Example of everyday life… Nicholas’s 2nd birthday party was a disaster.  Sensory overload for him.  Too many people in the house, too much noise – he spent the day in his room, by himself.  We tried to sing happy birthday, but that ended up with him tantruming all over the floor.

Between 2 and 2 ½, this was the peak of the worst he had ever been – and I didn’t see it until he was different, better.  If you played on his terms, everything was cool.  Change the plan and chaos ensued.  He still had no interest in pointing, waving, other kids, answering to his name.  He uttered a word here and there, but the only noises coming out of him were grunting, screaming and crying.

In hindsight, I started acting like a robot, so to speak, wherever we were, looking for things he would get interested in, couldn’t have – so I had to be pro-active and steer clear or set up an environment that would keep him happy.  You don’t even realize when you’re doing it.  If we went into a restaurant and had a teenaged waiter – I knew instantly that this was going to be a waste of time – getting me fries as quick as possible meant nothing to him – he has no experience with kids to know that me asking him to bring them asap meant for him to hop to it and bring them out NOW so that I could enjoy a quick meal before Nicholas was bored with all of his toys and wanted out of the seat to run around.

I felt like I had no reason to exist other than to say, ‘nicholas, no, Nicholas, stop”  – to which he never listened anyway.  So everything that started with that phrase ended in me carrying him out to the car anyway I could keep hold of him while he was thrashing around.  No one ever told me that this was not normal.

Something changed from 2.5 to 3 years old.  I’m getting my child back.  The differences in him are astounding.  Now that we see who he “is” – we are stunned at who he “was” – now I see the issues, now I see the signs.   I’ll explain in more detail what we did and how we did it in another post.

At 2.5, Nicholas was finally evaluated by Early Intervention.  The evaluators suggested a developmental pediatrician and told us him getting services was a “no brainer” His scores were as follows:
Language Comprehension: 25-30 month range (displays some difficulties)
Language Expression: 19-24 month range (displays some difficulties)
Nonverbal thinking – 31 month range
Social/Personal Behaviors – 13-18months with some scatters to 24 months
Motor Behaviors: Solid at 25 months with scatters to 30 months

He started with DI therapy and speech.  At first, he liked playing with the therapists, but then when they kept coming back and expecting things from him, the tantrums followed.  Screaming started.  Meltdowns like you’ve never seen before.  We, along with the EI team, pushed through and got to the other side.  We worked with the EI team and implemented their strategies throughout our daily routine.  We weren’t just leaving it up to a few hours of therapy each week, we knew that would not get us very far.   Before we started any therapies, I hired an early childhood education student to play an active role in our household.  I knew I needed help.  I knew that pulling the real Nicholas out would take more than a few hours of therapy a week – and it’s not easy playing and interacting with a child that you literally have to force it out of every step of the way.  Kristin is fantastic – an absolute godsend that I am so happy to have found.  I brought her in for Nicholas’s therapy sessions, so she could actively participate and learn from the therapists and continue to carry everything we were doing into her playtime with him.  So, Nicholas had therapy, play time (therapy) with Mommy & Daddy and play time with Kristin. 

In this time, Nicholas saw 2 pediatric neurologists.  The first appointment left me having a breakdown in the parking lot of the hospital.  I already knew my son had autism.  But this doctor seems to enjoy telling parents their child will never amount to anything.  He might as well have beaten me with a baseball bat in the parking lot because that is exactly how I felt that day.  After flaunting his board certifications and his autism-board status – he told us that our son would learn nothing and amount to nothing if we did not medicate him (with Risperdel,  a drug prescribed to schizophrenic adults) – he told us he would not write a script (which we needed) to add ABA therapy until we came back with our medicated child.  He told us he was not “stonewalling” us – but clearly he was.   He told us he would be willing to put money on the fact that our son would have the genetic markers for autism and that we should look into institutionalizing him in the future.  The only good thing that came from all of this was the genetic testing that we had done showed NO GENETIC MARKERS FOR AUTISM.   Fortunately, he felt man enough to want to prove me wrong about me mentioning a possible milk allergy, which he belittled me about like you would not believe, he did order allergen bloodwork (and also told me he had no allergies).  During this appointment, we did not mention metal toxicity, vaccinations, etc – I can’t imagine what it would have been like if I had.  By the way, his bloodwork not only revealed a milk allergy, but soy, corn, wheat and peanut as well.

The 2nd pediatric neurologist’s appointment was nothing like the first, but not at all insightful or helpful, other than getting the RX for the ABA therapy.

At the same time, I had already begun ramping up Nicholas’s supplements. All of the ones I have tried have brought significant gains.  Epsom Salt Baths and Evening Primrose Oil have calmed him down dramatically.  His focus is better, he is more attentive. His eye contact is fantastic compared to what it was.  He responds much better to his name.  We can actually go to a store and not have a tantrum to deal with. 

He knows his colors, animals, alphabet, numbers, shapes and more!  To hear him say the words is amazing.  His conversational speech still needs work, but we know it is in there.