Since the peak of aggression last month, Scotty’s behaviors have decreased and a month later, we find him back to his normal self, drawing appliances, catching bugs and asking questions. Sometimes I’m anxious still, thinking in the back of my mind that tomorrow maybe be a different day.
I thank God for the last few [...]
If you ask most parents, aggression is the hardest thing to deal with as parents. It invokes “crisis” and disrupts family life and learning. For many years since Scotty was 3 years old autism took on many faces - tantrums, head banging, blood curling screams, scratching, biting and sleepless nights. After many [...]
On our recent trip to Mexico, one of the things we noticed was our difficulty understanding their language. Because we only know words, but not how they are put together, we can only understand about 2 words each sentence. For those who cannot speak English it was a struggle to communicate. It [...]
This is a poem I was given in a support group. It was hard to read at the time, but now I fully understand it. It deals with the acceptance of our lot in life whether that be our children or our roles. We do not design or plan our lives, thankfully [...]
The life we choose is usually not the path our Heavenly Father would have for us. For instance, I would not choose to have a child with any disability because it would be a life full of struggles, a life far from perfection. When autism came to our lives through our son [...]
Over the last four years of homeschooling, I have struggled to fight against the urge to teach as the schools do. For one thing it is the only method I’ve ever known and for another that was the way I was educated for 16 years. It is hard to break established habits. [...]
Whenever I face another year, I like to look back and remember God’s many blessings and answered prayers of the prior year. I keep a journal where I write down my prayers, trials, praises and encouragement from Scripture. I find that if I don’t write anything down, (especially my prayers) I tend to [...]
About three years ago I was led to NDT by Dennis Gunderson of Grace and Truth books. I was in the trivium pursuit e-loop asking about a phonics program for children with autism. He then recommended a book “Too Wise To Be Mistaken, Too Good To Be Unkind” by Cathy Steere. It was [...]
Our homeschooling journey began in 2001, when I started reading books on the subject. The books that helped me the most were A Mom Just Like You by Vicki Farris, The WholeHearted Child by Sally Clarkson, Praise Her in the Gates by Nancy Wilson , and Lifestyle of Learning by Marilyn Howshall. With [...]
Some days it seems the only predictable thing about it is the unpredictability. The only consistent attribute, the inconsistency. There is little argument on any level but that autism is baffling, even to those who spend their
lives around it.
The child who lives with autism may look “normal,” but his or her behavior can be perplexing [...]