UGH! I haven't been able to blog for awhile now because of my last post I titled "Huge." It came up as questionable content, so until it was "investigated" I was locked out of my own blog!
It's sad, in this day and age, how an innocent topic can be so wrongly interpreted! Now that I'm back up and running I will be posting again!
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
HUGE!
Heading into Casper earlier today Jonathon commented "Am I huge Vickie-Honey?" I replied "you are a big guy Jonathon." He then says "You are huge too." I looked at Tim and said "I think he just called me a fat ass!" Jonathon replies "THAT FAT ASS IS NOT VERY NICE! YOU SHOULD SAY NICE WORDS! You are huge like me Vickie-Honey."
I'm not sure what the whole "huge" thing is about... kind of afraid to ask since he does tend to be brutally honest! LOL!
I'm not sure what the whole "huge" thing is about... kind of afraid to ask since he does tend to be brutally honest! LOL!
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
NO LIPS!
Today is Valentines Day. Tim sent Jonathon downstairs to tell me "Happy Valentines Day," but what he came and told me was "Daddy Tim needs you." When I came upstairs Tim asked if Jonathon told me "Happy Valentines Day." I told him no and we called Jonathon into the room. I said "Happy Valentines Day Jonathon! I need a Valentine kiss!" Jonathon only gives Eskimo kisses, with his nose "NOT THE LIPS CUZ THEY'RE DISGUSTING!" As he was coming in to give me my "nose kiss," I told him I wanted a lip kiss and tried to sneak in a smack on the lips! He interrupted my Valentine intentions with... "CUT! CUT! CUT! NOT THE LIPS VICKIE-HONEY! THAT'S SO DISGUSTING!" .......sigh....... oh well......... at least I got a nose kiss!
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Lottery
We stopped at a gas station tonight so I decided to buy a lottery ticket. I told Jonathon "pick five numbers." He chose 15, 25, 35, 45, and 58. For the powerball it said "choose one." Yep... he selected the number one! Yeah... We didn’t win! LOL
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
It's Raining!
Jonathon and I are at my brother's house watching his two kids while he and his wife are on vacation. I got the kids to bed tonight and Jonathon in the shower. Pretty soon my nephew comes into the bedroom and says "Jonathon's laugh is so loud. I can't sleep." He was correct, Jonathon was hysterically laughing while taking his shower. I decided if I wanted the kids to get to sleep I better go check on Jonathon.
When I walked into the bathroom it was quite obvious WHY Jonathon was laughing so hard. The shower head is a removable one, the kind with a hose on it so you can SPRAY it wherever you want... Jonathon's area of choice to spray... the bathroom ceiling! When he saw me he let out a huge laugh and said "did I make it rain in the bathroom?!"
UGH! Looks like I get to wipe down my brother's bathroom from ceiling to floor!
Note to self... NEVER, EVER, EVER, buy a removable shower head for our bathrooms!!
When I walked into the bathroom it was quite obvious WHY Jonathon was laughing so hard. The shower head is a removable one, the kind with a hose on it so you can SPRAY it wherever you want... Jonathon's area of choice to spray... the bathroom ceiling! When he saw me he let out a huge laugh and said "did I make it rain in the bathroom?!"
UGH! Looks like I get to wipe down my brother's bathroom from ceiling to floor!
Note to self... NEVER, EVER, EVER, buy a removable shower head for our bathrooms!!
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Separation
I have never been a parent who has been able to see Jonathon as being separate from his autism. I guess because his autism is so pronounced. In the past few years he has been able to communicate more and more in his own genuine language, without movie talk, to let his needs be known, but other than that it is generally movie talk. Seeing the autism specialists may be helping me to "see" the Jonathon that is under the autism.
Since our visit to the autism specialists and our new way of communicating with Jonathon I'm starting to see that we can possibly make a significant improvement in how he interacts with us. It is definitely hard. Mainly because we have all been so rote in how we communicate with him and he with us. We now have to retrain ourselves and him. I know it will be worth it in the long run. It's just hard to break old habits.
I've noticed that if I don't catch (redirect) him on his first "attempt" to converse (him using echolalia) he tends to get aggravated and thinks that I am ignoring him. For example he might say a line from a movie; if I don't intercept that thought with something else of significant "value" such as "Jonathon, I am trying to decide what to make for dinner tonight. I'm thinking about cooking a roast or chicken." That is a comment that is "current" to what we are doing and it has value compared to "I like your shirt." The shirt comment is a lame attempt at me trying to turn him "off" from his movie talk and he recognizes it as me avoiding his thoughts.
It's been a couple of weeks since our visit with the specialists. It's easy to fall back into our old habits. I find it the most difficult to stay on our new communication style when we are out in public. Mainly because my thoughts are directed at trying to get errands done and I tend to do the "uh huh, yes, no" type of answers. Outings are the worst time for me to revert back to old ways! Outings are when Jonathon's anxiety increases and we have more behaviors. I need to think about and figure out a way to make our outings more successful. I may either have to take someone else with me to help keep him "current" or I cut our trips down to just a couple of errands and the focus is on him and not the errand.
Boy this is a lot of work!
Since our visit to the autism specialists and our new way of communicating with Jonathon I'm starting to see that we can possibly make a significant improvement in how he interacts with us. It is definitely hard. Mainly because we have all been so rote in how we communicate with him and he with us. We now have to retrain ourselves and him. I know it will be worth it in the long run. It's just hard to break old habits.
I've noticed that if I don't catch (redirect) him on his first "attempt" to converse (him using echolalia) he tends to get aggravated and thinks that I am ignoring him. For example he might say a line from a movie; if I don't intercept that thought with something else of significant "value" such as "Jonathon, I am trying to decide what to make for dinner tonight. I'm thinking about cooking a roast or chicken." That is a comment that is "current" to what we are doing and it has value compared to "I like your shirt." The shirt comment is a lame attempt at me trying to turn him "off" from his movie talk and he recognizes it as me avoiding his thoughts.
It's been a couple of weeks since our visit with the specialists. It's easy to fall back into our old habits. I find it the most difficult to stay on our new communication style when we are out in public. Mainly because my thoughts are directed at trying to get errands done and I tend to do the "uh huh, yes, no" type of answers. Outings are the worst time for me to revert back to old ways! Outings are when Jonathon's anxiety increases and we have more behaviors. I need to think about and figure out a way to make our outings more successful. I may either have to take someone else with me to help keep him "current" or I cut our trips down to just a couple of errands and the focus is on him and not the errand.
Boy this is a lot of work!
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Identification
There are times when I look back and the progress we've made is incredible. Other times I realize we appear to be treading water.
Yesterday Tim and I were doing some work in our laundry room and needed the kitchen stool. Instead of Tim or me having to fight our way out of all the stuff we'd moved around I thought it would be easiest to yell upstairs and ask Jonathon to bring us the kitchen stool. Turns out it wasn't going to be easy.
I yelled upstairs and Jonathon came running. I knew I needed to keep my wording short, as he tends to get stuck on one word out of the entire request, if he's not familiar with the request. My wording was "grab the white stool by the kitchen stove." He came down with the "white" window we had taken out to clean which was in the kitchen and "by the stove." Tim said "that's a window. We need the white stool by the stove." Jonathon ran back up the stairs and reappears with a "white" box that was sitting in the kitchen. I decided to give him a little more information... "Jonathon it is the stool that we stand on. It is white with black steps." He runs back up the stairs only to reappear with... another white item. Obviously Jonathon's brain was stuck and he was not going to move past the "white" part of the request, so Tim crawled through the laundry room mess to go upstairs and show Jonathon what we were requesting.
I think this is an example of a couple different things going on in his brain. One... as the autism specialists pointed out, his mind gets stuck on certain events or topics. In this instance his mind caught the word "white" and couldn't move any further into the request being made of him. He knows he needs to bring us something "white" so begins the guessing game. The second thing, I believe, is going on, is his learning level is that of a small child. He's stuck in those early formative years when small children learn by asking "what's that? what's this? etc..." The difference is Jonathon doesn't ask the wh questions that young children do when experiencing their environment. You know... the questions that tend to drive parents crazy! For Jonathon a piece of his development is missing. Where we, (Tim and I) fall short is assuming he knows what everyday items are called.
Can you imagine living in a world where you don't know what everyday items are? He tends to know how these items work, but has great difficulty identifying them. Years ago we had a similar experience when I asked him to go downstairs and bring me the blue dustpan. Every attempt he made to bring me the correct item ended up being something blue, but not the dustpan.
The part of this that makes me sad for him is he feels like he's failed when he brings the wrong item and repeatedly apologizes. It isn't a big deal to us but it is to him. I think he feels like he's stupid for not knowing. Really it would be equivilant to me being in a car repair shop and someone requesting a tool or a car part. I would have absolutely no idea what they were talking about! They could describe the item to me and I would probably do the same thing Jonathon does... narrow down my options as to what was being requested. The difference is I have the ability to "pick" my first description of the item and then move on to the next identifying characteristic of the item, then the next, and the next until I have found the correct item being requested. Jonathon's brain doesn't let him narrow down the identifying characteristics to find the correct the item.
I'm going to have to ask the autism specialists if there is something we can do to help him in this area because I honestly don't know if his brain can get past the point of where it seems to get stuck in the identifying process. We see this with names of family members as well. People who's names he should know but doesn't.
Just another mysterious piece in how his unique brain works.
Yesterday Tim and I were doing some work in our laundry room and needed the kitchen stool. Instead of Tim or me having to fight our way out of all the stuff we'd moved around I thought it would be easiest to yell upstairs and ask Jonathon to bring us the kitchen stool. Turns out it wasn't going to be easy.
I yelled upstairs and Jonathon came running. I knew I needed to keep my wording short, as he tends to get stuck on one word out of the entire request, if he's not familiar with the request. My wording was "grab the white stool by the kitchen stove." He came down with the "white" window we had taken out to clean which was in the kitchen and "by the stove." Tim said "that's a window. We need the white stool by the stove." Jonathon ran back up the stairs and reappears with a "white" box that was sitting in the kitchen. I decided to give him a little more information... "Jonathon it is the stool that we stand on. It is white with black steps." He runs back up the stairs only to reappear with... another white item. Obviously Jonathon's brain was stuck and he was not going to move past the "white" part of the request, so Tim crawled through the laundry room mess to go upstairs and show Jonathon what we were requesting.
I think this is an example of a couple different things going on in his brain. One... as the autism specialists pointed out, his mind gets stuck on certain events or topics. In this instance his mind caught the word "white" and couldn't move any further into the request being made of him. He knows he needs to bring us something "white" so begins the guessing game. The second thing, I believe, is going on, is his learning level is that of a small child. He's stuck in those early formative years when small children learn by asking "what's that? what's this? etc..." The difference is Jonathon doesn't ask the wh questions that young children do when experiencing their environment. You know... the questions that tend to drive parents crazy! For Jonathon a piece of his development is missing. Where we, (Tim and I) fall short is assuming he knows what everyday items are called.
Can you imagine living in a world where you don't know what everyday items are? He tends to know how these items work, but has great difficulty identifying them. Years ago we had a similar experience when I asked him to go downstairs and bring me the blue dustpan. Every attempt he made to bring me the correct item ended up being something blue, but not the dustpan.
The part of this that makes me sad for him is he feels like he's failed when he brings the wrong item and repeatedly apologizes. It isn't a big deal to us but it is to him. I think he feels like he's stupid for not knowing. Really it would be equivilant to me being in a car repair shop and someone requesting a tool or a car part. I would have absolutely no idea what they were talking about! They could describe the item to me and I would probably do the same thing Jonathon does... narrow down my options as to what was being requested. The difference is I have the ability to "pick" my first description of the item and then move on to the next identifying characteristic of the item, then the next, and the next until I have found the correct item being requested. Jonathon's brain doesn't let him narrow down the identifying characteristics to find the correct the item.
I'm going to have to ask the autism specialists if there is something we can do to help him in this area because I honestly don't know if his brain can get past the point of where it seems to get stuck in the identifying process. We see this with names of family members as well. People who's names he should know but doesn't.
Just another mysterious piece in how his unique brain works.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Good or Not?
Jonathon had gotten in the shower upstairs last night and after awhile Tim heard a pounding on the wall. In our family the pounding on the wall means "I need something! Someone come help!" Tim went into the bathroom and asked Jonathon what he needed to which Jonathon replied "I need those pajamas." Tim came downstairs chuckling and reported to me that Jonathon finally figured out what the knocking on the wall meant. I see this as both a good thing and a bad.
Good, in that he has figured out if he needs something, while in the shower, he can knock on the wall and someone will come help. Bad in that the little stinker knows he's supposed to go downstairs and get his jammies BEFORE his shower and I think he was just being a lazy!
Oh well... who doesn't try to get a family member to do something for them if they can!! LOL!
Good, in that he has figured out if he needs something, while in the shower, he can knock on the wall and someone will come help. Bad in that the little stinker knows he's supposed to go downstairs and get his jammies BEFORE his shower and I think he was just being a lazy!
Oh well... who doesn't try to get a family member to do something for them if they can!! LOL!
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