Introductions

Replies:

• 
• by
  • Coach1
  on Nov. 25, 2007 at 2:03 PM

• Hi - My name is Christine and I'm a native to Vancouver, WA, it will be 38 years in July.
  
  I enjoy reading and writing...working on finding my nitch with either children's books or teenage novels, they're both fun to write.  Also, I have recently taken up genealogy and found a distant relative back in Oklahoma in the process!  I have fun scrapbooking, gardening, and spending time with family and friends.
  
  My husband and I will be celebrating our 18th Anniversary this Christmas Eve...(high-school sweethearts).  We have three wonderful children, Kyle (17 on November 28th), Kaylee (15) and Keifer (13).
  
  Our lives are very busy, but we make sure to find time together.
  
  Wishing you all the very best this holiday season~
  
  Hugs,
  Christine

• 
• by
  • paddleballchris
  on Jan. 17, 2008 at 9:26 PM
• Hi Bonnie, didn't know you had your own group. Here I am again to bug you with questions.You were always helpful.- joan

• 
• by
  • PJSMOMMIE
  on Jan. 19, 2008 at 1:11 PM
• good morning
  
  
  I am pamela and i am a 28 year old mom of two boys which is crazy enough plus add my 6 year old being high functioning autistic and my 3 year old with ocd and autistic traits.  Doctors have said since alex (my 3 year old) has eye contact hes not autistic and his ocd isnt to the point where he cant go on with out making sure the door is closed right or his blankets.  Anyhow, being in a small town its very hard to find moms and families that have simular situations to be able to talk about their every day lives.
  
  
  thankyou for adding me to the group.
  
  
  pamela

• 
• by
  • autinae
  on Feb. 1, 2008 at 9:52 PM
• hello! thanx for adding me to this group.  i work with autistic children and go to some trainings, so i hope that we will all be able to help each other and support one another.  have a great weekend!

• 
• by
  • Deandrea82
  on May. 29, 2008 at 4:52 PM
• Hi Im Deandrea mom of 2 . my youngest child Jeremiah is 6 and has Aspergers. I just moved to Stone Mountain Ga (Dekalb county) and he has just been diagnoised. In Florida I got the run around and relocated for my son. So far soo good. Im glad to find a group like this where moms can get together vent encourage and educate each other .Thanks.  Look forward to chatting with everyone

• 
• by
  • liveindependent
  on Jun. 10, 2008 at 11:18 PM
• Hi: I am a mother of a son age 32 with PDD/Autism.  It was a long struggle and sadly even with all the publicity it still seems parents walk in the dark for answers. Childhood was difficult, other parents critical, toilet training horrible, education constant struggle. IQ-76, and withdrawn, having no social skills-no friends. Has had two relationships, working on making his current one better than the past. Lifelong Therapy, not much medication but behaviour management, and therapy for anger management. He receives funding from DDA for mentor  weekly teaching cooking, shopping, laundry, landscaping, housekeeper once a month, and respite care funds (when parents travel). He owns his own home, manages money with parents support, drives, worked but bad experience and has never returned so collects SSDI. He has grown a lot but still has episodes of depression, and frustration but no violent behaviours.  Learning more about himself, it comes in stages.  As parents we hung in there with unconditional love.  I am sure everyone judged us because he looks normal.  Now that he is older his walk and body structure is showing weakness-walks side to side.  He goes through times of staying in his house for days and is on the Internet-computer long period of times. This is a great worry for Parents. We are still involved with him daily. Calls us every day, several times.  Local Police keep an eye on his home, we introduced ourselves and explained his challanges.   He is aware of his challenges and we teach him more and more daily. One day he actually will Advocate for others.  We believe he is living a quality life.  We have developed a special needs trust to provide for him when we are no longer here because we do supplement his income.  Very proud and you will look back on all these nightmares with smiles. We have met some very wonderful people along our journey. We look at our life as a Mission and we have shared our different life with many other parents with our same differences.  Hold your heads up high and be proud.
  Guardian Angel

• 
• by
  • aqryus
  on Jun. 20, 2008 at 8:56 PM
• Hi,
  My name is Judy, and I am a grandmother of an 11 year old boy with autism. I first learned about autism when I taught special needs in NH--and then my grandson was born. I am now retired and living in Florida.
  
  Since I have observed both personally and through teaching how autism affects families I wanted to do what I could to help kids understand autism better, so once I retired, I decided to write books for children. My first two are about autism. Check them out at www.judithmammay.com
  
  Judy

• 
• by
  • Pghpagirl
  on Jul. 21, 2008 at 10:49 PM

• Hi I am Teri I have a son that is 4 that was diagnosed with autism a little over a year ago.  I have been getting him OT and speech and also he has a TSS for 15hrs at home and 5 in school and 4 hrs of BSC.  He just got a blended case manager also.  I am trying to get him to a Dr at childrens hospital to get him tested for metals yeast ect... I have been waiting since november to get a call to schedule the appt.  For now I am taking it one day at a time and doing as much research at home as I can. 
  

• 
• by
  • kimbercase26
  on Jul. 22, 2008 at 12:04 AM

• Hi! I'm Kim. I have a 6 year old son. He doesn't have Autism, but I joined this group because I wanted to learn more about Autism. I want to go into a field that works with them. I love to work with people! I think that this field of work would be very rewarding for me. I hope to learn and possibly help people on here (Even if it's just ear to listen!) If anyone has any info that they feel may be helpful to me, just email me or message me! My email address is kimbercase26@yahoo.com. Hope to hear from you!
  
  Kim

• 
• by
  • Growing2Fast
  on Jul. 31, 2008 at 10:59 AM

• Hi! I'm a 37yr old mother of two.  I have a 3yr old daughter, Verity, and a 5yr old son named Samuel.  We are a military family and have suspected something was going on with Samuel since he was about 2yrs old.  But, being in the military, when our son had a doctor appointment he would rarely see the same person twice.  So, though my husband and I would talk to the pediatricians, they didn't really help us much.  Just after Samuel turned 3 and we were getting ready to PCS/change stations we had a pediatrician that finally took notice of what we were saying and she told us to have him evaluated by the school district once we reached our new duty station to see if he may qualify for a head start program.  We took that advice and had him tested as soon as we arrived and, sure enough, they said he was developmentally delayed with a moderate to severe speech delay and they placed him in the preschool program. 

  At this time he was 31⁄2yrs.  He couldn't go to his local school district because it was full and his first year of school was at a neighboring district.  They were great and we really liked the staff there.  However, the next year of schooling he was placed in his home school district.  His classroom teacher and aids were awesome.  However, the speech therapist was not as impressive.  At the beginning of the school year he was lucky if he was getting a session with her once every two weeks and finally, after 8wks of school, I made an appointment to talk with her face to face.  She basically told she thought Samuel was making great strides of improvement on his own and that she had an overwhelming amount of kids she needed to work with that were far more in need of her assistance.  And I told her I was sorry she was being over tasked but that Samuel is my child and still needs help and that he wasn't being given the services specified in his IEP.  I also suggested that if she was unable to provide those services then we needed to discuss that with the school district and see what other arrangements could be made.  After that, she did make more of an effort to see Sam, but some of her time working with him was "observation time" while he was out on the playground.  This didn't exactly thrill me, but I didn't really know what to do about it.  Then, at the end of the year, on his last IEP she wrote that Sam had made great improvement through out the year, that she no longer felt he had a moderate to severe speech delay, she thought it was mild at best and that his time with the speech therapist could be scaled back next year when he entered Kindergarten. 

  Again, I was at a loss.  I knew Samuel wasn't were he needed to be developmentally.  So, in June, when Samuel had his 5yr check-up on base, I had a sit down with his pediatrician that was doing the exam and I gave her the low down on what had been going on.  Explaining that he was 5 and still wouldn't have a BM on the toilet, still violently fought us every time we had to cut his hair or clip his nails and that though he could talk he still wasn't conversational and didn't comprehend what was being asked of him.  Then I gave her a demonstration and told her to go ahead and ask him how old he was and she did.  He answered, "S A M U E L that spells Sam."  Then she ended up spending 45 minutes with him (it was only suppose to be a 15min appt.) having him draw, talk to her and examining him.  I left there with referrals to see a private speech therapist, an occupational therapist, a pediatric gastroenterologist (to make sure there isn't a physical reason he won't have BMs) and a pediatric psychologist. 

  Since then he has been given numerous tests and I have written a novel of paperwork.  We will be getting a report from the psychologist the beginning of September that she said we will be able to take to the school district.  She said it will include the results of her observations and tests, the results of the observations and test of a second therapist she had look at him for a second opinion and the reports from the speech and occupational therapists.   We have also been approved for private speech and occupational therapy sessions twice a week for the next six months.  So far, from what all the paperwork has pointed to and from what has been said to us, the specialists all seem to be on the same page with their thinking and autism is what they are all bracing us for.  Though the psychologist said he presented himself well and that, if that is the case, he is high functioning.

  So, here I am!  Trying to gather information about what is going on with Sam so I can get my mind wrapped around it all.  My husband and I want to fully understand everything the specialists are saying to us so we can make informed decisions about his care.  We also want to be able to stand our ground armed with knowledge when talking to the schools.

  This group looks like a great place to help aid us in this quest.  We live in the Shreveport, LA area and any help or advice any of you may be able to give us would be greatly appreciated.

  I truly wish this ball had started rolling 3yrs ago when we first started asking for help.  If he does end up with a diagnosis of autism, all of this crucial time during his early developmental years will have been wasted.  It really makes my husband and I feel so angry and guilty.  Like we should have done more to make sure he didn't slip through the cracks.  It's all just very heavy on our hearts.
  

  That was long.  Thanks for taking the time to read this.
  

   
  

        ~JEN~

  

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