Laughter is the best medicine

Chris' mom likes to take Adam for a weekend every once and a while and this past week she took him from Wed. evening until Friday. That allowed Chris and I to do something we haven't had a chance to do in a while, go out on a date. We decided to go to Comedy Caravan because we had some tickets from one of the youth at church and we needed to laugh. I didn't realize how much we needed to laugh until we got there and until our conversation following the great comedian we saw.

I realized we had not done anything with just the two of us since the miscarriage in May. Because of this we really haven't had the opportunity to realize that we are both still grieving a lot. It's difficult to understand why one would still be grieving a little person you've never met, but you do. You grieve the thought of their birthday, if they were a boy or a girl, what Adam would be saying now that I would be 5 months pregnant, the pictures we would take, making a new room for Adam and a place for the baby, the excitement when Adam would take the magnets on the fridge and say "Look mama, it's our family" then he'd point out all 4 magnets saying "Daddy, Mama, Adam, and a baby!" We still have the video of the first time he ever did that, I still have my pregnancy journal and I just can't get rid of them because it's like saying it never happened because there's nothing to show for it other than those things.

I realized that Chris and I haven't laughed much since May and laughing was the best medicine for both of us. It got us to think about being funny and enjoying each other, remembering that we are still grieving and allowing that but also looking to the future for new things to come. The grief is still there, it will be there for as long as there are children to be thought of but each day it gets a little easier to do and think about the things that weren't difficult before.

So the comedian we saw, Mary Mack was sent there just for us. Not that she really was but out of all of the comics we could have and did see that evening she is the only one that spoke to me, got me to laugh, and who I thought "I could hang out with this person." So if you get a chance check out her website and listen to her stuff.

Health Insurance

I find that whenever I'm thinking about something and it is brought up in the media it is everywhere.

Saturday Chris led me to Michael Savage's statement, Sunday I read a post at Womanist Musings where someone commented on and I replied regarding insurance. This morning I received an e-mail that led me to a link for the Courier Journal, Louisville's newspaper.

The Courier did an article that featured families struggling with the rising cost of health care. I thought they did a good job of conveying what many families are dealing with. I was able to relate to it on a personal and professional level.

Personally our family has struggled to pay for private insurance for years as well as the cost of going to the doctor if we do end up going. Professionally, the article speaks about a family struggling to pay for therapy for their son who has autism (click on the "Haysley family" link under videos at the bottom of the page) because their insurance company will no longer pay for it.

Check it out, I'm hoping that with more articles like this one something will change regarding insurance payment for Applied Behavior Analysis as a therapy for children with autism and for insurance as a whole.

Disturbing events...

There have been several media occurrances lately that have dumbfounded me about autism. The first was a family asked to leave a restaurant because their young child with autism was disturbing others in the restaurant. The second was a statement from Michael Savage and his thoughts on autism.

We all have different experiences and thoughts about various subjects and some people have not had the opportunity to come in contact with anyone with a disability. I feel as though those who make statements and choices such as those noted above should be informed about what autism is and how it effects a family.

I have not run across any feedback from others about Michael Savage but I did see many remarks regarding the family and they were quite disturbing. Autism is not a choice, it is not something that allows a family to do anything they like, and it is not something that people can fully understand. It is also not something that telling a child to "cut the act out" will help. In fact, being a behaviorist and a mom I can say that that type of disciple is the worst. It doesn't address why the child is doing what they are doing and it doesn't give them voice to what they tried to communicate with the behavior in the first place.

The following websites are just a few of many out there with information about autism. Unfortunately the numbers of children diagnosed with autism are on the rise. I hope that people will learn about and learn from those with autism instead of criticizing something they may not understand.

CDC

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke

Autism Society of America

Autism Speaks - they have a statement on Michael Savage's remarks

Adam's New Bike!!

It's really hard for me to believe that Adam is 3 and a half years old! It really does seem like he just started talking and walking. He's had a lot of "big boy" changes these past couple weeks. He's stopped using his paci, he's started dropping naps, and he got a big bike. He's so proud of his bike that he's been riding in the park across our street every morning and he took it out to Meme's (my mom's) house to show her too. Isn't he so big!!