Ya Missed, Try Again! - Living with Autism: The Fifth Year

    Ugh..... Is it August again? I don't think August has ever been my favorite. It just reminds me that summer is ending and school is starting. It's hot and sweaty, and Facebook so kindly reminded me today that it's been five years since Eli was diagnosed.

   I didn't get a chance to write my annual post last year because we were in the middle of PCSing( moving, for you nonmilitary folks), living in a hotel, sharing a laptop..... You get the idea. I really wish I had written something though, because looking back, Eli had made so much progress in 2015. I wish I could have reveled in it, but like most things in life, you don't appreciate them until they're gone.
 
  Instead of crying in my beer, and wishing for the past, I'm gonna try to put all this in perspective. I've seen two sides of what special education looks like for Eli now, and I definitely know the former was much more beneficial than the latter.

  In the 2014-2015 school year at Fort Rucker Elementary, Eli started the year off in the PSCD(preschool child development) classroom with a clear plan to have him in the kindergarten general education room full time before he turned 6 in April. It started off a little rocky with a new aide who wanted to' hand over hand' everything. The school hired a new aide by the end of September and even though she wasn't a warm and fuzzy kind of gal I would prefer for Eli, she was exactly what he needed. Strict, rules were black and white, and she gave him tons of freedom to do the right thing. Eli was in the kindergarten room fulltime when they got back from Christmas break. It.was.awesome. He participated in everything; fieldtrips, music programs, lunch and recess. He was still being pulled out for one on one instruction, but that's what he needs.

Remember this moment?? http://letters-from-the-homefront.blogspot.com/2015/05/kinder-end-of-year-performance.html Yeah..... that was kind of a big deal!!! SO awesome! It was a huge moment for me because it told me he most definitely can do what his peers can do! He does not have to be held back.

Move forward to 2015-2016 school year. New town, new house, new school. Devin also came back from Afghanistan in June of 2015.... So, a lot of adjusting and getting use to a new normal. I knew this was probably going to be a bumpy road for a while.

Fort Belvoir Elementary took Eli's one on one aide away, assuring me that there were four adults in the kindergarten inclusion classroom. (I decided at the end of 2015 that Eli should repeat kindergarten since he didn't get a full year in the classroom. FRES wanted him to graduate to 1st grade, but I declined.)

It was a much different picture than what Eli had the year before- The classroom was much smaller, but with more kids, and there was a teacher, aide, SPED teacher, and her aide, but they were split between two inclusion rooms. So there wasn't really four adults in the room at all time.

The SPED teacher called after school everyday to tell me all the bad things Eli had done during the day. If he had a good day she didn't call. So while I waited at the bus stop every afternoon, my heart would start pumping and I would pray for no phone call. I think there were only two days the first two weeks she didn't call. It was a nightmare.( I use to be upset that his old school didn't tell me enough, and now they were telling me too much... Maybe I didn't want to know all the bad things?)

It finally got to the point one day when they 'evacuated' the classroom because Eli was pushing desks over and tearing things off the wall..... And then there was the 'Zen Room'. The Zen room was a room without windows, with fake clouds painted over the florescent lights. There was one black leather sofa in the middle of the room and an ipad playing soft music in a cage high up on the wall.  It was anything but zenful... I didn't know his SPED teacher was taking him here until he got so upset one day and took off all his clothes and urinated on them. They couldn't get him dressed in time and he missed the bus, so they had to call me to come pick him up. As you can image, I was outraged! And thought I made it pretty clear not to take him to the Zen room anymore. The next week it happened again!!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?????

Eli had NEVER displayed these behaviors EVER. Not at home, not at his old school-NEVER. He was CLEARLY trying to tell us something. So back to the drawing board we went (AKA IEP meeting). His kindergarten teacher was very young and it was her first year teaching. His SPED teacher was an older woman, very kind and sweet, but SO clueless in how to deal with Eli's behaviors and now I really didn't trust her. The young teacher in the Autism room was a RBT studying to be a BCBA. I knew she would know how to handle Eli's behavior, but I knew the autism room wasn't exactly the best place for him. I decided to put him the the autism room fully expecting they would have him back in the inclusion room by the end of the year. Well.... that didn't happen.

After Spring Break, we had a meeting to update his IEP and discovered not only was he not back in the classroom full time, but they weren't even giving him his full inclusion hours that had been on his IEP the whole year!!! UGH. The hardest part of trying to get inclusion hours is trying to coordinate the schedules between the general education class and the autism room. (This is why a 1:1 is necessary for a kid like Eli- to have the freedom to take the breaks the child needs.)

The three of us sat down and hacked out a schedule for Eli and the rest of the year went much better. His Kindergarten teacher even took Eli on a field trip without an aide from the autism room or myself. His behavior had improved and his teacher and his classmates had gotten to know him and love him. I was finally feeling like we were making headway when his autism teacher announced she would be leaving at the end of the year. This was heartbreaking in so many ways. She had been a strong voice for Eli and understood him so well. I knew I was going to have to start all over again next year.

Once again, a summer full of therapy and schedules so Eli doesn't regress too much. And once again, I feel a summer slip through my fingers. When do the children play? We had wanted to move here for so many years and had been told Fairfax County was the mecca of special education and education in general, yet all I'm left with is disappointment.

Ride or Die

Eli thought it would be a good idea to teach himself how to ride a two wheeler this weekend..... I have purposely NOT taught him, even though he has been more than capable of riding a two wheeler for probably a couple years now.
  Eli has that fun autism antic where he loves to ignore you....... so riding bikes with him seemed slightly dangerous to me.... This momma can only handle so much stress. But as usual, this child of mine is UNLIMITED and I will NOT be able to ever hold him back!!!!!

Lesson Learned.

LAST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  I don´t know if I should laugh or cry!!!!!!!!! I´m usually pretty excited about summer, but not this year..... UGH. Did I never even post their school pictures??????? AHHHHHHHHH! Stop the clock!

Kinder Spring photo- I don't normally buy spring photos, but how could I resist this one???

Fall Kinder 

Fall 1st Grade

 James' first grade class

Eli's kindergarten class

  I never ordered Shayne's school photo because I thought she was going to do a retake, but she didn't..... Can we have a do over this year? I feel like I failed in so many areas... UGH. Or maybe I should just be happy it's OVER! 

Baseball

Kinder End of the Year Performance

 

  Eli has been preparing for his big Kinder performance since before Christmas. The daily reports were usually not so great in music class- very little participation. His teachers said he doesn't do the motions or sing to most of the songs..... Which didn't make a lot of sense to me because at home he loves to sing!!!

His teachers were a nervous wreak on the big day- I could tell they were just praying he would stay on stage for the whole performance!!!(Apparently, on dress rehearsal for the students, he took his shoe off during the middle of the performance and handed a Band-aide that was on his foot to his para pro. Ha!)

 Eli definitely brought 'game' for the big day and did AWESOME! I was so very proud of him!!!




Can you find Eli? I really wish I would have gotten more of this on video because he was really doing all the motions to this song! I figured out why he wasn't participating- this was the only familiar song they did, all the other songs were not popular songs, or even songs with a great rhythm.... Except for the Spanish song, which he got to stand in front for and shake the maracas!

Because we Like to PARTY!

Because one celebration is not enough these days..... Eli had TWO parties!!!! Good thing he is all about THAT cake!

This is Mr. Sean(Ms. Suzie's husband, Eli's respite care provider) They are BEST BUDS!

Eli and Harry's birthday are less than two weeks apart, so us deployed moms thought doing a party together sounded a lot less stressful! It was a great success!!! 

Opening Day!

Yes, that's a PINK helmet.........

That's Amber(ABA therapist) out there with him.... Eli did not love the first inning, but had a great comeback the 2nd inning.

Harry and Eli- buddies!

Ahhhhh! If only they were like this ALL the time! 

James got to catch the WHOLE game! So exciting!!! 

He did AWESOME! It really is the perfect position for him because he HAS to pay attention all the time! 

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SON!"

It was Holy Thursday and a paschal full moon on the day you were born. I should have known something BIG was about to enter this world. You make me a better person, Elias Harold. "Happy birthday, son!"

T-ball

Eli had his first T-ball practice ever yesterday! YAY!!! He loved it and did great with a little extra help from his buddy, Harry!

Lunch with Daddy and Oma

  The boys have lunch back to back and unfortunately, we missed James' lunch(bad mom). It was Native American day for Eli and he had James' cool headdress and chest plate from last year, but didn't want to wear it at lunch so he switched with his buddy, Donavan.

Eli and McKenna at the bus stop.

Education Week

It's Education Week and Flyboy was invited to read a book to James' class today in the library! How fun! Eli got to join in the fun too! Soooooooooo cute!

James insisted on the Halloween book, Hallo-Wiener.(Thank you, Auntie Toni!)  I tried to talk him into a Thanksgiving book, but he said he wanted to make the class laugh. (It ended up being a great choice because Eli loves that book too and he sat and listened the whole time!)

The boys are part of a deployment group at school. The Spanish teacher and the counselor do a fabulous job sending pictures and newsletters to Flyboy. They are doing an Operation Celebration after school on Thursday that we'll be missing, so they had James and Eli give us our own special presentation and gifts today after we read the book. So sweet!  

Itsy Bitsy Spider

Swim Lessons

 Eli swimming the full length of the pool!






This post is SO long over due! UGH! I'm so behind!-

 Waaaaaaaay back in February, I started looking into swim lessons for the boys. I knew they needed private lessons, but I was hoping they could still do them together.(There was no way one was going to wait on the other while the other one sat out.) CYS promised me they were hiring a new guy that would be perfect for the boys, and they would contact me as soon as his paperwork goes through........ Fast forward SIX months, and they finally called and the boys started swim lessons in July. YAY!

It only took one lesson to figure out trying to do both boys at the same time wasn't going to work. Ha! So they arranged two teachers at the same time for both boys to have private lessons! Double yay! It was great-Minus the lovely Alabama thunderstorms in the summer afternoons........

This was our first lesson- Both the Rich boys at the same time! Give that man a medal!

Second lesson- Mr. Rayn with Eli and Ms. June with James in the background.
 

James doing the back float!

On Fridays, they get to do the diving board!

Eli diving for sticks.

 

 

 Unfortunately, after James broke his arm only a couple weeks into swim lessons, he didn't want to get into the water with his cast! It has taken a while, but he is finally back in the pool! Lessons have been moved to the indoor pool and Mr. Ryan is back to teaching them together again. It's a little easier now because he knows Eli is a super swimmer now, but it's still chaotic! Next month I'm going to try to get them slots back to back. Eli has come a long way with his waiting skills..... I think they  can do it!

P.S. Mr. Ryan is AWESOME! He has ADHD himself and that's why his mother put him in swimming. He totally gets my boys and is SUPER patient with them!