What Love Is

"Good night, Claire.  I love you."

"Good night, Mom.  I do love you, too, but here's what I think about love and the members of my family.  I don't feel my love for them, but I do like to have them around and I want them to live as long as I do.  I don't want any of them to die while they're kids or anything."

Good enough.  We'll take it.

Angry Birds and Poetry

Damon and Anne like to play Angry Birds on the computer.  (We don't have smart phones or ipads or anything cool--we're so last decade.)  Anne has tried to convince Damon to launch the eagle.  I guess it's an effective weapon against pigs or blocks or something (I don't know.  I've never played.).  Damon refuses.  He says it's disrespectful, the eagle being our national bird and all.

Different topic:  I was in Claire's classroom for a little while yesterday observing her progress.  She liked having me there and didn't want me to leave.  When she got home that afternoon she told me, "I was sad when you left, so I made up a poem to help myself feel better:

If we went to the neighborhood of a hare,
then what would we see there?

A blueberry bush and a kitten,
a horse and a flea,
the the cutest little puppy
that you ever did see."

To help motivate the kids (Claire) in school, we've told them they can earn pet geckos if they achieve their (Claire's) goals--10 days of goal reaching to get the cage, 15 days of goal reaching after that to get the geckos.

Geckos were Ange-babe's idea (Thanks, Angela!).  The kids are excited.  I'm excited, too.  I just found out geckos can live 25 years.

A Typical Dinner

I made tomato soup for dinner earlier this week.  While it was cooking, Claire asked me to lift her up so she could see what was in the pot.

"What is it?"

"Tomato soup."

"I thought it was spaghetti!  Why aren't you making spaghetti!  You tricked me!"  She ran away in a rage.

"If it smells like spaghetti, maybe you'll like it," I called after her.

Later the kids and I sat down to eat.  (Jake was still at work.)  Before the kids could get too far in their verbal abuse of the soup I said, "I don't want to hear anything except 'Thank you, Mom, for working so hard for us every day and making us dinner.'"

Damon and Anne dutifully thanked me.  Claire cried, "I can't do that!"

"Then just don't say anything, Claire."

"I have to say something to make myself feel better."  She dipped her finger in the soup, licked her finger and added, "Nice try, Mom, but it could have been better."  She didn't have anymore.

And I let it slide.  It was better than a melt down, so I'm going to call it progress.

Damon tasted the soup without eating it, but he didn't complain, either.  Anne had seconds and thirds.  I love that girl's tolerant taste buds.

holding my breath

Claire's teacher (whom I really like and who is a very good teacher) talked with the special ed teacher and got some ideas.  She suggested continuing on with the goal sheets I had been sending to school, adding a few more specific goals, and then asked about using a sand timer.  She would present it as a game and tell Claire to see if she could complete x amount of math problems before the timer ran out.  I told her that in the past timers hadn't been very effective (in the classroom, anyway.  At home with her tutor, timers worked pretty well.)  However, she was welcome to try it.  (I'm anxious for her to try anything so I can avoid another meeting with the principal.)  She tried it, and it was a success!  Claire came home so proud of her math worksheet (which was totally finished) and how she'd beaten the timer three times!

Oh, how I hope the timer keeps working.  It would save me so much time and heartache.  And I could focus on play dates for Claire (she spends almost all recess by herself and has said she wants to make new friends).  And maybe I could paint this dark wood paneling and hang the curtains I bought to replace these disgusting vertical blinds and...

looking for the positive

"We are blessed with so very much. And yet it is sometimes difficult to view the problems and permissiveness around us and not become discouraged. I have found that, rather than dwelling on the negative, if we will take a step back and consider the blessings in our lives, including seemingly small, sometimes overlooked blessings, we can find greater happiness."  ~Pres. Thomas S. Monson

I'm not even going to comment on the election, except to say I can't comprehend it and Jake was right and I was wrong.

So.  Claire needs a little help in the classroom.  Her teacher doesn't deny this.  Last year, we were able to help her succeed with ABA therapy in the classroom (our private therapist provided the therapy.  The school provided their permission for the therapist to be there after many unpleasant meetings).  I called her teacher yesterday, asking if she would let me come in for about an hour every morning to get Claire re-trained. I told her that when Claire didn't need me, I'd be happy to do whatever she wanted me to do. The woman has 26 kids in her class.  I was sure she'd jump at the chance to have free help.   Alas.  First she has to talk it over with the principal.  Which means we'll probably be back to the ugly meetings, where I try to convince them that I know my child and that I know what works.  Why they are so against parents being involved in helping a child succeed is beyond me.  It makes me want to scream.

Heavenly Father has helped us in the past, and I'm sure He will help us again.  I've got to remember that.  It shouldn't be so easy to forget.

education espionage

I might be paranoid, but I think the elementary school doesn't like me.  Maybe I left a bad taste in their mouths last year over the fight to have Claire's tutors in the classroom.  I've signed up to be a volunteer in Anne's and Claire's classroom and in the library.  Only the library has asked for me.  When I go in to spy on Claire, I often see lots of other parent in there.  Hmmm.

Claire ended kindergarten last spring in a really good place.  She was almost indistinguishable from her peers and hadn't had a tutor with her in the classroom for about 2 months.  We continued her therapy at home over the summer, then ended her therapy just before school started. (Ah, I was so happy.  I felt like such a hero for keeping the tutors coming for so long.  And it was so nice to have them finally gone.)  This morning I went in to spy on her.  It was discouraging, agonizing, and depressing.  While the other kids hurried to finish their morning worksheet, she pressed on her desk with her hands and looked around the classroom.  She is the class messenger this week, so while I was watching she and another little boy left to make some deliveries to the lunchroom.  She seemed excited, and maybe being a messenger is distracting her.  I'll have to spy next week to see if she's doing better without a special job to look forward to.  If not, are we going to have to have tutors in the classroom at the beginning of every school year to retrain her?  Gah! 

The Presidential Campaign

I've probably mentioned before that Damon is a talker.  If he's not talking about interest rates, demographics, or how much money Jake makes (Jake considers this an intrusion of privacy and refuses to discuss it), Damon's talking about the presidential election.  Yesterday, his comments on the election prompted Claire to say,

"I hope Mitt Romney loses."

[Gasp! My child is an apologist and a socialist!]  "Why, Claire?"

"Because I want Dad to win."

[Sigh of relief...hey, why doesn't she want me to win?!]

"And then we'll all be famous."

Anne was on board with that.  Here's her campaign poster:

Anne gets confused.  She isn't sure if Claire has Jake running for president, king, or prophet, but she does know that when he wins, we'll all be wearing crowns.  And Barrack and Mitt (the colorless guys in the middle) will be upset.

Here's Claire's poster (Jack H! means Jake Henderson!):

Parents who think their children are brilliant are so annoying, but when their children really are brilliant, it's less annoying, right?  The guy on the left is Obama the donkey.  The guy on the right is Romney the elephant.  They're both saying "Boo." How does she know about party symbols?  I don't know!  She had no help or coaching with this drawing.  I love the hands on the bottom.  From left to right, they're clapping, handing Jake a trophy, a ribbon, and money.  So Jake could be a communist, a socialist, or a capitalist, since all three are after accolades and money.  But once again he's being crowned which leads me to believe that although there's an election going on, Claire and Anne are more interested in monarchy than anything else.

It's fun to swim at the YMCA

I thought I was going to be a daily blogger for a few days there, but it turns out I only blog when I'm avoiding something I don't like and that can be put off.  Right now I'm avoiding making a grocery list and going shopping.

Last week was the beginning of summer break.  I bought a YMCA membership and the kids and I swam there a lot last week.  Damon and Anne and I enjoyed it.  Claire is still terrified of the water, even after 10 days of private lessons last summer.  At the Y I strapped plenty of floaties on her, more than Anne had on even.  Anne paddled all around having a great time.  I tried to convince Claire she could do that, too.  She screamed, cried, sobbed "You're torturing me!", and clung to my body or swimsuit like, well, like a drowning person.  (Don't worry--my swimsuit is very sturdy.  Not one of those flimsy things girls wear to showcase their hot bods.  No matter how hard Claire pulled, she'd never be able to expose anything.)  A swim instructor was so concerned she left her class of little kids to give me some tips on how to acclimate Claire to the water.  Sigh.  We're gonna keep trying, though.

Once we're out of the pool, though, Claire really shines.  The girls and I go in the women's locker room to shower and change.  Damon goes in the men's locker room where I hope he rinses off, and then he waits for us, dripping, in the hall.  He WILL NOT change in the locker room.  People would see him naked.  I remember how horrified I was when my PE teacher made us shower in the high school locker room, so I try not to make a big deal out of his shyness.  Even Anne hates getting dressed in the locker room.  She somehow manages to shove herself in a locker (maybe 8"x18"x8" small) and get dressed in there.  It's amazing.  But Claire and I are able to get dressed like normal people.  Claire's an interesting mix.  At the kindergarten program two weeks ago she was very nervous to have everyone looking at her.  She kept turning away from the audience to shelter herself.  But in the locker room she doesn't worry about it, and at the pool, she's not bothered a bit by everyone staring while she screams her head off.

state of being

Damon, AKA mini-Jake: likes money, especially saving it.  Worries about inflation, and believes the government should not allow it.  Sometimes asks if I've paid the credit card bill yet.  Gets upset if he doesn't get to bed early when he has to get up early the next morning.  Master Chung calls him a serious student of Tae Kwon Do, and believes he has the potential to be a black belt some day.

Claire: has a hard time going to sleep before 10 p.m. if I don't give her melatonin, unless she has had a lot of exercise.  Getting her to exercise a lot is difficult.  Is "excited and nervous" for 1st grade. (She met her 1st grade teacher and classmates last week.  From what I can pump out of her, none of the kids I requested are in her class.  I can't get a class list so she can start making friends over the summer because that is illegal.  I swear the school admin's primary goal is to thwart us at every turn.  %#&*@!)

Anne: says she doesn't sleep at night, but does an excellent job lying motionlessly and noiselessly in bed from 9 pm to 7 am with her eyes closed.  Really wants a cat for a pet.  Finally lets me listen to whatever music I want in the van.  We went through a rough patch where songs had to be "wild."
Wild= The Cars, J. Geils Band, Bon Jovi, John Cougar Mellencamp (sp?), The Beatles, The Police, Mad Outlet, anyone with a heavy beat and questionable lyrics. (I like some of their music, too, but I don't allow songs like "Angel in the Centerfold" in my car, which broke Anne's heart.)
Not Wild= Adele, Jimmy Buffett, most classical music.  If she grows up to be a porn star, it won't be my fault.  If she grows up to be a tattooed alcoholic searchin' for her lost shaker of salt, heck, it could be my fault.

a drop in the bucket

"(yawn) I'm tired," I said, getting into the van.  We had been grocery shopping.

"You can't fall asleep in the car," said Anne.  "You could wreck and have to go to jail."

"Anne," said Claire, "Even if mom goes to jail, there will still be plenty of other ladies in the world."

michigan beach

Saturday we went to South Haven.  It was a good day.  The kids' willingness to smile for the camera is matched only by my amazing photography skills.  Whoops, there goes Lake Michigan, pouring onto Canada.

Whoa, now it's headed for Indiana, or whatever is south of us.

sandbox

"Aren't the kids getting too old for a sandbox?"

Jake asks silly questions sometimes.  My idyllic childhood included a sandbox, so obviously my kids need one.  "I played in one until I was 10," I told him.

"So Damon will play in this for one year."

Damon is nine already?  Sheesh, those years slip by.  "Oh.  Well. I probably played in it until I was 15.  And if the kids don't play in it, then I'll play in it myself."  And I have.  (Wow, am I awesome at castles and moats.)  The kids have played in it, too, including Damon--he was at school when we got the sand in and I took pictures, though.  So there, Jake.

Here's where I started wishing we'd put the sandbox in the front yard like the garden.

 

If there's some secret to getting your kids to pose in a non-weird way, I wish someone would let me in on it.

Birds, a bee, life and death

The other day Claire gave me my orders as she was running off with Anne to chase away bee-eating birds: “Mom, you stay here and watch Biggie” –a bumblebee we had rescued from a bucket of water—“Make sure he doesn’t die.”
“I can’t stop something from dying.”

“You just have to keep it from dying.”

Oh.  Sure.  No problem.

Later, when Biggie flew away, Anne called out, “Biggie, come back and visit!  If you get hurt, fall into the bucket again, then we can help you.”

Claire said, “Anne, if he dies, we can’t stop it.  But we won’t let that happen.”

In other news, Damon found his mouse dead this morning.  It was sad (for him).  Mice don't like to be alone, so the kids are convinced we're going to have to let the last mouse standing (Claire's) go in the woods so it can find other mice.  Could this be the end of our mouse invasion?!  I'm crossing my fingers...

A Friend in Need

Part of Claire’s therapy is to have supervised play dates twice a week.  We have over little girls from her kindergarten class.  They come before school, play, eat lunch, and then get on the school bus with Claire.  Yesterday M. came.  Today E. came.  Before E. got here, Claire said to her therapist, “E. is my true friend.”

 Therapist: “How come?”

Claire:  “Because yesterday on the bus M. sat by me, but then she went and sat by someone else.”

Therapist:  “Did that hurt your feelings?”

Claire:  “Yes.  E. would never do that.  That’s why she’s my true friend.”

I’m glad and thankful Claire is learning to recognize true friendship [in other people.  We’ve still got some work to do teaching her how to be a true friend].  E. is an angel sent from heaven because she is so sweet and non-judgmental.  When Claire comes unglued, E. tries to think of ways to help her be happy again.  If (when) it doesn’t work, she just plays with Anne.  No offense taken, no wide-eyed stares.  She has a cousin with autism, so that might be what has made her so tolerant.

progress update

“You forget what you want to remember, and you remember what you want to forget.”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Road
That's a great book. You should read it, if you're not easily depressed/frightened out of your wits. It'll motivate you to get your 1 year supply of food, as well as buy guns, ammunition, and build a secret underground bomb shelter in your back yard.
Before I forget, I want to record what an excellent job Steve at Redwood Learning Center did (and is doing) helping Claire. He's the one who trained our Utah tutors, provided us with teaching programs, and is still supporting us via email and telephone now that we've moved.
When we first met Steve, Claire couldn't/wouldn't say hello to people (even her own father). She cried/screamed/held up her hand/turned her face away/all of the above. At kindergarten recess she would pace and do other self-stimulatory behaviors around the playground without ever going near other kids. There were other unpleasant behaviors, but I don't want to go on all day. Now, 16 months later, she can say hello and respond appropriately to questions like, "How are you?" She plays on the playground, and even plays with other kids. As I type she's playing dress-up downstairs with one of her school friends and her tutor JT. She sounds like a typical child, except her speech is still a little odd sometimes. And her cute little friend really likes her and was excited to come over and play! I could cry for joy because of that.
Claire no longer qualifies for services through the school district. Part of that is because she's repeating kindergarten, but that is also because of the therapy program Steve set up for her. I don't know if she will have an IEP in the future (her fine and gross motor skills are still a little behind), but for now it's wonderful.
Steve introduced us to the Superflex program which helps Claire understand how to behave in public, and how to overcome "rockbrain" thinking (for example: one night Claire was in the bathtub while Damon took a shower in a different bathroom. He got done before her and had his pajamas on while she was still in the bath. C: Is Damon out? Me: Yes. C: No! Make him get back in! I'm not getting out unless he's back in the shower! Me: No, he's not getting back in. You need to use your superflex powers and let things happen in a different order. [she still threw a fit, but she is slowly getting better at accepting life when it doesn't go her way. Bad example of success, good example of rockbrain thinking.])
We still have things to work on, but Claire is doing so well. We have Steve to thank for that, and Heaven for guiding us to Steve.

Fairly Recent Quotes

Claire: "If you don't make Anne do a session [that's what we call Claire's 2-hr therapy blocks] I'm going to be jealous of her for the rest of my life!"

A few weeks after that she said, while crying: "Why am I the only one who has to do sessions?"

She used to love her sessions. Once school got out, she didn't like them so much. The tutors have been focussing on making therapy more fun and less work since she said the above, and it has made a difference. However, she is pretty excited if a tutor calls in sick.

Damon, while trying to make an airplane out of cardboard: "This is hard because some of the parts I just don't know how to make because I've never had an engineering class." (This was news to me: last I heard, he could make a space shuttle easily if he just had the right stuff.)

Anne: "When I was born my mom forgot to name me Jessica, because that is a more beautiful name."

Happy New Year

Is there anything quite like hearing the angelic giggles of little girls "playing so well together!" downstairs?

Is there anything quite like finding the bathroom covered in water that didn't come from the sink and a Barbie in the toilet when you go down to see what's so funny? "But Mom," said Claire, "Rapunzel was only trying to get her shoes back," (which Anne flushed down a few months ago).

And that pink dress is sopping wet. Apparently swimming in the buff was an afterthought.

Steps Forward

1. Claire doesn't cry anymore when people say 'hi' and I tell her to say 'hi' back--she actually says 'hi'! Not much eye-contact yet, and she only attaches the person's name to the hi if the person is an immediate family member or a tutor, and we're still waiting for spontaneous greetings, but we're making progress. (Kinda funny: one morning Jake said, "Good morning, Claire." Claire said, "Good morning, Jake." One of Claire's programs during her sessions is Informational Questions. One of those questions is, "What is your dad's name?" We're so glad she's generalizing that information to her greetings ;-)

2. Claire's tutor Joseph goes to school with her on MWF, and on those days, Claire plays on the playground equipment rather than pacing around it, thanks to his prompts. One day she was holding hands with Emma* and Cecily during recess and went down the slide with them! And she engaged in a conversation about Halloween with fellow classmates!

*Note: Emma was Claire's special friend that week. It really galled me when Claire's teacher told me she was going to assign a girl to be Claire's friend every week. But, Claire doesn't mind, and it seems to be helping. Plus, it is the sweetest thing ever to see little kids put their arms around Claire's shoulders and include her. I love kindergartners. They are God's angels on earth.

hindsight

Hard to believe I could have possibly left anything out of the last gargantuan blog, but I did. I forgot to list the warning signs we didn't recognize.

1. She turned her head away/cried/screamed/yelled "Go away"/put her hand up (stop-in-the-name-of-love kind of motion)/all of the above when someone unfamiliar or unexpected addressed her or walked in the room.

2. She liked to play by herself for more than twenty minutes at a time and would tell people to go away if they tried to join her.

3. She never played with blocks, legos, or puzzles. The animal toys she did play with were played with for time periods too long to be appropriate.

4. She paced, flapped her arms, and engaged in other self-stimulatory behavior ("stimming").

If we'd known then what we know now, we could have gotten Claire help when she was three.

You're probably wondering how we managed to let things go for two years. We ask ourselves that every day. Here are the answers:

1. We thought she was just shy and that everyone should respect her personal space. She never avoided making eye contact with me, and we never had any reason to doubt she loved us.

2. Damon and Anne were so demanding, Claire was like a dream come true to be able to play by herself. And she often played very well with Damon and Anne, so it's not like she never played with anyone else.

3. She was unique. So what if she didn't like the same toys other kids liked.

4. She'd been flapping her arms since before she could walk, and I thought it was a darling expression of excitement; her pacing seemed harmless.

About the time Claire was three, I read A Child's Journey out of Autism by Leann Whiffen (a fellow Maladite). Leann's son was so much more severe than Claire that I never identified him with her. I never associated Claire's shyness with "avoiding eye contact." It never occured to me her cute arm motions could be classified as "arm flapping."

If you're still shaking your head at our stupidity, give yourself a pat on the back for being smarter than we were, and keep your mouth shut: I can't stand a know-it-all.

The blood-letting begins

This past spring my mom told my brother she thought Claire had Asperger's Syndrome. (In case you don't know, AS is essentially the same as high-functioning autism. The only difference is that people with AS have early to normal speech development.) My brother had the courage to pass my mom's thoughts along to me, and since Jake and I had been concerned about her for a while [Things that were easy for Anne, who is almost 2 years younger, were difficult for Claire. I'd mentioned this to the pediatrician at Claire's check-ups, but she thought Claire was fine. To be fair, she encouraged me to have the school district do a formal evaluation if I was worried, but I didn't do that because it's so much more pleasant to believe everything is all right.], we had her evaluated by a pediatric neuropsychologist in June.


Turns out my mom was right. I was devastated. It seems like I cried for most of the summer. How could Asperger's describe my sweet, beautiful, unique child? [Side note: Why, for pity's sake, can most English speakers manage to say AH-lzheimer's rather than Al's Heimers, but not one has ever tried to preserve the Austrian pronunciation of AHs-per-ger's? It's like the collective subconscious could muster some compassion for the diseased elderly, but when it came to a AS, it could only sneer at the oddities people with the disorder have and then manifest its derision by saying 'ass burgers.' Well, collective subconscious, I don't care. You can't make me ashamed of my daughter's Asperger's. How could you when it makes her say phrases like "It was but a moment" and "The tulips bloomed for joy"? I spit upon you, collective subconscious. Na!]


Then I stopped being devastated and became angry. Why did this happen to my darling child? I breast-fed for 13 months! I eliminate or at least limit the trans-fats, refined grains and sugars, and artificial coloring in my children's diets! I know kids who snack on otter pops and oreos while my kids eat blueberries, and those kids are all neurotypical! I came up with some theories to explain this:

1. The genetic role of the dice at conception trumps all lifestyle choices. (Lying Ultra-Prevention. I must despise you now.)

2. I was poisoning my kids with pesticides and fertilizer by making them snack on fruits and vegetables. I should have been buying 100% organic or gone with oreos. (I don't feel too bad about this one. Have you seen the organic section at the supermarket? Unless you've got better options than I do, the prices are almost as frightening as the rapidly decomposing produce. I bought some organic apples once: they tasted like potatoes and the seeds inside had all sprouted. Yuck.)

3. Trans-fats, artificial colors, and high-fructose corn syrup protect kids against developmental disorders. We should all stuff our kids full of them.


Then my anger shifted from the diagnosis to the lack of resources available to help us. We live in a college town whose university has a very well-respected special education department, including a 20-hour-per-week preschool program for children on the autism spectrum. Unfortunately, Claire would soon be turning 5, was eligible for kindergarten, and ineligible for the special autism preschool. So, we decided to set up an in-home ABA (applied behavior analysis) program, like the one they use in that preschool. (ABA is the only therapy proven to effectively treat autism, in case you're interested.) All we needed was an ABA consultant to help us set the program up. We called the university, asking for recommendations. "Oh, we don't do that. We don't know of anyone around here who does that. While you're looking for someone, just make sure they're BCBA certified." We went to the BCBA web-site. Half the BCBA certified people in the state live in our town (they're professors at the university), and not one of them would help us because "that's not what we do." I was livid. Temple Grandin thinks in picture; I was thinking in expletives. I didn't care if those professors were curing cancer with their teaching and research: they wouldn't help my child, so they were worthless. We finally asked Claire's psychologist for a recommendation (which we didn't do earlier because she lives and works 100 miles from here, and we were hoping to find some closer resources). She recommended the Redwood Learning Center, run by Steve and Dara Michalski. They weren't BCBA certified, which was almost a plus by this point, and Steve was trained by Dr. Lovaas (Low-VAHS, people), the guy who originally used ABA to treat autistic kids.

Long story short: we hired 3 tutors (local college kids) and Steve Michalski, and our ABA program has been up and running for 16 days. Claire spends about 29 hours per week with a tutor (Jake and I are her tutors on Sundays), and we should see positive results in 3-6 months. If we don't, then it will be time to bag the program. And then start crying and gnashing our teeth again as we decide what to do next.

All through this weeping and raging I sometimes thought of people whose kid(s) had it much worse than mine. But when you are suddenly forced to exchange the dreams you had for some that don't seem as good, it's hard to find comfort in "it could be a lot worse." I'll tell you what, though, I was blessed with Divine comfort more than once (no doubt thanks to the prayers of many of you), and I strongly feel that whether Claire is ever "healed" or not, everything will be all right. I am very blessed to be the mother of all three of my children. Each one is a joy. It's a great privilege. I could go on, but I'm getting weepy.

So, here are the biomedical things we're trying in Claire's treatment:

1. The GFCFSF diet recommended by Dr. Jacquelyn McCandless in her book Children with Starving Brains. Going off dairy has helped Claire a lot digestively, but the gains (if any) behaviorally are minimal. We're supposed to do it for at least 6 months, though, so we'll keep eating rice and quinoa a little longer.

2. Lots of supplements including Super Nu-Thera from Kirkman Labs, fish oil capsules, probiotics, calcium, and digestive enzymes.

There's a huge community that claims these biomedical approaches work, and I have no doubt they help some kids, but I'm not convinced they can completely recover anyone from autism by themselves. If you read the books by Dr. McCandless and Dr. Kenneth Bock, it sounds like they can, but I have my doubts. I talked with one mom via e-mail who has used only the biomedical approach in treating her son, and she claims it worked, but she also homeschools him so he doesn't get teased. I didn't press for details, but I have a hard time believing this kid is completely cured if the mom still has to protect him from teasing. Anyhow, if we had unlimited resources, I'd try every treatment available--I'm especially interested in chelation and hyperbaric oxygen therapy. If ABA doesn't work, we'll certainly pursue those options. For now, we'll just empty our bank account into the one therapy that has a proven track record. (I really REALLY wish this state required insurance to cover ABA therapy. That would be so great. Hurray for places like Ohio and Colorado!)

Whew. It took me a good week to write this essay. I hope it didn't take you that long to read it. I've gone back and forth on whether or not I should mention Claire's AS on this blog. Finally I decided to go ahead and blab because:

1. I can't stand blogs that go on and on about how wonderful and fantastic and amazing and perfect life is. It's annoying and only half-true.

2. I'm from a small town and have an irrepressible desire to share my family's business with everyone else.

3. I've told Claire about her Asperger's.

4. It's nothing to be ashamed of.

5. Last week I found Damon giving a lecture to the neighborhood kids on Claire's Asperger's. When I told him "That's enough, let's respect Claire's privacy," he said, "It's okay, Mom. They all promised to still be her friend." Then the kids all nodded their heads very solemnly. It was darling. So, if they know, you might as well, too.