Autism, Overstimulation, & Setbacks Oh My!

A 'Selfie' we found on my wife's phone.

The sixth grade has proved kind of a rough transition for this kid. We have forgotten work, not moved quick enough to get things done, been overstimulated to many times to count but glass half full at least we haven't had to worry about some of the crazy apocalyptic crazy thoughts that were in my head as we headed into middle school! Granted most of those were just worry wort dad thoughts & involved pretty much just crazy stories you read in the new happening verbatim to my kid. Every time I would read one of those horrifying stories about how a kid with autism was mistreated I just knew THAT exact thing would happen to him. So, like I said, glass half full none of that has happened! :)

What has happened is I got a call from our counselor yesterday while we were knee deep in the fall section of Hobby Lobby. (Don't judge me! I gave up my man card long ago when I got a pinterest!) She told me that he had fallen asleep in second hour at his desk. The teacher tried to wake him up, when she did they said he looked around at the other kids wide eyed & confused for a second then crawled under his desk to the fetal position. He wouldn't talk or make eye contact with anyone so the teacher called for the counselor. When the counselor arrived she told me that she tried to talk to him nice & slow for a second telling him that she has a soft bean bag chair in her office that he could come relax on. He took his backpack & headed to her office where she let him decompress for a while before he could even talk to her. She told me that after he started to talk again she assured him he wasn't in any kind of trouble & gave him the option to go back to school for the rest of the day or she could call me to see about going home. He made the decision to go back to class. I'm so proud & happy that he made the very grown up choice to go back to class but I'm not gonna' lie I wanted to rush to that school, pick him up, & get him home! Sometimes I realize that he is way braver than I am.

Annie likes to tag along when picking up kids

I normally pick him up separately from the other boys. We pick up the two boys at the elementary & then I drop them off at home with mom so I can pick Jayden up just me & him. I took him to sonic for a green apple slush with nerds in it to ask him how his day was, he didn't know the counselor called me. He went over his entire day with me, telling me how it was a good day with no problems at all! I gently pushed & pushed telling him he was acting like something had happened or he was not telling me everything. Even without the call I would have known something was up because he was obviously acting out of the norm being overly animated & evasive. Almost like you would see a character act when they are hiding something on a cartoon or kids TV show. I pushed one last time before telling him I got a call. I said 'Jayden I'm going to order our drinks & I want you to think about your day. I know from the way you are acting that something has happened or there is something that has thrown you off a bit. Think about it while I'm ordering, maybe there is something that happened that you 'FORGOT' about. Either way I am going to email or call the teachers to check so please be honest with me & think really hard." Sure enough after I ordered he put his hand to his chin like a sitcom character rubbing it & saying 'hmmmm' Then he said "You know, there is one thing I just remembered that happened today!" He told me about what happened telling me that he remembered being very sleepy & then waking up under his desk curled up.

Going over the night before in my mind there was nothing out of the ordinary. Bed time was the same as it always is, reading books, saying good night, up in the morning like normal, everything was in line. Usually you can see these things headed your way but this one caught me off guard a bit. We haven't had anything like this happen since about 3rd grade. I can even remember in kindergarden them having problems with him going under the desk to seek refuge or wandering the halls because he got out of someones sight for a minute but that was a long time ago! Time will tell I guess.

Practice Practice Practice!

I think band is keeping him somewhat on point. I'm not sure if I mentioned it in my last post, he was approved to play the drums. The snare drum! Yeah... Up to this point its not bad because I haven't actually heard him play the snare, he has a practice pad that is soft & pretty quiet so thats a big plus. $775 for supplies to play the drums & we get Xylophone, Snare practice pads, & sticks but no drums. You would think I would be upset about that but yeah...nope. Lets keep the drums at school for now shall we! :)

Hate Is A Strong Word For An 11 Year Old!

These first days of middle school have been rough to say the least. Problems were written on the board for them to copy down & answer. He copied the first one down & answered, then the second, then the third, then class was over. Did we copy all the problems down first then go back an answer them? Nope! Already we are having a mix of homework misplaced, not done, or hidden as to not have to cut into his personal time at home.

After finding some of the work hidden in the back of his binder & him coming clean that he hid it as to not have to do it we had a little bit of a blow out & that included punishment but after that it seemed as though we were doing good. That is until I found work as well as a weekly progress report showing missing work with a note from his teacher that didn't make it out of his bag. Its so hard because I know some of it is Autism & some of it is 11 year old boy but those two mesh together so much its hard to tell what is one or the other. So needless to say we came to blows (put down the phone, stop calling DHS, not those kind of blows!) There was an unabashed conversation about his inability to carry much of any of his own responsibilities, there was a calling out of his failure to do work that is required even if he thinks he shouldn't have to do it, & there were tears! Whats the last thing you want to do to a kid with autism before you send him to middle school… pretty much everything I just said I did but what are you going to do!?! At some point you see him getting older & realize he is that scary in between that terrifies me! He is so high functioning that he can do these things but he still has flippin' autism so these things are sometimes ridiculously hard for him to do or understand but again at the same time he has to be prepared for high school, college, life, a job, & an unforgiving society that in most cases would rather eat him alive than cut him a break.

When he got home we backed off a bit & tried to just help with work but give lots of support. Trying to stay consistent in our approach is one of the hardest parts because with any other kid you would be like
'okay, this isn't working lets switch it up' & that will just confuse this kid. I knew this was all coming, I knew that autism was a rock, middle school was a hard place, & we would eventually get stuck in-between them but I just didn't think it would happen this fast. All this I can handle! All these things I can swallow! All these things you have just read we can overcome. That is after I'm able to get over what we founding his school folder:

Let me tell you, I sat & watched them Emmy's last night just to see if they called my name because I feel like I should get some kind of award for me performance as 'Dad who comes at the situation with an even hand despite their heart being ripped out of my chest' My wife handled it better than I did but we had a talk about hate, parents, self pity, responsibility, growing up, & more. With any luck we've made some progress but you can't know until you let it ride to see. I know the kid doesn't hate me. I know that we will get through all this. I know that he will be able to take on all this new stuff but knowing all that doesn't mean any of it comes easy.

Back To School Day 2, Okay The Honeymoon's Over

Remember that time a long time ago… like… yesterday, when I posted about what an awesome day he had on the first day of middle school & everything was gonna be just fine? You remember that? Yeah, the dad who wrote that is gone. Today he got kicked in the face by reality & then Autism stepped on his rose color glasses of optimism. I'm back in charge now. Regular ol' cynical Tom that is not so much a glass half full guy but not really a glass half empty guy either, more of a I spilled my glass in my lap & now it looks like I peed on myself kinda guy!

When my son got home today he was so overwhelmed & over stimulated as he tried to tell us about his day no words would come out. I sat on the couch listening to him make groaning noises like he was physically trying to push the words out of his mouth three or four times then two words would come out then groaning then two words & so on. We haven't been to that place in a long time but let me tell you it was a big punch in the gut. Probably a good one to be honest with you. I may have needed a wake up to the fact that YES we are back in school, YES you do need to get your 'A' game back out of the back of the closet & lace up your boots because it's about to get real. Not to say he had a bad day but it was obviously a lot to take in & with it being only the second day of school I'm sure the teachers, staff, & special education teachers are trying to normalize themselves as well as learn their new kids. So I'm really just at a time where all we can do is decompress him as best as we can & send him back into the lions den as prepared as he can be.

 Any time we are off school be it for summer, spring break, or even Christmas break the first week (sometimes month, I know you feel THAT pain) is the real test of a parents mental capacity. Summer is a special kind of hell though because at least with the other times you know the environment they are stepping into & have a dialog. Back to school time is just a waiting game. My head tells me "You have to give HIM time, you have to give THEM time, & you have to just be there for anything that's needed" but my Dad-ness tells me "Lets take a mulligan this week, get some grilled cheese sandwiches, & watch adventure time together!" 

I know it will get better & after my wife giving me the only medicine that will cure an over bearing dad's racing thoughts (Chicken, Mac & Cheese, & 12 year old bourbon) I am feeling better. So yeah, thanks 'Kids Growing Up' you've successfully killed Doe-Eyed Dad & brought back fatty comfort food eating dad but that's okay. Tomorrows another day! 

PS just to be completely clear, because I know my wife will read this post I have to clarify: Fatty Comfort Food Eating Tom never REALLY went anywhere! That was a total turn of phrase & had no truth as to my eating habits which are…less than healthy… yeah that's the terminology I'm going to use! 

6th Grade Here We Come! {Middle School Vs. Autism}

Wow! The last bit of school was great, the summer was even better, & as I came to the realization that I was about to have a 6th grader this week I did several things. 1st. Melt Into A Puddle Of Dad Sludge  2nd. I put myself back together thanks to the nice people at Blue Bell :) 3rd. I decided it was about time to jump back to the blog! That's when I realized that I hadn't posted, other than small social media posts, since march! Wow!

Things have been good! We took the summer head on with the boys first trip to my favorite place on earth, Colorado! Pikes peak was below freezing, hiking in the Rock Mountain National Park, & having snowball fights in the middle of summer were just a few of the things we did. You can see some highlights from our trip on our photography blog if it tickles your fancy! I think I've just about got my wife convinced that if I can market our studio in CO a bit & book enough weddings as well as portrait sessions we may try to start spending a month or two in the summer there. We'll cross our fingers.

Like I said, 6th grade! How did this happen? I remember him being born, taking a first step, & then BAM here we are. Don't even get me started on the other two boys, Zion (with an anxiety disorder & MERLD) started the 3rd grade & Deano (Completely painfully NT to the bone) starts 1st grade. This summer has been so amazing, it was like we took a vacation from Autism! Granted I know we still did the same things we always do; routines, de-stressing, all of our autism adaptations. The difference this summer was it was all normal for us, no big hiccups or hurdles! We just rolled through. It was great! That's why I think it was even more scarier than I thought it was going to be when it was time to snap back to the real wold & start gearing up for middle school. All of a sudden I was all 'BACK TO THE WAR ROOM' starting to plan strategies for the transition & digging out my big boy panties to make sure we are ready to go to bat for the kid. 

When we heard that the orientation was a 'Drop off the kids, parents aren't welcome till the end of the day' style thing I went into 'Its okay, Its okay, I'll just talk it out' mode but when I couldn't get ahold of anyone to talk to I escalated to Dad-Con 4. My wife put it out on Facebook & what happened? The teachers, staff, & principal from the elementary school stepped up (a lot of them are on our Facebook) to give support as well as advice. The principal even made a call to the middle school personally to talk to them about Jayden & to make sure someone gave me a call to talk about him! It doesn't get any better than that. She really went above & beyond, I don't know what we would do with out such an amazing set of advocates in our corner! I know not everyone has that so I'm being mindful to stay thankful. 

He came from the first day excited. The fact that he has science the first hour of the day & is working on picking what instrument he wants to play in the band is great. We are currently deciding between the xylophone & the snare drum so that should be… interesting… yeah, that's the word I'll use! 

Thanks for reading! Don't forget to keep up to date on Facebook.

I love that this photo captures the boys 100% Zion makes a goofy face (his classic defense mechanism), Jayden makes not a drop of eye contact, & Dean is just as A-Typical as you can get!!

A Once In A Lifetime Trip To The Zoo! {Take THAT Autism}

I've fallen off the blogging wagon here recently & after talking to my brain (better known as my wife) I realize it's mainly because things have been super good! That's not something I like to admit, that I blog more when things are hard with my son, but it's totally true! I imagine it's because blogging is cathartic but I know that reading good news is cathartic of me so maybe my good times blogs will help others! Speaking of good times blog… MAN do I have one!

I'm going to keep this short because no words can translate how much of a big deal this is & I know you all can feel that as well. It wasn't that long ago my son wouldn't touch some things, wouldn't eat somethings, he had a lot of texture issues. We have worked on that as well as his other reservations & issues. These were put to the test this weekend & got blown out of the water! I've said it before & now I am even more convinced that when autism butts heads with 11 year old boy 99% of the time 11 year old boy will win!

We are wedding photographers & photography takes us some pretty amazing places! We get to interact with celebrities on a regular basis, we travel to amazing locations, & we become part of our clients lives. We photographed a wedding at the Oklahoma City Zoo last year & we thought we hit the jackpot because I LOVE the zoo! Shortly after that wedding we got a call from the events manager who worked with us on that day, she was getting married & wanted to book us. I met them & shortly after did their engagement photos, it was beautiful. After getting a job offer at another venue that she couldn't pass up she decided to leave the Zoo after many years of being a part of that family. To remember those times & as a cool one of a kind couple shoot she arranged for crazy behind the scenes access at the Zoo & asked us to go with them to photograph the day. Not only photograph but bring the kids along to let them be a part of it as well! Giant Galapagos tortoise, bears, sea lions, seals, giraffes, stingrays, & more! All three boys, including Jayden, jumped in & those autism issues that we work through & that rear their head at times just disappeared giving way to the excitement of having your face kissed by a sea lion!

Petting a stingray.. just an average sunday!

Like a very wet dog!

Feeding the stingrays

Getting a feel right after watching them get a bath

Our new family photo!

They REALLY wanted to ride him!

Feeling the texture of a 100 year old shell

I'm not sure if he was shocked at the mouth or mimicking the bite but I love that face!

This one followed Zion around because his shirt was the same color as a carrot! 

Tug O War!

Yummy!

I don't think either one of them knew what to think about the other!

No one is shy!

Learning… up close & personal

One big happy family

Say AWWWWWW 

No, your breath is great! A bit fishy but great!

So, What's The New Cause Of Autism This Week?

It happens once or twice a year. A "new" story breaks in the news about  'The Cause Of Autism" & the debate begins again. Not really a debate but more spouting talking points, for that matter most of the stories aren't really stories just buzz words, & to be 100% honest most of the articles are not really new anyway.

Never the less I heard a story about how older dads are more likely to have kids with autism & that got me to thinking. Now that its 2014, lets take a quick search to see what causes autism! Seeing as a massive amount of organizations raise hundreds of millions of dollars to fund research into the causes of autism instead of funding services I'm sure they've got this thing locked up. I mean surely if they were just going to throw out a bunch of wildly different ridiculous hypotheses with pretty thin science behind them surely they would maybe do something worth while like maybe put all cash in a big fund that just issues checks to families with kids on the spectrum so they can have a bit of help with things they need. You know therapies, weighted blankets, tuition, safety equipment for the house, anti-depressants for mom & dad, frozen chicken nuggets by the pallet load, minecraft shirts, expensive cigars & vintage whiskey for those days when grandma takes the kids to the science museum… 

Sorry, I trailed off there for a second.

Anyway here's what I found:

• Older Dads More Likely To Have Kids With Autism
• Asthma As A Risk Factor For Autism
• Air Pollution Exposure Increases Risk Of Autism
• New List Of Toxic Chemicals Causing Autism Published
• Humans Are Responsible For Nearly 62% Of All Cougar Deaths
• Mother's Genes May Explain Autism Prevalence In Boys

     & my personal favorite, an old post from THIS BLOG titled:

• Jenny McCarthy's Tears Cure Autism! {The Shocking Story Revealed}

Very informative reading in that last one but my hands down favorite is with out a doubt the story about the alarming rate of cougar deaths! Not sure why that came up when I searched for the cause of autism.

Mediocre Parenting Lessons From The Movie Labyrinth

I love reading these types of posts from other bloggers & I love coming up with them myself, so I decided I would take a bit to see what Parenting Nuggets one of my favorite movies growing up had to offer!

 Creatures, Babies, Monsters, David Bowie, David Bowie's Hair, & David Bowies stretchy pants have a lot to offer in the way of mediocre parenting advice.

So here we go. 

1. "I wish the goblins would come & take you away! Right Now!" 

Yeah, that's right, I started with it! The day I'm writing this post happens to be a snow day so no school on a Monday = me borderline kidding, borderline seriously asking David Bowie to appear & take these kids away to the castle. Although I'm pretty sure after about 3 hours of Minecraft YouTube tutorials & knock down drag out fights over the iPad he would just bring them back!

2. "It's not fair!!"  "You say that so often, I wonder what your basis for comparison is?" 

I remember saying this to my parents & I remember the explanation. "This isn't fair dad!"  "No its not! A fair is where you go to see a bearded lady & the worlds smallest horse!" Life's not fair kids, welcome to earth.

3. "It's only forever, not long at all" 

 I try to get this across to my kids often. Fight, bicker, call names, but your family is your family forever. My rules may suck & you may in fact "NEVER TREAT MY KIDS LIKE THIS!" but like it or not I'll be your dad forever.

4. "If you so  much as set a foot in the Bog Of Eternal Stench, you'll smell bad for the rest of your life"

 Seriously, how does so much stench come out of such small kids!?! BO, Socks, Farting, Laughing so hard at the fact that they farted that they fart again, burping the alphabet, & my personal favorite… "Skid Marks" These are not the things that Mr & Mrs Cleaver dealt with, no one told me about this part! 

5. "I ask for so little. Just fear me, love me, & do exactly as I say." 

Really though, that's all I ask! This one statement sums up my whole parenting strategy! Is it really to much to ask of me to never have to really get on to you kids but that you be so scared of me getting upset that you never do anything wrong!? 

6. "Things are not always what they seem in this place. So you can't take anything for granted... quite often it seems like we are not getting anywhere, when in fact we are. So the way forward is sometimes the way back…"

     Heh, will you listen to this crap? This actually comes up in my life a bunch. How may times am I giving a lecture or a stern talking to only to get tongue tied or say something stupid? The worst is when I say something while talking to the kids (as they are getting in trouble) that is also an inside joke of my wife &  I  only to hear her snickering from the other room.  Example is song lyrics. You know how hard it is when I holler at the kids "Stop What You're Doin'!" only to hear her laugh at me because we both know that we are both thinking the lyrics to the Humpty Dance by Digital Underground! 

Okay, stop what you're doin', cause I'm about to ruin the
image & the style that you're used to. I look funny but yo
I'm makin' money!

Toy Share Time! {Better Than Minecraft?}

So we are doing some videos & the trade off is I'm letting Jayden pick the topic of some of them while I get to pick others. Well, we set up the camera & what he wanted to share with everyone was his favorite toy! Better than iPhone, better than Wii, better than… dare I say it… MINECRAFT! I bought this thing called Snap Circuits Jr. on amazon for him. It had really good reviews & it comes with all kinds of circuits to connect so you can, if put together correctly to flow the electricity, make the lights light up or propeller spin. He loves putting it together in different ways & it has, as you can imagine, spurred him to research switches & circuits to learn more about electricity.  Very fun but very educational with real world applications for down the road. I paid about $25 for it on amazon. You can check it out here:
No, that's not a regular link its one of those nifty "if you buy one of these by clicking on this tom gets a kickback from amazon" kind of links. I didn't get this free to review & I wasn't asked to review it I just saw it on amazon so I bought one & he happened to go ape over it. {Just wanted to put that out there} I just know that sometimes with our kids it hard to find something that they will really really like but doesn't include them getting on a computer or wii or xbox or yeah, you get me.

Vloging!

I really enjoy posting videos on Youtube & Jayden… well, he would live on Youtube if I let him! Really, how many Minecraft videos could there be!?!

***Side Note*** After reading this first couple of lines over my shoulder & then running to his room I was just informed that here are approximately 78,600,000 Minecraft related videos on youtube.

We have a youtube channel that I sometimes post on but after going through to review the comments (you have to keep the Internet trolls in check) I realized that I have just about 500 subscribers. Why not do some vlogs! It puts a face & voice with the blog as well as I realize that sometimes it's easier to watch a 3 minute video than it is to read a super long blog. The videos of Jayden overstimulated or even the interview style videos to get a look at his perspective are interesting, fun, & judging from the overwhelming response from readers they are helpful so check it out: Adventures In Aspergers The YouTube Channel

So head over to the Youtube Channel & subscribe! As I post videos I will post them up here on the main blog as well. I'm excited!!

Valentines Day, Shmalentines Day & Birthday Blues

The Family Band

We are not Valentines Day people. The kids get some candy at school, my parents (as they do for every holiday) get gifts for everyone, but that's about it! My wife & I have never really done Valentines, it's just not something that has ever appealed to us. (Trying not to sound like one of your annoying pretentious faceboook friends! You know the one I'm talkin' about "I don't celebrate the commercialization of my love by the card companies!") We just spend a lot of time together since we work together & we do what we want when ever we want so every day is like valentines. All that being said we do use any excuse at all to spend time together. As a gift last week my wife gave me the wink to let me know it was okay to buy a beautiful guitar I have had my eye on for a long time.

   My geek dad dreams came true the other day when they boys came home to see it & Jayden pulled up a can to show me how he could keep the beat with any song I played. When we started to play (& he kept perfect time) the other two come running in with a keyboard & little guitar to play as well! I'm trying not to show my excitement but they were totally into it as we sat & played bluegrass songs I was pretty much in heaven! Best Day Ever.

   Jayden will be 11 tomorrow, February 15th, so we have had a trip to the Oklahoma Science Museum on the books for a while. It was supposed to be a family trip until today when Zion got in the car from school & was white as a ghost! That sheet white, ashy gray lips, & sunken in eyes that screams "Death Warmed Over". Getting him home we fired up a breathing treatment & checked his vitals. If you know anything about O2% then you know from the photo he was about 3 shades of up creek without a paddle. Zion's asthma & weak lungs are a constant worry but he has been so good for a long while now with only a few little attacks but today he had me worried there for a second! Breathing treatments, steroids, some smart water & we were right as rain… as much as can be expected anyway. Both he & my youngest are starting to look/feel sick so we tried to roll with it! They can just go to grandma's house while mom, Jayden, & I head to the museum for birthday fun! Day saved! No sooner did we come to that idea did I look over & Jayden looked like… well…. take a look…

From Fine to Sick In 30 Minutes Flat! A New House Record!!

  Yeah, all of a sudden it hit him! Watery eyes, the nose, the tummy, & a head ache. A big dose of medicine later we will see how things look in the morning. We may be hanging at the house for our 11th birthday. A good night sleep will tell I guess. I hope all of you are staying warm with the weather the way it is in the east. It was snowing & a for a week didn't get above freezing but now it's in the 60's. with the 70's on their way next week. Crazy Oklahoma weather. Anyway, happy Valentines Day from us to you!

Dancing . . . With A Girl . . .

The other day I got a phone call from the mother of one of Jayden's classmates. She was so excited that they had paired up for the big dance program & wanted to see if we could co-ordinate their outfits. I'm pretty impressed with my ability to hide the "What the heck are you talking about!?" in my voice. Just rolling with the "I know, I'm so excited as well!" I got as much info as I could from her then after the phone call I did the mad-dad-dash to his room to ask the questions I should have known the answer to already! "Hey Jayden…. is there something you forgot to tell me?" … "No" "Maybe something about a dance program you are going to be in?" "Oh yeah. I'm dancing in a program" It almost seemed like he knew what we were talking about so I went out on a limb & asked "When is it buddy?"… to which he replied "I don't know!" Aaaahhhh!

This happens sometimes. His school had a program one time that he was in & once we got there were astonished to see him center stage with a singing solo! These things just don't get back to us.

   Last year he took ball room dancing & loved it. For the program he danced with a partner & then with my wife. He had such a great time! Despite the fact that we had barley even found out about the program & were shocked to see all the other kids dressed up standing beside Jayden in his bluejeans & t-shirt! NOT THIS YEAR! I have a heads up! While out looking for an outfit for him yesterday we found what may be the most epic bow tie ever! I'm a bow tie guy so I really wanted him to go that route & what better way to get him on board than an old school Mario Brothers  bow tie.  
     So, on valentines day my son will be ball room dancing with a girl from class in the school program. How did this happen! How are we dancing with girls already? I'm not ready for growing up to be here already!

Showing mom some dance moves!

Realizing I'm Not The Best Dad {& I'm Okay With That}

   I've never been big on calling parents heroes, unless of course that parent rescued a kid from an icy lake or something like that!  This is just me though. I'm cool with the use of the word or phrases like Autism Warrior Parents & others like that. It's cool, it's just not me!

 Even when I was working in EMS full time we would go into the local Walgreen's where a nice young lady worked who my partner & I worked on after a really bad car wreck. Every time we would go in she would tell everyone standing in line the story of how she crashed & couldn't remember anything but our faces as she drifted in & out of consciousness.  She insisted we saved her life, we were heroes, we were angels, but we weren't heroes…we weren't angels…we were medics & that's what medics do. I feel the same about fatherhood. A lot of time I get the 'Man, your the greatest dad' card or 'Your kids are so lucky to have such an amazing dad'. It's super flattering & I'm always as gracious as possible but in my eyes I'm not the greatest dad! The kids aren't always lucky to have me! I think the word hero is thrown around to easily these days. Again I say that's just my opinion.

   This blog is a part of it as well. I get emails talking about how I'm a hero for autism or Super Dad! Don't get me wrong, I'm not down on myself I just realize that I'm not the best dad. Not only is that okay but I think it's a good thing. I've decided if I could point out or shine a light on my flaws, & if people could see them but still realize that we get by okay. We deal with the good times & we hit the hard times head on. In the end everything turns out just fine. Maybe if it's clear that if this mediocre parent like me can rock the crap out of Autism & parenthood in general then who knows what you can do!

I get a lot of emails asking advice during hard times. I relate the best I can, tell them how I would do it or what I did when we were in a similar situation. I also usually make a point to tell them that I don't have any good advice other than it's not easy, black & white, or the same with any two kids. All I know is if you do your best & work hard to advocate for your kid your bound to catch a break sometime! That doesn't always sound too promising to a lot of parents but I find it funny that we autism parents have a different view. Us autism parents are not so Glass Half Full & not so much Glass Half Empty but more "Really The Glass Is Spilled All Over The Table Again? Well At Least The Glass Isn't Broken This Time!" We can find a little glimmer of hope in just about anything. We have to! If not you'll go crazy!
   
Well, I hope this came across like I wanted it to. I hope I didn't come off as a... you know…

 I had the awesome opportunity to appear on Autism-Live last week! Check out the clip below. If you've never heard of Autism-Live they have a bunch of great resources so check them out.



****UPDATE****

P.S. I realize after publishing this blog, I felt really good about the message but also realized I didn't really point out any of my flaws so I wanted to address those here:

Tom's Flaws & Shortcomings As Not Only A Father But Husband:

• I am THE single most sarcastic person on the face of the planet! Yes, I have a kid with Asperger's & I can not help but use relentless sarcasm 100% of the time!
• I sing everything I say to my wife… really like 70% of everything out of my mouth is in song form. I make up songs to tell her dinner is ready, I make up songs to tell her I need to run to the dollar store, make up wildly inappropriate songs to badger/heckle/razz her , & yes I make up songs to intise her to... love me ;)  (HUSBANDS please note that the last song type mentioned works only about .001% of the time & even when you break out the Antonio Bandarez voice it will still be very unsuccessful!)
• I sometimes let the kids say bad words when mom isn't around! That's right, I said it! When my wife is out of the house we fart, say off limits words like crap, & make inappropriate jokes about nuts! (They went to see the new animated movie Nut Job & came back with a new slew of "Hey daddy, the squirrel was trying to hide his….nuts hahahaha! Yeah so that's inappropriately cute but when my youngest got in the car the other day & said to his mom "It's so cold out there! I'm freezin my nuts off!" We both got a talking to & now don't make those jokes!)
• Lastly, my full luscious head of hair. These kids think that they are gonna be okay but they are not. Every guy in my family is bald.  I've just dodged a bullet by some sort of sick luck & will almost, without a doubt, be bald by the late thirties! (This is simultaneously a bad thing for that reason & one of the only things I still have going for me as well!)

Okay okay you think a guy could be serious for a second but nope, I can't! Sorry! :) 

A Minecraft Birthday! {Why Do They Have To Grow Up!}

    Our two youngest boys have birthdays 13 days apart so we usually, with their blessing, combine the parties into one. This year it had to be Minecraft! The cakes were so awesome & there are so many of your kids who are Minecraft crazy like mine I thought I would share a few pictures real quick.

   Okay, seriously though, it's not funny anymore! They can stop growing now! Today my middle son turns 8… what happened! How did he get this big? How did I get this old? Why does it all have to change? What time is it? Where are my pants? You kids get off my lawn! … Sorry, I lost track there for a minute. As I was saying he is 8 years old today despite all his neurosis (he was awake pretty much every hour on the hour last night even with a good dose of melatonin) he was pretty happy this morning.  I surprised him with his favorite breakfast this morning pancakes in funny shapes & my wife made bacon! My birthdays don't really depress me anymore…the kids birthdays… those will knock the wind out of ya!
 
   On a short side note if you don't know about the webshow Autism-Live you should check it out! It's a great resource & a lot of fun! Aaaaannnnnddd since your are already going to check it out now that I gave you a heads up on in you should totally tune into the show next week on Jan. 22 at about 11:15 or so to see…. me! I have been on a few times & it's always fun! Between that & a great opportunity I'm a part of next month where I will be speaking on a panel at the University Of Oklahoma's Children's Hospital about Autism, Immunizations, & all kinds of interesting stuff! 

They insisted that the minecraft cake have a pig on it! Non-Nagotiable!

All the staples! Pig, TNT, Steve, & a Creeper!

Making wishes!

The rare & illusive REAL smile! You don't get many of these with that kid!

Jayden, doing a good job at not being upset that this party is not about him!

The many faces of Zion!

Post-Christmas Break Break Down {The Sky Is Now Officially Falling}

   Every year after the Christmas break is over & school starts back we have problems! Is this just my son or is this common, I bet it happens to a lot of our kids! It sucks & we knew it was going to suck but no matter how well you think you are prepared for something you know what? It still sucks!
  It's partially my fault for taking the first few weeks of "How was your day Jayden?" "GREAT!" he would say. Yeah…just gonna take that a face value! Yesterday I pushed to find out how things were really going & found out what I should have know, if you don't watch where you're going while driving the titanic you're going to hit an ice burg! Yeah… we hit an ice burg!
   Piles of old papers stuffed in his desk that stood as high as his desk itself, I learned from his teacher. That poor woman who I can only imagine probably, after this year of school, talks in her sleep… "Jayden, what are you doing?….Jayden, why is all this work in your desk?… Jayden, why are you crying?… "
    I have been trying all my tricks to get this under control this year before we head to middle school next year. (I don't even want to think about it!) We have now moved from taking things away like game time or TV time when he has done something wrong to taking most everything away & making him earn everything back through successful work & life habits. Will this work? Hell if I know but man, I sure hope so! My hope is that without the distractions of things that we normally allow a bit of throughout the week like TV, Netflix, & generally Zombie-ing out around the house & making him mostly stay in his happy place(his room) reading, working on some of his projects that are a bit more brain stimulating maybe we can get him to where he needs to be! We spent a long time yesterday talking & going over our new way of doing things yesterday. A lot of tears were shed, many "I wish you would get hit by a truck" looks were given, & I think we all understand each other now.  We didn't get there without some rough patches of the conversation though. About mid way through out talk I asked Jayden "How does this all sound to you? How do you view this? You can tell me how it makes you feel & you're not going to get into trouble or offend anyone, just be honest & lets communicate." I got an answer that cut me like rusty prison shiv! "Honestly, it sounds like the start of a very horrible life" So yeah… at that point I wanted to say "I don't care about school, lets go out for ice cream & head to the science museum!" But I controlled myself & we talked a lot about responsibility, perspective, & the ripple effect that is set off by his actions.
     Long day! Looooong day! Today he came home with a positive attitude, had all his work in his bag,  & he got his snack then headed to his room to work some sort of invention out of circuits that I'm sure I will hear all about tomorrow.

Not Even Jenny McCarthy Believes Jenny McCarthy Anymore!! {The Great Autism Flip-Flop}

I need to charge my phone!

   When I read about Jenny McCarthy or see her speak on TV I sometimes feel like I should be watching the trailer for a bad scary movie! The deep movie guy voice comes on.. "In a world where crazy is used as currency… One woman is the richest in the land…" It's not to hard to find out how I feel about her, her views, & the super harmful misinformation she spreads without any facts or real knowledge to back it up. I hadn't heard from her in a while & we try to keep clear of The View as well but someone just posted this on my Facebook & I was pretty….well see for yourself! "Jenny McCarthy Abandons Her Controversial Position On Vaccines"
   Really? Really!?! Come on now. I'm sorry but when I saw this I really had to check twice to see if this was something Jon Stewart posted or maybe a satire news site like the Onion but nope! You spent the last 7 years spouting anti vaccine propaganda & being the driving force behind an organization that scares the crap out of me!
   Her preaching her crazy then flipping on it reminds me of a guy I used to know! He had something similar going on in his life…

  Man! That really happened! You can really just do almost anything you want when you are a celebrity & have some money. Crazy! Anyway…I'm pushing my soap box back under the table! I know I've got some of you who are anti vaccine & maybe even a couple McCarthy fans (I'm sure she has done some good things, I don't know of any but it could happen) but its just an issue I'm passionate about, I've spent to many years working in ambulances & the ER to not be vocal about something that I know saves lives!