Back to Basics

How easily you forget how things used to be. You think you have it hard until you realize how hard it actually was. That is me...today! Bubba has been off his medication for 17 hours now, and all the symptoms I forgot existed are slowly creeping back in. (To our credit... Evander and I are not testing out some cruel experiment, but Bubba must be off his medication for 7 days in order to have accurate allergy testing performed on Tuesday.)

Last night, after removing his normal dose, I said casually, "It isn't that bad. He acts like this anyway!" By 9:00 am I was on the phone with Our Children's House begging for an occupational therapy appointment. He was, and is, literally bouncing off the walls. He is banging his head on the wall, eating cardboard, and screaming in the highest pitch my ears have ever heard. In a way, I wish I had my pediatrician's home number because I know she would be fascinated by the immediate return of certain behaviors but not others.

For instance, while he is climbing on top of our headboard and free falling onto the bed, he is completely verbal. As he fills his mouth so full of turkey he looks like a squirrel hoarding food for the winter, he is sitting quietly, making sure to use his napkin. After he spins in circles for minutes at a time, he politely asks to watch his favorite show. Why do some behaviors return and others do not? What tells his brain to flap his hands and use his words?

I'm not so sure why but I do know that we have returned to basics. after coming home from therapy I scooped Bubba up and slammed him on the bed over and over and over again. He was then rolled up like a taco and tickled. Next was wrestling and jumping. To many this may sound like child abuse, but to those who know, it is sensory therapy. His senses are overloaded with the sights, sounds, and smells around him. He needs the hard impact play to feel and understand where he is in space.

Autism spectrum disorders are immensely fascinating to me, and, if I had the time, I would love to study all about them. Why does it pick some children and leave others healthy? Why are some children severe and others lightly touched? The answers to these questions I may never know, but I do know that we are one of the lucky ones. He is verbal and relatively independent. He is incredibly intelligent and full of energy.