Awareness, Understanding and Acceptance

I was talking to an acquaintance the other day about Dominic. This gentleman knows that he has Autism. During the course of our conversation he said, "so, he's a genius, right?" All I said back was, "well, he can play the piano!" Yikes, looking back on that conversation, there were so many things I could have said instead. Like, how about Autism is not the same for every child or adult? Lately, I feel like I'm in "unchartered territory" with Dominic. Given that he is well past 11 years old, I am almost 100% sure he is going through puberty. So many emotions and hormones are swirling around these days around Dominic that I feel like I am caught up in a tornado! We work all the time on getting him to tell us his feelings. This morning he kept saying, "James got stung on his nose by a bee!" I asked him to show me in the Thomas the Tank Engine book he was looking at where in the story James got stung. Sure enough, there was a part in the story where a bee stung James on the nose. Dominic said, "he needs a Band-Aid!" For Dominic to recognize that James was hurt and needed a Band-Aid was HUGE. I then said, "how did James FEEL after getting stung?" Dominic said, "sad." A common misconception about children and adults with Autism is that they have a hard time with emotions, both regulating and recognizing them. Yes, some do, but not all. I love that Sesame Street recently introduced a character with Autism! I also love that Dominic's school is again having a peer-to-peer program this year. It warmed my heart when I got an e-mail from Dominic's teacher telling me that over 100 children wanted to sign up (for the second year in a row)! How cool is that? If even one child goes home and tells their parents about the children in Dominic's class that in itself is helping to start the "conversation." No one in either my family or my husband's family has Autism. My own dad has gone from not really knowing how to talk and act around Dominic to becoming one of his biggest supporters. It has taken years, but I know that they both have a lot to "teach" each other. It has been almost nine years since we were given the diagnosis of Autism for Dominic. Do I think I know everything there is to know about Autism? No, I do not. Are some days more challenging than others? Yes, they are. I do know this though. With awareness, comes understanding and with understanding comes acceptance.

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Those "Steps" to Independence Can Be Hard

We are heading towards 600 orders for Dominic's business. Since our long-term goal for Baked Goods By Dominic is having a "brick-and-mortar" and hire those with disabilities, it is essential and imperative that I continue to teach him all parts of the business. Since I prompted Dominic for so many years for speech, he has become "prompt dependent." What that essentially means is that he will look at me for a prompt, like, "what do you do next?" I do that one a lot. Dominic has been going to a private speech therapist for over ten years and she reminds me often that Dominic usually will know the answer, if I am patient and wait for him. That has been a very hard habit to break! Dominic has an incredible memory, so I put it to the test this morning. I didn't write out the steps, I wanted to see how much he could do completely on his own. We have a customer picking up his order today, but the only thing that had been done is putting the cookies into t...

Why We Pursued Guardianship of our Son with Autism

Last Thursday morning, my husband, Dominic and I went to our county's Probate Court and had Dominic's Guardianship Hearing. My husband and I are Co-Guardians, and we were granted "Partial Guardianship," which means Dominic can make some of his own decisions (future educational and vocational placement options, what to wear and how he wants to spend his free time), but my husband and I will make his medical, health care, legal, contractual and major financial decisions. The subject of Guardianship in the disability "world" has been and continues to be a controversial and divisive topic. I was a panelist for an Autism Conference this past summer and presented on what it's like to have a child with Autism. Towards the end of my presentation, I mentioned that Dominic had just turned 18 and that we were going through the Guardianship process. When the attendees could ask questions, the first person that went up to the microphone started telling me that I was...

Presume Competence

Since we have traveled outside of the United States since Dominic was very small, we have had to get him a Children's Passport every five years. Since his current one expires in February of 2024 and he is now 19, we had to apply for an Adult Passport. I don't know why my husband and I picked Dominic's first day of school and Michigan State University moving in their students, but the appointment was yesterady at 3 p.m. We had gathered all of the documents needed and then went into a special room in the East Lansing Post Office just for Passports. The three of us sat down and the clerk asked Dominic his age. He said, "19." Since we were also getting his picture taken for the Passport, he went into a separate room, where she took a picture of him and then let him look at it to make sure he liked it (it will be his picture for the next 10 years)! He said he did, so he sat back down with us. The clerk filled out a bit more of the paperwork and then she let Dominic s...

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