In So Many Words

I met a new blogger this week. I mean, I met a blogger I haven’t known before now; she’s not really a “new” blogger. She actually popped over from the Mom Blog Network, which just goes to show you it was worth signing up with all the social media sites I have over the last year and a half.

Anyway, Shawnda’s blog is called Asperger’s Syndrome Awareness, and she is also writing a book about her experiences raising her son, who is 13 and has a diagnosis of Asperger’s. Pretty cool!

I was reading some of her posts and was intrigued by her thoughts on Least Restrictive Environment and whether the way it’s put into practice is really the best thing for some of our kids. I’d love to hear your thoughts on what she has to say about it. Do you think, like Shawnda does, that it’s often really code for spending the least money possible?

For those of you who live locally, I wanted to let you know about a special night devoted to Autism Awareness by the Harrisburg Senators (for you non-Harrisburg area residents, that’s our local baseball team).

This event will take place on Saturday, July 25th at Metro Bank Park on City Island, with the gates opening at 5:30 pm and the game scheduled to begin at 7:00 pm. The team will be wearing specially designed puzzle piece baseball caps which will be auctioned off with the proceeds benefiting the Greater Harrisburg Area Chapter of the Autism Society of America.

Keystone Autism Services has joined with the ASA to support this event and will be there providing information on autism and on the various supports and services available to individuals. KAS has recently launched an amazing pilot program to provide support services to adults on the autism spectrum, called the Adult Community Autism Program. I’ll share more on this later, as it is an incredible step forward for the state of Pennsylvania and for the adults in our region who are living with autism.

In addition to promoting awareness for autism, there will also be a family picnic and wiffle ball game before the Senators play and the opportunity for the kids and siblings to run the bases after the game! Food can be brought into the park for children on special diets as well. More information and registration info is available at autismharrisburg.org.

This poem was sent out via AutismLink and was written by Cindy Waeltermann, who is the founder of that organization. It is reprinted here with her permission.

Autism Night Before Christmas
by Cindy Waeltermann

Twas the Night Before Christmas
And all through the house
The creatures were stirring
Yes, even the mouse

We tried melatonin
And gave a hot bath
But the holiday jitters
They always distract

The children were finally
All nestled in bed
When nightmares of terror
Ran through my OWN head

Did I get the right gift
The right color
And style
Would there be a tantrum
Or even, maybe, a smile?

Our relatives come
But they don’t understand
The pleasure he gets
Just from flapping his hands.

“He needs discipline,” they say
“Just a well-needed smack,
You must learn to parent…”
And on goes the attack

We smile and nod
Because we know deep inside
The argument is moot
Let them all take a side

We know what it’s like
To live with the spectrum
The struggles and triumphs
Achievements, regressions…

But what they don’t know
And what they don’t see
Is the joy that we feel
Over simplicity

He said “hello”
He ate something green!
He told his first lie!
He did not cause a scene!

He peed on the potty
Who cares if he’s ten,
He stopped saying the same thing
Again and again!

Others don’t realize
Just how we can cope
How we bravely hang on
At the end of our rope

But what they don’t see
Is the joy we can’t hide
When our children with autism
Make the tiniest stride

We may look at others
Without the problems we face
With jealousy, hatred
Or even distaste,

But what they don’t know
Nor sometimes do we
Is that children with autism
Bring simplicity.

We don’t get excited
Over expensive things
We jump for joy
With the progress work brings

Children with autism
Try hard every day
That they make us proud
More than words can say.

They work even harder
Than you or I
To achieve something small
To reach a star in the sky

So to those who don’t get it
Or can’t get a clue
Take a walk in my shoes
And I’ll assure you

That even 10 minutes
Into the walk
You’ll look at me
With respect, even shock.

You will realize
What it is I go through
And the next time you judge
I can assure you

That you won’t say a thing
You’ll be quiet and learn,
Like the years that I did
When the tables were turned…….

Merry Christmas Eve, Everyone! I hope that each of you will be blessed with joy during this holiday season.

I had so much fun Tuesday on Autism Twitter Day, even though I wasn’t able to really participate until after my little guy was in bed. This was the first time I had followed a hashtag conversation (it was #asd), so that was a new experience as well.

PF Anderson of Emerging Technologies Librarian wrote about it and put together a slideshow with some highlights. I even won a prize – I’ll definitely post about it after we try them out!

The best part about the day for me was the opportunity to connect with so many other individuals, parents and professionals whose lives are impacted by autism. I followed everybody I could from the RSVP page although I haven’t had a chance to check out their blogs/sites yet.

Huge thank yous and kudos to Bonnie Sayers from Autism Family Adventures for creating and masterminding this awesome event!

For those of you who took part, what did you think about Autism Twitter Day? And if you’re visiting me from Twitter, please leave me a comment so I can return the visit!

Bonnie Sayers at Autism Family Adventures is putting together an Autism Twitter Day on Tuesday, December 16th. This will be a day for people on Twitter who are affected by autism to promote positive autism awareness through tweeting and sharing links to your experiences, autism information, and things that have helped you.

You can find more details and RSVP for Autism Twitter Day here. Just be sure to put your Twitter URL on the Mr. Linky and not your blog.

Anyone can participate by following the #ASD hashtag at www.summize.com. There will also be three panel discussions and opportunities to win prizes throughout the day. See you there!

Hope everybody is ready for Thanksgiving! We are blessed with a family that is large enough not to be able to celebrate at our house (how’s that for being thankful for a small home!), so we will be traveling to State College tomorrow for our holiday.

Today while the TSS is here, I am going to get our Christmas decorations down from the attic so they are ready to go this weekend. I can’t really do it while I am alone with Michael because I can’t trust him not to follow me up the ladder into the attic, so this should work out well.

Here’s a few fun links for your Wednesday morning – hope you enjoy!

HE’S A POET!

Donna at Amazed By His Grace has shared her son Jonathan’s poem that was published in the first issue of GLIMPSE, a new publication from ICDL. His poem, I Love Butterflies, is very good (see page 12), and I also really liked Please Listen To My Heart by Roy Bedward on page 16.

MAKE IT FROM SCRATCH

So, I mentioned the other day that I was Twittering again. Well, I saw a Tweet from @feelslikehome asking for posts on homemade items to feature in a carnival she was hosting. I sent over my Macaroni and Cheese recipe, and she included it!

Check out all the great recipes, craft ideas, and other homemade tips in the Make It From Scratch Carnival #91. What’s really funny about this whole internet/blogging thing is she lives in my town but I don’t know her.

MORE TWITTER FUN

Also on the Twitter front, Bonnie at Autism Family Adventures is planning Autism Twitter Day to promote positive autism awareness. Visit her to find out more details.

TRAVEL TIPS

If you’re getting ready to travel with young children or children who have special needs, take a look at these Travel Tips from Danette at Everyday Adventures. You’ll be glad you did!

Picture courtesy of Hammer51012

I cannot begin to express the sadness I feel for this little boy who was emotionally abused and humiliated by his kindergarten teacher when she brought him in front of the class and had each of the students tell him what they didn’t like about him and then made them vote Survivor-style on whether to keep him in the class (he was voted out).

For those of you who are not already familiar with the story, you can read more about the original incident here. A follow up article posted today reports that the teacher has been removed from classroom duties until a decision is made by the school district on how to deal with her.

Bev at Asperger Square 8 has all the information to write to the appropriate school personnel, and Autistic Nation has provided form letters which can be modified to make a more personal statement.

One of the things that Alex has been repeating over and over since the event is, “I’m not special.” Barbara at Mommy Life has organized a card campaign and is asking everyone to have their children make cards and send them to Alex to let him know that he IS special. Cards can be sent to her and she will forward them all to Alex’s mother. Here is the address:

Alex is Special

c/o Barbara Curtis
15648 Britenbush Ct.
Waterford, VA 20197

Let’s all join together to show this little boy how special he really is. Thank you!

If you stopped by here in April, you are probably aware that I participated in Blogging for Autism Awareness during that month as part of a campaign organized by Genevieve Hinson. Towards the end of April, she was approached with an opportunity to keep the awareness going; BlogNetNews wanted to create an autism section on their site to provide ongoing exposure. They will also be donating some ad space to raise money for autism – more details to follow as this gets finalized.

I stopped by their site today and saw that the Autism section is now up and running at blognetnews.com/Autism. Each post shows an intro and can be shared or rated right from the feed. Clicking on the blog title will take you to a page showing all the posts from that blog; here’s what my blog feed looks like. And if a reader clicks on the post title or the ellipsis after the intro, they will be taken directly to that post on the individual blog.

You can even search the entire Autism section right from my blog – I have placed a search box in my sidebar that will return a list of all the posts from the Autism feed that contain your search term. Try it out! (Updated to add: This search function is no longer available on my blog.)

Blogging for autism awareness? Join us.

Thank you to Genevieve Hinson for organizing and encouraging the Bloggers Blogging for Autism Awareness this past month. I personally have enjoyed the opportunity to meet and learn from a variety of parents, professionals, and people on the autism spectrum. The many different experiences and perceptions shared show that the oft-repeated quote still hold true:

If you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve met one person with autism.

My general posts on autism awareness can be found here, and the complete list of my Autism Resources posts can be found here. While I will still continue to post about autism, of course, it won’t be with quite the same frequency, I’m sure. Thank you to all who have been following along with me and the other bloggers; I hope you will stick around so we can continue the conversation. Blessings!

Note: Although I will be taking the Autism Awareness blogroll down from my sidebar, I am leaving it here so that you can still visit them as you have a chance.

Blogging for autism awareness? Join us.

I have been thinking a lot about posting during April for Autism Awareness Month. There are so many different aspects of the disorder to consider, from early signs to therapies and treatments, plus all the family and societal issues you deal with, and the thought of trying to convey all of that to the world is pretty overwhelming (not unlike how I felt after getting the diagnosis).

When I am confronted with a problem, my first instinct is to start reading about it – online, in books, through message boards, anywhere and everywhere I can. I am (overly?) detail-oriented, however, and could not even begin to share the information I have gained in a succinct manner. So, inspired by Martie at Hitting the High Notes‘ idea of posting a daily tip about autism, I am going to post each day about the best resources I have found in a particular area of interest.

In between, I will still post about my regular topics and possibly some thoughts about autism, but I am not going to try to become the source of all knowledge for things autistic! In fact, I am hoping to learn a lot from the other Bloggers for Autism Awareness over the next few weeks.