One Family's Story

April is the official month for Autism awareness….meaning those who are in the on-going fight to cure it or love someone who has it, want to make the whole world “aware” of the difficulties that people with autism experience.
Well, I’m a mom with two boys with autism and no, I’m not going to donate to the cause this month….I “donate” (emotionally and financially) on a daily basis anyway….and I’m not going to campaign for a cure….we as a family have been dealing with autism for 14 yrs.
Now, I’m not saying “Don’t find a cure…..I love my kids just the way they are”. I do love my boys, and yes, they will have some challenges to overcome in life. But, I still struggle with the chemical, environmental vs. genetic predisposition battle that seems to be the crux to finding that cure.
In the meantime, as any parent will do, I will accept my boys’ challenges and guide them through life’s puzzle. And autism is a puzzle. As the doctors and research describes it, there is a “Spectrum”, or a line with degrees of autism. On one end you have the child who cannot talk and rolls himself up in a ball for security and on the other you have Asperger’s syndrome.

Asperger’s is the diagnosis my youngest boy has been given. Ben is 11 and up until last year, he has had the diagnosis of severe ADHD with emotional difficulties. Those “emotional difficulties”
along with the ADHD have made it difficult for him in a traditional school setting, so this year, along with his brother, I’m home-schooling the boys. Remember, I mentioned that I “give” on a daily basis!
Ben is a very bright child (as most kids with Asperger’s are) he has difficulty with peer relationships and tends to play with kids younger than himself….he feels more comfortable because he doesn’t always “get’ the social cues of his peers.
Ben’s “brightness” doesn’t always translate well on paper and on tests….so, with home school we don’t have to stick to the conventional ways of testing what he’s learned.

My older son, Ethan (14), is diagnosed with high-functioning autism. And being the older of the two, his road to Autism has been a bit bumpy. As our first child, and as parents without a clue, we had such difficulty with his behavior when he was younger. He would not respond to discipline and because he was so easily over-stimulated, he would have frequent meltdowns in public places.
Ethan still experiences over-stimulation, but as he has grown, he has learned some coping skills. However, some of the things that allow him to feel secure, seem strange to his peers. such as, flapping his arms and hands and repeating words to himself over and over. He has learning disabilities that require an I.E.P. and Special Ed. instruction.,. as well as weekly Speech and social interaction group (Ben will be attending one of these group too).

So, there you have a little peek into the lives of a family with autism in this month of Autism Awareness. We are slowly putting our pieces of life’s puzzle together and learning a lot about ourselves in the process.