Ode to Autism Christmas Joy

 Christmas time is always a joy with an autistic child. Well, I should say an interesting joy. Let’s start with pulling the Christmas decorations out. Words of advice. Don’t! Wait until the child is in bed. I mean that is if the autistic child sleeps through the night. If not, pull and put those Christmas decorations up in between the aah, not again. Then we have putting the Christmas tree up, the lights on and the ornaments. Oh, the joys of the child pulling on the strings of tree lights while trying to put them on the Christmas tree. As you’re slowing getting through stringing the lights on the tree, the child is already shoving the ornaments on the tree. The vision you have of having the child help decorate the Christmas tree is not the reality of how it goes. Once you get the lights on the tree and notice the child has put all the ornaments on the same spot of the tree, you decide to just let the child keep going. You’ll fix or redo the whole tree after the child has gone to bed. Sadly, it takes you three days to decorate a 7ft. pencil Christmas tree because autism sleeps when it wants. After three days of decorating the Christmas tree, you decide to change the whole color of the ornaments you originally had picked out. Why? Because after the third day of decorating with those chosen colors, you’re just over it. So you move along with other chosen colors. Colors you feel are more Christmasy colors. 

Then the Christmas shopping begins. The deliveries start coming and you begin to want to wrap. You of course can’t put anything you had just wrapped for the household under the Christmas tree, because Santa brings the Christmas gifts, of course. So, then there’s the question of where the heck am I going to hide these Christmas gifts, that the child isn’t going to find them?! The child might not know the gifts are his, if the Christmas wrapping paper wasn’t recognizable. You then put the outside the household wrapped Christmas gifts under the Christmas tree, because who wants a tree with nothing under it? Bad idea for wanting something under the Christmas tree to make it look more Christmasy. The child then begins to ask questions, such as, where my presents? Or I want to open presents. There is also so much joy to Christmas with an autistic child. Such as baking Christmas cookies. The Christmas Eve joy of opening Christmas gifts from your siblings. Then there’s Christmas Day! Another day with blogs about the joy of those!

The Fright with Food

 Let’s talk about food and autism. One of my biggest pet peeves is a parent of a mainstream child comparing their child to a child with autism. My favorite is, Johnny’s a picky eater also. No, no, Susan it’s not about being a picky eater. Does little Johnny vomit when wanting to try new foods? Is little Johnny unable to finish foods he loves the taste of because he’s just vomit half of it all over, because of the texture or smell? I believe the answer is, no. Children with autism aren’t picky. They seriously can not handle many textures or smell of certain foods, even some of their favorite foods. It’s not about a parent putting a meal on the table, and the autistic child looking at it and not liking the look of the meal. It’s not because the autistic child would much rather want to eat their favorite snack, than breakfast, lunch or dinner that’s put on their plate. My oldest who is 24 years old and autistic, just would refuse to eat many veggies and fruits. He would eat corn and potatoes. My husband and I were new to the whole autism spectrum disorder, and very uneducated. I remember getting upset at my oldest and just thinking he was being picky or just didn’t want to eat the veggies and fruits, because they were considered healthy foods. My husband and I would do the whole, two bites of your veggies, then you can be finished with your dinner. We did this for years. It got to a point where he would only want the broccoli stems on his plate. When I look back on those years and remember the look of disgust on his face, because he just couldn’t handle the feel of the texture. I feel absolutely shameful as a parent to have forced my autistic child to eat something he just could not handle eating. It took having a second child with autism spectrum disorder to learn, what we failed to know 10 years ago. As my oldest was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder at the age 11 years old. My youngest is 3 years old, and was just diagnosed Sept. 9th 2020. My husband and I had a hunch that our youngest was autistic when he was a few months old. My youngest had a few of the behaviors the oldest had. I see a lot more of the autistic behaviors in my youngest, then what I saw in my oldest. So many more behaviors that it’s quite overwhelming to me as a parent and caretaker. My oldest had sensory issues due to being autistic to some sounds, objects, and foods. Nothing compared to my youngest. My youngest will actually gag and then vomit at certain textures of foods he tries, and even foods he loves the taste of. So, please Susan, don’t compare your non autistic little Johnny to that of an autistic child. It’s unsettling and disheartening to a parent who’s child is autistic.

What's Sleep?

 Sometimes Autism sleeps, but most of the time it doesn’t. When we become a new parent and struggle with the midnight feedings. We get up with the baby, knowing that this will only last about 4 months. Well, surprise! You’re an autism parent! The only sleep you’re getting is that in which you daydream about. Sometimes Autism surprises you and you may get a quick 5 minute cat nap. The quick cat nap will never be a 5 minute power nap, it is for your autistic child. You might get a good nights sleep, after getting up throughout the night for the 5th time. And, you’ve mastered sleeping on the edge of the bed. Oh, and we can’t forget the hopes of sleeping in late, because your autistic child only went to bed at 3:00am. Yes, there’s hopes of the child sleeping in late. Again, the jokes on the Autism parent! Oh, I’ll sleep. When I’m dead! Then that leads to another dilemma. Because then you think, I can’t die! Who do I leave my autistic child to?! But, hey, that’s another blog.

The Children

 These are my 3 children we adopted. The oldest son was diagnosed with Autism and mild IDD. We adopted him through the foster care system. The second oldest son is transgender, suffers mental health issues and misophonia. We adopted him through the foster care system. Then there’s my youngest. The youngest was diagnosed with Autism and Global Developmental Delay. We had legal custody of him, since he was 8 months old. January of 2020 his birth mother, my youngest sister, signed off her parental rights. We finalized his adoption September 2020.

Special Needs Mama

 This is me. I’m a mother of 3 adopted children special needs children.I was born with a congenital heart defect. My heart defect made it risky for me to carry children. It would have been risky for the child I was carrying also. I was 27 years old when my husband of 25 years and I, fostered our first child. Our oldest child was 2 years old when he was placed in our home as a foster child. Parental rights were terminated two years later. On July 25th 2001the adoption was finalized. I was a month away from turning 30 years old, when we got the call for our second foster child. The child was born at 28 weeks and stayed in the NICU. The child came home with us as a foster child on December 2nd 2002. It wasn’t until 14 years later that our youngest child. I had just turned 45 years old when the youngest came into our home. This child was not a foster child. He was the newborn of my youngest sister. All 3 of theses children are special needs and have interesting histories and stories. I will share their stories individually and together as a family throughout my blog.