You're silly!

Gotta figure out how to put a stop to this "you're silly" business to everyone. Today M. said "you're silly! you look silly!" to a man coming out of the elevator, in a wheelchair, with a messy pony tail, wearing big mirrored sunglasses, a bright purple outfit, and missing both his legs at the thighs. I couldn't see his reaction through his sunglasses, but I didn't even bother trying to explain to him that she says that to everyone, that it's one of her repetitive behaviors. We just ran the other way. Unfortunately, he lives in our building and we'll no doubt be seeing him all the time...

Flintstones vitamins were on sale...

Trying to remember how this hellish Tom & Jerry obsession began and then I remembered, because Flintstones vitamins were on sale. They were in the clearance cart for half price, and much cheaper than our regular brand. So I thought, they have all the same ingredients, so what the hell?

So what the hell???


Well, hell is what I got.

When we got the vitamins home, of course M. wanted to know who the Flintstones are. Realizing kids today have no freaking clue about Fred, Wilma, Barney, Betty, Pebbles, Bam Bam, Dino and elephants who stick their trunks through your window so you can wash dishes--I turned to YouTube for a little Flintstones introduction.

M. was mildly amused for a few clips, until she noticed other fun-looking cartoons in the side bar.

Tom & Jerry.

So I thought, what the hell?


.......


And now I have a kid who talks of nothing but Tom & Jerry, wants to BE Tom, and has to have special rules at school where she can only "be Tom" when outside, and who doesn't want to go anywhere else now, like church, or anywhere else where she cannot be Tom.

So what the hell???

WHY IS NO ONE TALKING TO ME!!!???

is the latest annoying social problem we are experiencing, whenever I try to say anything to anyone, or anyone tries to say something to me. Put that with the "Are you talking about me???" anxiety and you can forget any conversation. Just have a drink.

Only when she's been drinking

After the big haircut today we went to get the promised ice cream, because M. was good while the lady cut a foot off her hair, trimmed bangs, did extensive texturing all over, etc. Without her glasses on I don't think she could see that all of her hair was being cut off. But I don't think she minded. I could have had her head shaved and she wouldn't have cared as long as ice cream was involved.

At the Baskin Robbins two little girls came in behind us and M. immediately pounced on them, getting right into their faces and demanding to know names, why they were there, what kind of ice cream where they getting, etc. 

The two girls were stunned, but handled it well, only backing away slightly.

"Is she always this friendly?" their dad asked me.

I don't remember what I actually said, but it wasn't as good as what I should have said:

"Only when she's been drinking."

Today did not suck

Took M. to my work so she could have a visual of where I am when she's at school. So she introduced herself to all my coworkers, of course, and said her current stereotype "you're silly" to our admin lead which confused the woman a bit since she wasn't doing anything at all, and I didn't preface the visit with any autism labels so she was just momentarily puzzled then hopefully brushed it off... but it could have gone so much worse and I am grateful for a good day, which was pretty long and started with preschool end of the year party at Naydenov gymnastics, then class picnic at a park, then home for a bit, then visiting my work, then another park. The only crying fits today were at the second park when M. bumped her head like she usually does, and then when she was climbing down a jungle gym ladder and a child approached the ladder from the top, which set M. off screaming because one time someone came down the ladder behind her and stepped on her fingers, therefore irrational fear etched in permanent memory.

Michael Jackson is not alive

The song Billy Jean was on the radio and M. seemed to like it so I told her the man singing is Michael Jackson.

"Who he is?" she wanted to know.

I said something like, he's a man who sang lots of songs. And then I added that he's not alive anymore.

"I'm not alive either," M. said.

"Yes, you are," I corrected.

"NO. I'M. NOT!" M. insisted, giving me angry eyebrows.

Then after a pause.

"Mommy, what does alive means?"

Don't say HI

A classmate at preschool said hi to M. as we got to school this morning.

"Um, I don't like that," was M.'s sharp reply.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said the girl.

So my plan for the ways of the typical kids to rub off on M. is failing, as M. is not learning social skills from them at all, but rather is simply enforcing her arbitrary, crazy, mad hatter rules--and they are clearly all conforming!

(and of course it has always been okay for anyone to say goodbye, but NOT "hi.")

Patterns

This morning M. stopped the game she was playing on the iphone to track me down and demand a chocolate muffin, out of the blue. We haven't had chocolate muffins in this house for weeks. But it didn't take me long to figure that since she doesn't play the iphone games as much anymore that perhaps the last time she played that particular game, was probably weeks ago when we had chocolate muffins. And of course, to her, there must be a correlation.

Just like when the neighbor cat who never lets her pet him, did actually let her pet him one day after we came home from gymnastics class, so the next time the cat let her pet him again, M. said, "and now do we go to gymnastics?" Because in her mind of nonsensical patterns, the cat only lets her pet him on gymnastics days, therefore, since she pet the cat it must be a gymnastics day.

The downside of the fun

Of course I love it when we have a good time and laugh, but the downside is that when M. thinks something is funny then I'm doomed to have to repeat it hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times so that what was once a good memory is now something I dread daily!

Leave no trace

Spring cleaning and reorganization projects are hard enough without having to consider the repercussions of an item accidentally left "out of place."

"HEEEeeeeyyyy! MOOMMMmmmmmy! Why did you put that there? That doesn't go there! You're silly! Did you put that there when I was at school? OOHHhhhhh! That is so silly! MOOMMMmmmy!......" and on and on.

And the item in the spotlight is usually just a piece of paper, a stray plastic bag, a dust rag, any mundane object left in a surprising place--like if I get distracted by the phone and forget to put something away while I'm cleaning. An exclamation will be shouted and the above interrogation will follow. 

There's been a lot of cleaning and reorganizing around here now that my friend, the one with all the twins, is coming to visit and stay with us next week. With all their allergies and our collective behavioral problems, this should be interesting.

Storm warning

Saw a good phrase on another autism blog:

severe behavior storm

Good one! I'm going to use that.

The search is over

Perfect job (I hope), perfect location (no commute), perfect hours (within school hours), perfect pay (so I can still keep some of the services M. needs), and it's all mine!

I'm big

"I'm big! I don't need help because I am BIG!" M. told me off as I was taking her to the bathroom at a church event and had tried to steer her around some obstacles. So she really told me, looking over her shoulder at me, as she swaggered along, and I reached out to steer her again, because she was walking straight into a wall.

...

The screaming crying freak out record for gymnastics has been broken. M. made it through a class without crying. All week we discussed self control, and how she can learn to stop herself before she cries, like she learned to stop herself from hitting her teacher at school, like she had been doing (not hitting in anger, but compulsive hitting to say hi, get her attention, etc). And that if she cried again at gymnastics we wouldn't be going back. It's very difficult for her to stop her compulsive behaviors and crying is one of them. The slightest frustration and her reaction is to cry--loudly, wailing, streaming tears, red face, choking, gagging, the works. Two or three times when she wanted the teacher to help but the teacher was busy with another kid, or she couldn't do something just right, she burst out briefly, then looked over at me with sudden fear, and stopped herself. I also helped by making sure she had a no-sugar snack before gymnastics, was dressed in very light clothing (she's easily overheated), and informed the teacher of possible triggers like being touched unexpectedly and feeling crowded.

Sarcasm

Now I know what I've missed about Facebook, all the opportunities to make snarky comments. Good to be back.

Being around M. most of the time makes me have sarcasm withdrawals. She's very literal. The closest I've heard her come to sarcasm was the other day when I was asking her to hold my hand across the street but she had one flower in each hand already. So she said, "I can't hold your hand. I only have two hands. I am not an octopus."

With the right sassy tone that could have been a beautiful sarcastic retort for a 4 year old. But M. really meant just what she said.

She-is-not-an-octopus.

Gymnastics - 4th session, Lesson 1

After 3 sessions of gymnastics, M. is already on track for a perfect record of screaming crying freak-outs in her 4th session. The first two sessions she attended was during her name phobia phase, so she flipped out any time the coach called her name. So that was miserable. For everyone. Then by her 3rd try she was over the name problem, but suddenly decided she was terrified to go upside down on the bars, which meant a lot of screaming crying freak-outs, since the coach pushed her to keep trying. So that was miserable too. For everyone. And now for her 4th try, M. has decided to take offense at being told what to do (which is kinda the coach's job) and to scream, cry, freak out and storm out of the class. So today was miserable also. For everyone.

"But you can't even tell any difference," the woman next to me replied when I told her M. is mildly autistic, which is what EVERYONE says and that's why I hate telling people. But I wanted to offer at least some explanation for M.'s lunatic behavior besides just that she's a bratty, out of control kid.

However, one of the kids in M.'s class could sure tell, though she didn't say anything. But I knew she knew something was off, the way she stood quietly beside me, looking up at me with wide curious eyes, then at M. (still crying and wailing), then back up at me to see my reaction, with the kind of searching eye contact I am not used to from my own kid. That right there is the difference.

Dog-gone

The sleepover only distracted M. from having to give our dog away for so long. Every few minutes she forgets and asks me to let him in, then we have to have the talk all over again that involves layers of reasoning behind the decision to give him away to some friends. The reasons are mostly financial, as well as less time at home to take care of a dog now that I just got hired at a job. M. mostly doesn't understand the financial reasons since she solves it by telling me to "just go buy some more money." What she understood the most was when I told her I don't think our dog liked it when she closed him in her room with them together and she would be loud and do things that scared him simply because it was fun for her and no regard to all the times I told her he doesn't like it. She said, "He didn't like it so he wanted to leave. " I almost told her that wasn't true, then decided maybe it's time for a lesson in consequences and how people don't want to be around us if we treat them badly. She wasn't cruel to him, but just way too exuberant and really annoying the hell out of him. I know he'll be happier where he is now with typically developing children who can understand how to treat animals. Happy trails Bentley! (from here forth to be called Bento by his new Japanese family--and no, even though that means box lunch in Japan, they do not plan to eat him)

Couscous

It's autism awareness month, and coincidentally we were discharged from our occupational therapy today. Although it kind of sucks to lose support services, it's not the end of the world, I suppose. Our issues fall largely in the area of gray right now, now that we've made progress with the major issue which was food texture sensory/anxiety problems. Now we are trying a lot of new foods without freaking out first, without examining it with suspicion first, etc. Not necessarily liking all of it, but at least trying. And then not gagging and pulling our tongue out if we don't like it.

Couscous (plain w/ added garlic powder)
Raisins
Rice a Roni (with noticeable parsley)
Chicken curry and rice
Motts granny smith applesauce
Carrot cake
Taco Bell mild sauce
Rice cake
Lasagna (we're talking layers of texture here!)

Out of that line up, the applesauce, the hot sauce, and the couscous are probably the only keepers, but it's at least something besides just goldfish crackers. And we haven't needed the Miralax in a month or more.

* I now have a habit of speaking in the first person collective sense, saying "we" when I mean "she" and such, because of the ongoing "Are you talking about me?" paranoia. It's almost as annoying as the 18 months when I couldn't use her name out loud.

"I don't like to pray!"

At church this morning M.'s bff was out sick and the teachers tried to soothe her by suggesting she make a 'get well' card and pray for her friend, to which M. announced, "I don't like to pray!"

Okay then...

But today I guess she not only did not pray but didn't make a get well card either because all she brought home was a paper plate with streamers attached that says "Sing Praises To The Lord."

M. asked me what it says, so I read it. She repeated slowly, "Sing. praises. to. the. lord."

Then asked, "What does 'lord' means?'

I told her, "Lord means God."

She said it to herself but without a shred of understanding. And that's fine. For a black and white, concrete mind that doesn't understand concepts, God is just a word. Praying is even more vague and unsettling to her I'm sure.

So she doesn't like praying, that's okay. It's still better than last Easter when she announced to everyone as we were leaving church, "Mommy, I don't like Jesus!"