The Continuing Adventures of Josh the Incredible

When it comes to Josh and autism, I'm finding that things tend to change when I least expect it.  I don't exactly know what 'typical' childhood development looks like, but on a graph I imagine it to look something like this:

And here is what I think development looks like for a kid with autism (getting the assistance that s/he needs):

There are a lots of peak and valleys in that graph, but the overall trend is moving upward and that is the direction Josh is going.  We hit a low right before Christmas with the move and stress of everything changing.  Now we're in an upward swing, with Josh making leaps and bounds in helpfulness and empathy.

I call him my little Cinder-fella because he is really helping me out around the house.  He loves bubbles, so we fill the sink full of dishes with soapy water and let him splash around.  Maybe only a spoon or two actually gets clean, but he sure gets a kick out of it.  Josh will also load the dryer with wet clothes that I hand to him from the washer.  He loves it when I lift him up to push the button that starts the dryer, so he know that to get to that point, he has to load it first, get a dryer sheet and then close the door.  Having a child dependent on routines works out once and a while.  I might never have to bend over for laundry again.  He'll get the laundry out of the dryer for me, but that takes more persuasion since it doesn't come with the reward of pushing a button at the end.  Josh also loves using the hand vacuum.  A little too much, as I found him picking a piece of Styrofoam packing into itty bitty little pieces the other day so that he'd have something to suck up.

Empathy is something I've decided lately to work on with Josh,

and I think it's helping the screaming situation.  Not solved, but I do think it's better than it was a month ago.  When Ben begins to cry I try to cut Josh off before he starts by asking him why Ben is sad.  Of course, if it's because big brother has a) stolen a toy from him, b) knocked him over, c) both 'a' and 'b' then there isn't much I can do, but I ask Josh if it's because Ben is hungry, or sleepy.  Then I will ask Josh to take Ben a cup of milk, or a snack, or bring his blankey.  It doesn't always work, but it is getting into his head.  The other day Ben was crying and Josh found his sippy and was trying to force it into Ben's mouth.  It only made Ben cry harder, which frustrated the heck out of Josh because what worked the last time didn't work this time.  But the gesture was totally unprompted by me, so Josh is thinking about Ben's needs.

We've also been trying to teach Josh how to say sorry when he's done something hurtful.  I didn't think he was getting it at all because after we'd been working on it for two weeks, he was going around saying "I'm sorry" randomly and for every situation.  Yet just the other day, Josh accidentally smacked me in the face and when I purposefully over exaggerated that it hurt, he came up to me and said "I sorry" and hugged me.  Again, I didn't have to prompt him.

In reading about autism I keep finding that one of the difficulties for adults with ASD is that they have a hard time reading cues from their human environment.  An example is if all of a sudden a speaker comes into the auditorium and all the chatter dies down, an ASD person might still be talking in a loud voice.  Or they can't read the social cues that the other person finds the conversation boring or offensive.  There are times and places for saying what's on your mind and there are times and places for knowing that it isn't appropriate to say whatever is on your mind.

Of all my desires, I hope to raise a child that can function in society and not be ostracized due to social awkwardness.  So it's my thinking that by starting now with the blatantly obvious (Ben is screaming for a reason, not just for the fun of it, Josh) and "Oh, owie owie, ouch, Josh, you ran over my foot with your car" then we're setting the stage for reading voice and facial cues that will help him develop empathy and social awareness.

And I think that's going to prepare him for school just as much as his ABC's and knowing how to hold a pencil.