We got our diagnosis.

I have known for such a long time that Madden had autism, and while I never shied away from telling people about it I always felt like I was being judged for what I knew to be true. This of course can't be said for everyone that I told this to, but for some who don't know Madden that well, or maybe don't know much about autism, I always got the feeling that they thought I was misdiagnosing him. Believe me, I have read so many articles and watched so many video's on the subject that I actually feel like I should go back to school and make this a profession. That being said, I feel like I can breathe a sigh of relief and now look forward to spreading knowledge on the subject to anyone who might have questions about it.

 There is a long road ahead of us, for one thing we need to get some blood tests done to rule out any possibilities of any other abnormalities that usually go along with having autism. Once that is done than we are going to schedule him some more testing in speech, and other areas to really pinpoint where he needs the most services. When we went in for the diagnosis I asked Thomas how he felt about everything and he said, "I don't know if I feel anything, we already know that he has something so I don't know what the difference will be after we hear what they have to say," As we were sitting there waiting for the doctor to tell us our results I could see that Thomas's demeanor changed a bit. The finality of it all soon came to be when the doctor said, "The speech doctor and the psychiatrist both believe your son to have autism." Then came the results of his testing which was a little harder to swallow. His language skills are that of a 2 year old, and I actually found that hard to believe because I have an easier time communicating with Lainey than I do with Madden. That is when the doctor told me that Lainey might actually be ahead of the curve. An interesting thing to hear is that your five year old is quite behind and your two year old is more advanced. While this is only in one area of his skill set, you hate to think of your child being behind in anything. He is also way behind in his communication skills, his social skills, yada, yada, yada. As a parent you start having fears of his future and all the struggles that are to come his way. Will he ever be able to catch up to peers his age and will be ever be able to answer my questions without getting frustrated. However this is not the route I plan to take.

Being positive is not normally my strong suit. I usually think of worst case scenario in almost all other aspects of my life but when it comes to Madden, or I should say my kids in general, I refuse to be negative. Madden brings me joy beyond words and has shown such improvement in these past 2 years that I know he will continue to grow in his knowledge and learning. The other high note from our diagnosis is the fact that the doctor's believe he is high functioning. Autism is the diagnosis, but the severity level of it determines so much. The range goes from high functioning to low functioning. High functioning like Madden means he is verbal, gives eye contact, and is not sensitive to touch. People on the low side of the spectrum are nonverbal, don't give eye contact, and don't like any form of touch. There are of course other criteria that fit in there but I won't bother with all the details right now. Madden is verbal and that means he will most likely be able to improve his verbal skills and hopefully someday hold a very normal conversation with us. Those are the things that I strive for with my son and I will do whatever I have to to try and get him the services he needs to get there. Just as I am sure any parent would move heaven and earth for their child if they had to!

Motivated!

Another year without blogging, but I refuse to give up. With as much as there is going on with us, I know that if I don't start writing it all down somewhere I am going to end up forgetting things. So here is the latest on each of the kids.

Madden - We are right in the middle of getting him tested for Autism. We have already done the speech evaluation and in 2 days we are going to get DDBP evaluation which I think is somewhat like a Psych Eval.. Stemming from the Speech evaluation we got a referral for Madden to start getting regular speech therapy through Cincinnati Children's. The good part about Madden's speech is that he speaks clearly and you can understand everything he says. The bad part about it is that his speech is for the most part not functional. By that I mean you can't hold a conversation with him, and or he can't answer a simple question for you. So many of the things that a lot of parents may take for granted like asking your child what he wants to eat for dinner would be a huge milestone for us to get an answer to. He has made such great strides over the last few years and I know he will get to a point soon where he will be able to talk and hold a normal conversation with us. School starts in a few weeks and I am feeling excited and nervous about it all. Excited that he will be getting structured academics and have an outlet from the house for him to explore and enjoy. Nervous because he has a new teacher and I know nothing about her. We have been so blessed to have a loving, wonderful, teacher the last 2 years where I knew he was getting the love and attention he needed. This is going to be a new school and new teacher so I feel like he is going to be very overwhelmed in the beginning, but hopefully over time everything will fall into place and this new teacher will be just as wonderful as our dear Mrs. Greiner! Current obsessions with Madden are his humidifier "Pete" and pretty much anything that plugs into the wall like the vacuum, fans, or even an old clock radio he found down at Man time with daddy. He is very sweet and loving and a joy to be around. We just started going to King's Island this year with the kids and it is so fun to watch Madden on the rides. He will ride anything and seems to have a great time in whatever he does. His favorite rides are the Woodstock Express, the log flume, and the airplanes.  I literally could go on and on but maybe for the time being I will stop there. To be continued...

Lainey- This little girl is one big ball of craziness. She LOVES using my Kindle, which she refers to as "computer cards." We literally have to take it away from her or else that is all she would do all day. It is quite amazing watching her use it, she know how to navigate that sucker with the greatest of ease. She knows exactly which apps she wants to play, how to use each app, and where they are located to get to them. She is a computer wizard :) She is still babbling a lot and not saying very long sentences at this point. You can tell she has a lot to say but can't really figure out how to say everything she is wanting to get out. She knows all her colors and shapes, and we just started working on identifying letters and numbers. She also just learned how to count different things. She could count to 20 before but didn't really know the relevance to it. Now she loves to count her fingers and different things we ask her to count that we find. Lainey LOVES to watch shows. Her favorite shows right now are Cinderella, Toy Story (all of them), Wreck it Ralph, Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph, Dora the Explorer, and anything pretty much on Nick Jr.. It is fun having her yell out, "Look Mommy a _____." She is so excited about the world around her and wants to make sure we are not missing out on it either. She also loves to sing and read books. I will say that Miss Lainey does have a bit of a temper when things don't go her way, but for the most part is pretty content.

My children can make me crazy and sometimes there are days when I have had enough of them. It isn't any sooner that I get a little downtime for myself and I miss them terribly and can't wait to see them again. I am sure this speaks true to all parents, but I do love my babies with all my heart and would not trade anything about either of them for anything in the world.