How does Autism affect my family part 2....

If you made it through yesterdays post, well done! And thanks for sticking with me! Today I thought I'd do a second post to carry on with some of the other things we go through here in Dee's house.

Yesterday I chatted about finding out about my children's diagnosis, sensory issues, and a bit about school. But what other stuff is there? Well there is a lot!

Food
Food is a massive issue in this house, not with me lol, I'll eat almost anything!, but my children are a different story. My Daughter (C), is getting a lot better since starting school dinners in September. She now eats some meat, and tries different things a lot. My son (J) is sooo different. Fruit: C will only eat bananas, J won't eat any fruit. Veg: chips! Seriously, frozen potato things like chips, waffles, and potato letters is really the only veg they eat willingly! C has started eating a few peas on her school dinner but that is it. Meat: C is enjoying chicken and turkey, and has tried pork and beef and liked it a little, she also likes gammon at school. J, no meat at all, except (again), frozen processed crap like chicken dippers, popcorn chicken etc etc. But one issue we are having is J's lunch, he will only eat toast with dairylea cheese, every single day since July last year :/  But even though i worry about their diet, their paediatrician says not to worry much, as the goodness they get from their daurylea cheese, yogurts and milk is alright at the moment. And one way of getting fruit into them without knowing, is these things that look like sweets, but are in fact raspberries/strawberries/raisins covered in a little dried yoghurt. They don't eat much chocolate or sweets, so if these fake sweets lol are going to get a little fruit into them, that's the next best thing!

Babysitter

Me and Chris going out can sometimes be a nightmare. We are very lucky in the fact that because routine is so important to people with autism, my children got to bed at 7pm on the dot and go straight to sleep. So when we do want to go out, we have to leave after the kids are in bed. There are only 3 people who can get my kids to bed apart from me and Chris, and that is my sister, my aunt and my Dad. My lovely friend and next door neighbour often babysits after the kids have gone to bed, but only after, as last time they wouldn't go to bed for her, and J ended up downstairs on the sofa. This doesn't seem such a bad thing to some, but honestly it is. It ruins their night, it gives them expectations of being able to do it every night. This also means we can't just get any babysitter either, it has to be someone we trust and that the kids know. This doesn't give us much wiggle room for a night out if our 4 babysitters are busy.

Going out with the kids
Taking the kids out can be  nightmare. J was using a special needs pushchair up until around January this year, and to be honest it was easier! As he's still getting used to walking properly outdoors, getting somewhere on foot can take a while longer! As I mentioned yesterday, J has sensory issues with public transport because of the crowds, therefore we taxi everywhere if it's not in walking distance, or if it's raining pretty bad. if the crowds in the place we go are too much, this ends up in a  meltdown with either child. For example, we could never take them into a supermarket, as the crowds and noise was too much and it ended up with them both screaming, and us just leaving without our shopping. Things are getting better though, and since we introduced it a few minutes first, then a  little longer, they can now cope fr about 20/25 minutes in a quiet-ish store.

Routine
Routine is huge in this house. I've seen many tantrums just because we've walked a different way home from school or the shops. But little things like that we change sometimes, just so they get used to it. There are certain things in their routine that they need though. Like their milk before bed. They have a small glass of milk each night before bed, if they don't get it, they won't go to bed, and won't sleep properly. They know that after milk comes bed.Their bed time has to be the same every night, 7pm. We can wiggle it 5 minuted either way, but they just know when its bed time now. There are things that cause major kick offs though, like one time my Dad took me in the car to pick J up from school, so he expected it every day, and when it wasn't happening, J would scream and cry and fight, and refuse to come home!

So there you have it. A bit of a look into our lives here. You know, it's manic sometimes, loud most of the time, and crazy all of the time! But I wouldn't change it. My kids are amazing, beautiful and extremely loving. When things are going a bit sour through the day, their kisses and cuddles are all I need to remind me that things could be so much worse, and I love them with all of my heart. And I'm sure they love me too :D

How does Autism affect my family? Autism Awareness Month

April is Autism Awareness Month around the world. So I thought I'd do a post about how autism affects me and my family, I don't think I've written much about it on here before, bear with me, this might be a long one!

When my daughter was 2 years old, my partner Chris started picking up on little things she was doing, and started looking into Autism. I remember I was reading Jodi Picoult's 'House Rules' at the time, in which the main character has Aspergers Syndrome, a form of autism. It was while reading that, that I started noticing similarities between the character, and my daughter. She eventually (after a lot of meetings and appointments with various people), got a diagnosis of Autism. I remember this breaking my heart. I didn't know much about Autism,Ii had only met one child with Autism when  I was 16 and worked in a nursery. He was totally non verbal, didn't like to be touched etc. I thought this was what life was going to be like for my girl. A few months before my daughter got her diagnosis, we started noticing the same things happening with my son who was 2 at the time. Therefore the ball got rolling, and yep, at around 2 and a half years old, he was diagnosed too.

Someone told me children with Autism don't smile, don't laugh, don't like to be touched, can't show emotion, and don't love. This seriously killed me inside. But now I know, boy was that person wrong. My children were both diagnosed at 2 and a half. They are now 5 and 4, so it's been a couple years since we first found out. And they are so loving.

We have good days and bad days. The bad can sometimes be horrific. My daughter doesn't have a great deal of sensory issues any more, she has learnt to overcome some of them, but some things still affect her. Bright lights annoy her, if there are loud sounds you still see her covering her ears until it has stopped. My son has lots of sensory issues, but again some of these are calming down. He has issues with loud sounds and crowds. What does all of this mean? Well, with the crowd issues my son has, it means we can't use public transport like buses or trains. This means we have to taxi or walk everywhere. As you can imagine, with it being £10 each way for a hospital appointment, it sometimes becomes very expensive. it means we have to plan things in advance most of the time, like trips to soft play, if it's busy, you can see they get overwhelmed easily with the noise and amount of people there, this can result in a major meltdown.

But it's not just sensory issues that affect them. They don't understand things like we do. For instance, social boundaries. They will gladly say hello and talk to anyone, which is very scary for us, as they would possibly gladly wander off if they weren't watched like a hawk.

But with the bad things, comes great things. My daughter is very bright and has high functioning autism. At 5 years old she has a reading age of around 9/10, is in the year above her normal one in school 3 days a week for an hour to do spellings with the older kids, and gets 10/10 every week. My son is getting on well and knows all of his numbers, colours, letters, and some words.  My daughter is in a mainstream school and is coping very well, she loves her friends but doesn't understand how to play games properly sometimes. My son is in a specialist autism school at nursery, although he also goes to a mainstream playgroup in the mornings too. They both need full time one-to-one support in school, but the people they have are fantastic and really know and understand how to deal with their moods.


There is plenty more I can say, but I think this is longer than Ia first anticipated!

I may do another post soon about the other ways in which autism affects us. If you made it to the end of this one, thank you so much. Feel free to comment :D

World Autism Awareness Day!

Today, April 2nd 2013, is the sixth annual World Autism Awareness Day. People celebrate this day with fundraising and awareness-raising events all over the world.

Today hits me personally. Both of my lovely children have been diagnosed with Autism. Chloe is 4 now, and Jack is 3. Luckily we were able to get them both diagnosed at young ages, although Jacks diagnosis came later than Chloes.

We have had a lot of obstacles thrown our way over the last 2 years since the diagnosis.  We've had the dodgy looks from other parents when one of the children is having a meltdown somewhere. We've had to stop going to the supermarket as Jack has severe sensory issues with the lights, noises, people etc, which means we've had to so all our shopping online.

We've seen many specialists. M Our Speech Therapist, J our Child Psychologist, Dr J our Pediatrician,  K our Health Visitor, and various other assistants and behavioural therapists. At the minute we're struggling with waiting to hear whether Chloe will be able to continue on into the mainstream school in September, that she currently attends for Nursery. These 2 weeks will be hell waiting for that email. Waiting to hear from the local autism school for a visit for Jack to start there in september.

I remember first finding out. I remember first even thinking about Autism. I had been reading a book by Jodi Picoult called 'House Rules' in which the main character has Aspergers Syndrome. I started noticing little traits between the character and my Chloe were similar. We had concerns about her speech etc, so eventually got through to our Health Visitor who agreed with us, adn it shot off from there. 6/7 months later, she had her diagnosis of ASD. Just as Chloe got her diagnosis, we had been to see the speech therapist about Jack too. And again, another 6/7 months later, he had his diagnosis too.

I remember someone telling me, 'It won't be autism, autistic children don't love, don't show emotion, won't cuddle you etc etc'. How wrong that statement was. Both of my children love nothing more than a lovely big hug, thety are full of  smiles and laughter. I mean of course they have their problems, the tantrums, the violence sometimes, the behavioural issues, but I love them more than life itself.

A lot of people don't understand Autism, not their fault, they aren't ignorant to it, they just don't know about it. But I always encourage people to read up a little, find out what it's about. So come on and read a little something about Autism, ask me questions if you're curious, I'd rather people asked than didn't.

Raise awareness of Autism.

Also I'd like to share a picture of my tattoo which I got for my children. It is a quote about Autism which I think fits my family perfectly.