cute outside with his dinosaurs and cars, so I grabbed my camera and as soon as I stepped outside he said "take a picture of me", like there was some better subject to shoot. I took several photos of him, he'd play for a bit, then look up at me and say "cheese" or just say cheese while he was playing. He really enjoys having his picture taken, he just doesn't always look at the camera.

We finally got the water line hooked up to the refrigerator, which Mr N is really enjoying, he loves getting his own water. It has a setting where we can set the amount to 8 oz and he just pushes a button and it fills his cup. He is so self sufficient and helpful. He insisted on buying another apple slicer the other day and has enjoyed cutting up his own apples (with help). He's also very insistent on helping with laundry, although he doesn't understand the actual process so I frequently find that he's thrown all of the clothes in the washer, or dryer, depending on which one is empty. One day he brought a basket of laundry to me that he dutifully carried up from the basement, it was full of dirty laundry. So I've been trying to let him help out when doing actual laundry so he can learn the process.

Blessings

I have been blessed in so many ways, my amazing husband, my two beautiful children, wonderful family, and true friends.

Today was a rough day, I'll admit it. Mr N had a major meltdown, through no fault of his own, he does not deal well with unfairness. Instead of fighting the situation, I chose to remove ourselves from it. My mommy guilt immediately kicked in when his meltdown ensued, it was I who exposed him to a volatile situation. His meltdown lasted twenty minutes or more, wreaking havoc on my nerves. Not because I was upset with him, but because I couldn't fix the problem. I couldn't make it better, I couldn't console him or convince him that other options would be fun and no amount of bribing was working. He got settled down and we got on with our day, but the meltdown took it's toll, he soon fell asleep then woke up crabby.

How does that relate to blessings? I'll tell you how, Mr N had an incredibly rough day but even in the aftermath, he was thinking of how to make others happy "let's get this for sissy" and "I'll share with sissy" and "sissy will play with this" throughout our shopping trip, he wanted to do nice things for his sister (even though he was getting a toy purchased with mommy guilt). I'm so blessed to know this amazing person, so proud and honored to call him my son, so happy to have the opportunity to be loved by such an incredible little man.

This little boy of mine is kind, considerate, caring, patient, loving, and full of joy. He puts a smile on my face every day and brings a tear to my eye more than I'd care to admit. He certainly makes my heart so very happy. Today he said "I want daddy, I want to hug daddy," out of the blue, no real reason other than he's an affectionate little cuddle bug that wanted to give daddy some love. Daddy's a lucky man.

In other news, Mr N lost his first two teeth!

Losing teeth

When E lost her first tooth, I came to dread the day that Mr N started losing teeth. I was worried and concerned that he wouldn't understand what was happening or being upset over the feeling of a missing tooth. But in July he was eating an apple when he came up to me pointed to his tooth and said "it's gonna fall out". At first I just thought it was cute that he understood he'd lose teeth just like sissy, but then I wiggled his tooth and it was quite loose. He wasn't scared or worried, just proud that he was going to lose a tooth, too.

Last night his first tooth fell out, literally just fell right out of his mouth when he was laying down for the night. We put it in a baggie for him and he slept with it. His new tooth has already broke through the skin, so he won't be toothless for long. He has a second tooth that is nearly ready to fall out, too.

I'm so amazed at how calm and sure he is about the losing of teeth, like it's no big deal and nothing to worry about. I'm so proud of him.

On another note, his last couple of haircuts have resulted in over the top meltdowns. He has been desperately needing a haircut and with school starting next week, I decided last night to get down to business and get it done. He was so calm, not a tear, he even let me use scissors to trim around his ears (first time ever). Afterwards he got his bath and happily showed off his new haircut to daddy. I'm blown away, usually he's sad for days about his precious hair being cut and stolen away from him (or snatched bald-headed like my bestie's mom used to say).

Our Labor Day weekend was uneventful and relaxing, we skipped camping after looking at the rainy forecast but took a couple of hikes close to town. E liked the one we took yesterday so much she wanted to do it again and take along a picnic. It was right along a creek, the trail laden with pine needles underfoot, the smell so refreshing it felt like home. E asked if we could live there, then asked why they couldn't build a town there, which made me wonder, why didn't they build the town 5 miles west? I love mountain towns built along creeks and canyons, little houses tucked into the sides of hills and windy mountain drives. Living at the base of the mountains is certainly far different from living in the mountains. Someday.

Mr N has become somewhat of a backseat driver, whenever we leave the house we tell him where we are going, then he proceeds to give us directions on how to get there, lest we forget. His verbalizing everything seems to have ramped up significantly lately. It seems like for such a long time it was requests, manners, speech fitting a two year old. But now he's sounding more and more like a 4 year old (aside from the enunciation) with the way he just talks like he's been doing it forever, using phrases and sentences so effortlessly.

I've noticed his echolalia has escalated in the last few months, it started becoming more frequent in June, at least that's when I noticed the increase. Last night he was doing it incessantly, to the point of frustration (and my amusement) since he was supposed to be going to sleep. I have been of the opinion that the echolalia is beneficial and imperative in increasing his vocalization and enunciation. Last night his echolalia was so clear and precise. As his speech improves and his echolalia increases, I can't help but think there is a correlation. My favorite thing is when he says "I wanna hug you mom". <3