Sunday

Another Sunday down.  Well, not really down, Anthony is still awake and we are watching Mad Men, but for the most part, it's over.  We had a pretty good weekend but that could be because a) Anthony didn't go to church with us and b) I took the girls to a birthday party today and it was just Mike and the baby home together.  But he did okay.  He is so, so loud lately.  He does this crazy-ass laugh here lately, it's SUPER loud, but as Mike said today, it beats the hell out of him crying or melting down.

His toilet training is ROUGH.  I think maybe we should go back to Square One on it but we'll see.  I am getting the paperwork together for his summer camp.  I can't believe it's almost May and then I'll say "next month" if anyone asks me when Anthony will be seven.  SEVEN.

What else.  Lord, he is a sweet thing.  He drives me crazy but I am so wild about him.  He is getting so big, he seems GIANT, especially because of the baby.  We bought a new swingset and by GOD I am going to get it assembled and I hope Anthony likes it.  It has a climbing wall that I think he'll like.

Anyways.  Onward toward, May!  Autism Awareness month so you can all go back to being unaware until next year, Ha!

Siblings

 Here's Anthony with Felicity, the oldest and the youngest - so far!  Ha ha ha boo hoo, just kidding, she will probably remain the youngest.  Anyways, I wanted to post a link to this youtube clip of this nimrod talking at a Ted Talk in San Antonio.  She is the sister of a brother who has autism, and she is deeply, DEEPLY concerned not about him, but about her self and HER childhood and the fact that she was a GLASS CHILD, which is someone that the parents look right through, because, you see, they are so busy with their autistic child. 

I don't agree with her assessment.  She seems determined to be adversely affected by her brother's life.  It makes me worried and sad, of course, that Maria or Veronica or Felicity would ever talk about their lives like this, but mostly I just don't think it would happen to them.  We really and truly love all four of our kids the same and we try hard to give them all what they need.  Maria, at this stage, is by far the neediest.  She is sitting directly to my left right now, drinking my coffee, insisting that she likes it and it's not too hot!  Sheesh! 

But Felicity is pretty needy, too.  She is a baby and she's been so sick that she's needed more time from me and Mike.  Veronica is kind of a needy person too, because guess why?  THEY ARE ALL LITTLE CHILDREN!  Maybe it will get worse later, but I think if we start with loving them and attending to their needs, I don't see where we can go wrong. 

This really makes me think about our lives with Anthony and how lucky we are to have a school for him to go to.  It's hard - yesterday we were at the ER with Felicity and the doctor asked her what grade her brother was in and Maria sort of stumbled, and I said, leading her, Anthony has autism and goes to a special school, and she repeated it.  If we didn't live here, if we couldn't afford his insurance or school, I guess he'd just go to our public school.  Then he'd still be in a different school than they are in, but he wouldn't have as long a day, he'd have more holidays off, he'd be around more.  I don't know if that's worse or better for him OR them but I think he seems happier at school. focused on his work. 

Yesterday his therapist told me that he was silly again all day, but his work was good.  That is bad for us because by "silly" she means that he laughs manaically and behaves crazily but because there is just one person focused on him, he's able to get some work done.  At home, it's a little looser so he's just crazy and not working.  Then I think he gets frustrated and then we all get frustrated.  We are working on it, I always think.  We are trying to keep him in his clothes and trying to keep him going on the potty and trying to keep him happy and, if I'm honestly, mostly just trying to keep him in his clothes. 

This is scattered,I want to post more for Autism Awareness Month but man.  Maria is talking incessantly to me and I can't even think anymore.  At least I am free of the fear that she is a glass frickety fracken child. 

World Autism Day

 I always have a moment of doubt when I put up a picture of anyone in the bath.  I think, is anything showing?  I don't think it is, but I always, always have a second where I worry. 

Autism Awareness.  UGH.  I am AWARE!  I'm amazed at how many people aren't, I guess, considering that the CDC just came out with new numbers that say that 1 in 88 babies born will have it. Is that right?  Or I guess is that kids have it now, that's it.  Because there is a big controversy about why the numbers have gone up.  Some people believe it's an EPIDEMIC because the world is poisoning our kids and some people think only diagnoses have gone up.  I am kind of with the latter group, because here's why:  the group that had the biggest rise in numbers is hispanics, and I think that speaks to diagnosis, right?  They're doing a lot more checking for autism in schools, the average age of diagnosis is like eight or something, so it seems to me that what we're dealing with is a rise in diagnosis.  If you ask me, people have always been complete wierdos and it explains a lot that many of them were on the autism spectrum this whole time. 

But this is not Anthony's autism.  Anthony's autism is .. autismier than a child's autism when they were diagnosed at eight.  When they got through preschool and Kindergarten and the first few grades.  When they are toilet trained.  When they have an interest in something, anything.  Anthony is, I guess, severly autistic.  He is LOW FUNCTIONING, as people love to talk about.  It makes me so, so sad to type this, because - well, because of two things.  One, it's Monday and we are so tired and wrung out after the weekend, it's hard to be a hopeful person.  And two, sometimes it feels like because he is low functioning and severely autistic NOW that that's how he's always going to be.  I don't feel that way all the time, but if I'm forced to put a name on it, and a feeling on it, that feeling is sometimes hopeless. 

My mom posted a thing the other day on Facebok about how much autistic people cost society and a friend of hers posted "This makes me so grateful".  I was like, uh, what in the who now?  I wanted to post and say "this makes me ... ungrateful?".  What the hell?  I don't really like reading articles about how much people like Anthony *cost society* because that seems like ammunition or something for why they shouldn't exist.  It seems kind of Nazi-ish, to me.  I mean, I know it's not, but man.  Lots of people cost society lots of money, not just people with autism, so I kind of resent putting a number on it.  The idea, of course, is that people like Anthony won't ADD anything to society and I say that's not true.  First of all, who knows?  Anthony could grow up and cure cancer, what the hell do we know?  I hardly think six years old is the time to make a decision about someone's whole future.  Secondly, Anthony goes to school every day where someone is EMPLOYED to work with him.  He has BAZILLIONS of insurance claims every damned month and someone has to process those, that's another person employed because of Anthony and kids like him.  He's getting billion dollar orthotics here soon, that's ANOTHER person working!  Anthony Beck for President!  Ha! 

Anyways, I am aware of autism every ding dang day.  Maria just asked me what I was doing and I said typing about Anthony.  She said "you're typing about his words, because he's doing really great?".  I daresay Anthony is adding to Maria's little society, too.  So shut it, naysayers.