Could Palin be good for Special Needs Children?

I’m voting for Obama. That’s not up for debate. I think Biden was a great choice for his side kick. I am voting for Obama.  So, nothing I say here should put that in doubt.

Like most Americans I know very little about Sarah Palin. I can’t remember seeing her photo or mention of her name until she was unveiled in a mostly empty auditorium last week. I don’t think that she has put in enough time to take over as leader of the free world if McCain keels over. I don’t think that her decision to carry a child with Downs Syndrome to term qualifies her any more than it qualifies my friend X who did the same thing. I wholeheartedly believe that both women made the right choice but, it doesn’t end there.

I do wonder if having the mother of a child with disabilities as the Nation’s second in command might benefit our children. (Let’s not get into whether or not Autism is a disability. What matters is that our children do need extra help as do children with Downs.)  So, would Palin help us? Is she interested in education? Healthcare? Social Security?  I’m interested to hear what she has to say on this matter.  Would she be an asset for our children or will she take the path that so many Republicans take? Make sure they are born but don’t help them after that.

My Dad says he is pro-all-of-life. He includes quality of life in his explanation– it’s not just about being alive but in having a happy life and being a contribution to society. It includes understanding and having a relationship with God.

So, this woman who obviously is pro-life, is she pro-all-of-life or just Anti-Abortion? I’ll be watching to see what she has to say. (But, I’m still voting for Obama!)

3 Ways to Put Money in Your Pocket– From Home with No Investment

1. Gather up your books– the ones in good shape– and go to www.cash4books.net then type in your ISBNs and they’ll tell you how much they’ll give you for them.  You can print out the prepaid shipping label and all you have to do is box it up and drop it off.  They’ll send you a check or deposit the money into your PayPal account. I sold 6 books for $23. They turned down a bunch of books and there were a few that were selling for so little that I figured I’d get more than that in a yardsale and it didn’t seem worth the effort.

*** Check this out*** Brandon sent a comment about http://bookscouter.com/ comparing book buyers to get you the better deal– check it out! I ran a few of the books that www.cash4books.net turned down and was able to find buyers. I didn’t go through the whole process so I’m not sure how user friendly it is but at first glance it looks really great.  Please let me know your experiences.

2. Become a Fashion Designer– go to www.cafepress.com and set up shop with your own designs– no sewing, no shipping, no nothin’. All you have to do is upload the image, select the items you want it on and maybe do a little tweaking.  They sell it, ship it and even do some marketing then send you a commission check.   Many of the designs are fancy fonts and do-able by anyone with MS Office.  (You can have either a simple free shop with one design — or many free shops– or pay about $7.00 for a premium shop with multiple designs.  Check out my shop at http://www.cafepress.com/bullfeathers we just got a check for $62.

3. PURGE.  Clean out your basement, attic, garage, kid’s room, your closet and have a garage sale or become an Ebay Seller. (Be careful on ebay! Look for tricks of the trade on-line before you post and make sure that you are very clear about what you will or will not do… being too easy to get along with might get you in trouble…) On the plus side– I made $2,000 in three months just by cleaning my house.

Please share your ideas and experiences– Have you tried any of these? others?  How did it work for you? Advice? Words of caution?

More on Changing Schools

I’ve started putting a binder together for my son’s new educational/therapy team– am including IEPs (to indicate progression) as well as report cards and progress reports, notes home from his teacher… all the things that will make the transition easier for my son– and, more immediately effective for his team.

Start identifying, in list form, the supports that work for your child:

What structure is provided at home and school? 

How does he communicate likes, dislikes, preferences?

Are there certain verbal prompts/cues you use with him at home and/or at school?

Identify his strengths, preferences.  

Does he have a behavior chain…in other words when he starts stressing or getting upset are there subtle cues/behaviors (such as wringing his hands, then pacing, etc).

Does he have a behavioral intervention plan?

What are his triggers? (Too loud, too fast, too… you know your child– what sets him off?)

Having all of this written out will help when you attempt to transition him to another school.

Ask your child’s teacher if you can have the tools that work for him– my son has a behavior wheel– He looses a green piece when he acts out, when all four are gone, it’s on to red… Red days are really bad! (No TV at home, no video games… only books are allowed and early to bed.)

The more proactive you can be the better for him– and, the better the move!

Dr. Dirt and Dr. Death

I have two brothers: one is a soil scientist the other an infant mortality specialist with the CDC. So, it’s no huge leap that we refer to them- lovingly- as Dr. Dirt and Dr. Death.

They are so different and yet growing up they were best friends… as younger adults they took long motorcycle trips across the country sleeping under the stars and eating spam or tortillias. They are extreemely proud that they have swum across the border to Mexico… they made up songs about needing to have a “butt pad like a baboon” and they really enjoyed eachother’s company.

Then, the women in their lives started interfering in their relationship and now they only speak when there is a reason. They only see eachother when there is a reason. Those women are now gone but the closeness hasn’t returned.

They raise their children very differently. Dr. Dirt is much more like me– “I’m the parent that’s why!” Where as Dr. Death is of the school that allows their children to run the show.  That’s caused problems between them… and child rearing has caused issues with the rest of the family as well.

Dr. Dirt is my friend. He’s the guy I call to chit chat. He’s the one I call for advice on everything from gardening to computers. Dr. Death annoys me– I’ll just leave it at that.

My brothers are good men. They were raised in the same household by the same parents within three years of eachother. They are very different. I love them both.

Interviewing a new School for our son with Autism

I have scoured the Internet and can’t find a set of questions to ask or how to evaluate a good school for a child with Autism so, I’m putting one together.

We are considering a move. Not because we aren’t thrilled with the school J is in now but for a new job.  There are a couple of options and the school will be the deciding factor. So, how do we figure out which option has the best school? What do we ask? What do the school “report cards” really mean?

I’m beginning the process and hope to have a good set of questions together pretty soon — in the next couple of weeks– and will share the whole thing with you then. In the meantime this is what my mother in law who is a retired Elementary teacher and Principal had to say:

I called my friend, Barbara.  She was a supervisor for the Special Education programs in VCSC.  She is someone I trust to give me the correct information.  While she is retired now, she still works with SMWC student teachers in the schools.

These are some of the questions and suggestions she made:

1. What kind of special education services are available?
2. How are categorical labels identified in your schools systems and by your state?
3. Do you have staff that can provide Speech, OT, and PT services that provide functional life skills and direction?
4. Is Integrated Therapy done with speech in the classroom as a whole, or in a small group, or in a social group for learning pragmatic speaking skills?
5. How is staff development done in accordance with IDEA?  Do other staff members understand autism and how to integrate such a student into the general education classroom?

 

Then she also suggested these:

1. Push to have a multi-disciplinary psychological evaluation that includes speech and OT and or PT requirements.  Usually these are done every three years but you may also request one.  (My thinking is that he is due for a re-evaluation this year if the only one that has been done was in preschool.)
2. Have a very clear I.E.P.to take with you!!  For example it should say that Jay will write his spelling words on the computer maybe 3 times rather than 10.  Write in the IEP that he needs extra time to process information if that is a requirement, etc. Make sure the I.E.P. is very specific to meet his needs.  (I will re-read his IEP to see if I think it needs to be tweaked.)
3. She said to go to this website: autism speaks   Barb wasn’t sure if it was .com or .net or .org but type that into your Goggle and it should come up.
4. Barb also suggested a fiction book written by an English man who worked with autistic child who wanted to write a book.  She says it gives great insight into how an autistic person “sees” things.  It is by Mark Haddon and is called the curious incident of the dog in the nighttime.  The title is written in lower case.
5. Barb also quoted another autistic author as saying, “I can look you in the face or I can listen to your words but I cannot do both.”  Barb says that facial features are difficult for the autistic person to understand where they understand perfectly that a dog wagging its tail means it is happy or a bark may mean let me outside because facial expressions do not have to be interpreted. 

 (I started reading the curious incident of the dog in the nightime and couldn’t get through it… when the kid lands in jail and actually likes the quite, stark setting I walked away from it… My sister said it was great. It’s written by an autistic young man so it’s through the eyes of autism.)

If you have tips or questions that should be asked of educators or therapists in order to find the best please comment.  I need help! Thanks!

Doing For Vs. Doing With

I’ve learned an important lesson this week: Doing something for my son is not the same as doing something with him. Frankly, it doesn’t even come close!

My time is spent doing things for my family– growing my garden, re-doing the playroom, organizing schedules, making meals, cleaning, washing and shopping… but, what really matters is the time I spend doing things with them…

Yesterday it was hot. J was planted in front of the TV, my husband was at his computer, I was playing hearts. We all hibernated into our own personal spaces and were wasting the day. I’m not sure why I did it but all of a sudden I rallied the troops: “Put on your swimming shorts– we’re going to play!” And, off we were to the kiddie pool on the deck. It was raucous, loud and we wasted a lot of water. But we were together.

People talk about families having dinner together as a great opportunity to talk. It is… but, frankly at our house that’s work. We prod and pry and push to get J to tell us what he thinks, wants, did… He’s always in a hurry to get away from the table and it’s just not quality family time so we don’t do it very often.  Playing is what works for us.  The trampoline, the kiddie pool or a good pillow fight are the best family times we have.  J ends up making some great sentences and there isn’t the “work” that’s involved in dinner conversation. Maybe the success of crazy play time has to do with his need for deep pressure. J’s autism seems to melt away during physical play.  He doesn’t care for organized sports but dutifully hollers “Go Purdue!” when prompted.  He doesn’t stick with games despite my efforts to get him to play to the end. But he can’t get enough of crazy, disorganized raucous playtime.

It’s important to do things for my family. It’s good for all of us that I’m growing a garden and that there is food in the house, clean clothes to wear and the playroom renewal project is a good thing but J won’t remember what color the walls are or what white food I bought in a particular month.  He will remember whether I spent time with him. I guess that’s all that really matters.

 

 

Evil Step-Mothers

Let me start off by saying that I don’t have a step-mother. My mom is alive and well and we had lunch together today.  My best friend since college (that’s almost two decades of huge phone bills) has an evil step-mother.  This woman is nasty.  She has managed to turn my friend (Chola) into a pariah within her family… she yelled at her at Disney World! How much worse can you get?

Let me back up a little. Chola’s mother passed away suddenly from complications after a minor surgery.  Mom Jones was a wonderful woman! She checked in on me from time to time just because I was Chola’s friend. She cried with me when I found out that J has autism. She was a surrogate mother when my own mom was overseas for most of the last 20 years.  I miss her and her daughter really misses her. 

Dad Jones is from that generation (or is it just a culture?) that expects men to be taken care of my the women in their lives… first his mother, then his wife.  So, when Mom Jones died he went lookin’ for a new caretaker within a couple of months.  So, he marries this woman who he really doesn’t know and who turns out to have lied to him up one side and down the other and pretty much cuts Chola out of the picture because Becky the queen B#@*! doesn’t like her. Ok. I’m over simplyfying but the whole thing was just so immature that it’s barely worth remembering let alone writing down. 

Chola has resigned herself to having a very superficial relationship with her father… she is resigned to her own daughter not having real grandparents… She is coming to my family reunion this year and I know her daughter will be spoiled and loved on and treated like one of our own by the whole clan.

Here is an article that Chola sent me with this note “I can’t tell you how many times I wish she’d go away or get hers but even when she does … it doesn’t change anything does it?”  http://www.teresastrasser.com/pages/syndicated_column_63.html

I pray that my Mom lives forever…

Pop Tarts and Social Skills: Foodie Tales from the Land of Autism

Knock. Knock.

Who’s there?

Ivan.

Ivan Who?

Ivan working on the railroad!

Pop Tarts are a main staple for J. His class has breakfast together every morning and try as I might to change his menu we always end up with Pop Tarts… They have Pop Tarts with jokes and trivia questions now– what a great social interaction tool for my little guy!  Every morning he tells a new joke and gets the desired response so he brings back the jokes from previous days and his classmates.

J likes white food– almost exclusively. He likes yogurt but it has to be the Trix brand. He likes string cheese but won’t even try other white cheeses… it’s a challenge.

A couple of weeks ago he stayed over with my parents and asked for spaghetti with butter. We don’t know where he got that idea since it’s not something we eat at home. My mom decided to make pancakes instead since he will always eat those but I tried spaghetti and butter a few days later and the response was a very adamant “I’d rather die!” (I choked back the laughter as best as I could…) ”Great sentence but I don’t think it’ll kill you!”)

Anything can be used to benefit social and verbal skills if you look for it… so, I’d rather J not be hooked on sugar with white flour but, at least they give him a jumping off point for a social interaction.

Another Follow-Up on Daytrana

Apparently the Academy of Pediatrics and Cardiology people are having a little tussle over whether kids on stimulants like Daytrana should have an EKG. Peds say no– Cards say yes.  Our Pediatrician says yes; Better safe than sorry. So we went in for an EKG earlier this week.

We went armed with a bag of books and the Leapster– amazingly I hadn’t even finished filling out the cardio questionnaire when we were called (I love this Dr.’s office– and the Dr.!) and went through the normal motions height: 45.5, weight: 45.5 (My kid is symmetrical!)

The three of us– J, Dr. K and I– talked about the benefits of Daytrana we were experiencing and  J’s skin irritation.  Dr. K said that Olive Oil will help with the skin irritation. We haven’t tried this yet because J likes the “blue lotion” (Bath and Body after sun with lidocaine) so I can’t say based of personal experience if it works.  I trust Dr. K with my kid and if he says it works it does.

Anyway– the EKG was no big deal (although the nurse had no sense of humor…) She put a bunch of stickers all over him and attached cables. (“I’m an Alien!”) He laid really still and she got the few seconds she need without any drama.  I showed him the printout of his heart going Ka-Thump, Ka-Thump and we decided that was pretty cool.

Dr. K said he’d call only if there was a problem but J didn’t show any signs of having issues.  YEAH!!

Our next stop was the library where he announced to Ms. Joyce the children’s librarian that he was an alien and just had a “Eeky.” She gave him a sticker.

Yard Sale Philosophy

I’ve been on a real purging kick for the last six months… it’s amazing that I still have enough for a yard sale considering how much I’ve sold on EBay and given away.  We moved from a monstrous Victorian to a reasonable (cleanable in 1 afternoon) Tudor and there are still a lot of boxes unopened in basement and attic.  I’m tempted to just price the boxes and sell them as a mystery item… that would sure be easier and I wouldn’t be tempted to keep any of these things that I haven’t used in three years!

But no. I’m going through each box and pricing the different items… probably will get more for it that way but, my “keep” pile is growing… Maybe that stuff will go in next year’s yard sale…

I’m amazed at how much I’ve held on to– scraps of fabric, maps I picked up in my travels, a box full of pencils, pens and rubber bands, movies we haven’t watched in years– and computer cables in triplicate for each computer we own. It’s bizarre… I didn’t grow up in the depression like my grandparents and I’m just now getting into reducing my footprint on the earth so why haven’t I gotten rid of this stuff before now?

Growing up making international moves I have one box of my treasures from childhood but, I have a box for each year of my son’s life… maybe I’m over compensating.  Will my autistic son care that I’ve saved these things for him? Do I need these things to remember in addition to the many boxes and discs of photos? Apart from photos, my parents have one shoebox for each of their children– that seems more reasonable than what I’m doing. Oh well…

I have become a conscientious consumer. What we need we buy. What we want we consider whether we’ll still want it next week… month… year. We consider where it will go and, frankly if we’d be able to get rid of it when we are done. Is it cheaper to buy or rent a movie? Will it be on cable in a few months? Will it re-sell on EBay for a good percentage of what we paid for it when we’ve seen it a couple of times?

Yard Sales don’t usually make a person philosophical but, when reducing consuption is a concern/priority even a yard sale makes you think…