Letting go, starting anew

The earlier post dealt more with catching up on the major happenings since the first post. This post will detail what I have been thinking about recently, since the possibility of Adrian being on the autism spectrum has been brought to the forefront. On Tuesday, I felt mostly relief. It seemed that finally someone was listening to me and that my child was NOT NORMAL. All of the idiosyncrasies, the compulsions, the emotional fragility...it just began to make sense. He has also been refusing to nap, and absolutely hates to go to sleep. In recent weeks, I have noticed increased aggression and perhaps even REGRESSION when bladder and bowel control are concerned. These unusual behaviors are mostly associated with him being told to do something that he emphatically disagrees with. However, the aggression and bladder control issues have also manifested themselves in the sleep routine. He has awaken frequently with screams, tantrums, and other odd behaviors for seemingly no reason at all. Last night, Adrian woke up three times because he peed his pants and wet the bed twice. Why? Who knows...he's been potty trained for months now. It has been emotionally draining to know that my child has what might as well be termed a chronic illness, one that could carry an immense and negative social stigma with it. But I will learn to deal. I will too surmount being the mother of an Asperger's child. I have let go of the child that I thought I had, an intelligent, witty, funny boy. I am now in the process of embracing a very similar child, yet I must add other adjectives such as emotionally fragile to the list. On the surface, it changes things slightly. Yet, it also changes things permanently. This is now who he is and I want the very best for him.

Catching UP...........

Since my last post, lots of things have happened. Adrian started a new preschool and was potty trained within 8 weeks.. and has turned 3 years old. My mother-in-law visited from Louisiana over the Christmas holiday. Micah has turned 1 year old, the pastor at our church went back to Korea, and Geoff started a new job. Since beginning at the new preschool, Adrian has had increasingly frequent behavior issues. He hits, slaps, kicks whoever and whatever is around when he doesn't get his way. Of course, this is seemingly innocuous or "normal" at 2years old. But most recently, he has become more violet and agressive. I was at my wits end when I was called at work (which is a 45 minute commute from the preschool) to pick Adrian up for agressive behavior for the third day in a row. Especially since they called as soon as I had gotten to work. I figured...I just need supernanny. He threw a chair at the teacher and then hit several of his classmates as they were standing in line. It seemed as though we have tried everything. Spanking, timeouts, verbal warnings, and ignoring (which landed us in the ER for loose teeth after an extremely energetic tantrum). The pediatrician essentially accused Geoff and I of not knowing how to talk to a 3-year old. He asserted that we were giving too many directives and talking to him too much. Well that's a bunch of you know what.

My immense frustration with Adrian’s behavior led me to do a quick Google search on behavioral therapy. I called Ashely therapy and they had an available appointment today. What a relief. The therapist listened to me and my concerns about Adrian. She thinks he may have Asperger’s or some other high functioning autism disorder. What a relief. It finally has a name! I have been doing my best to cope and parent with the limited (psychological) knowledge I have. He screams uncontrollably when he is upset. I’ve always been told “this is normal” But he is 3 years old now. It makes sense to me. He is intelligent, knows a whole lot, and has HORRIBLE social skills. Somehow, I never thought about such a possibility—that he might have autism. Recently, I had been coming to terms with the fact that there was something wrong. But I figured it might be OCD or ODD, given that he seems to have some compulsive tendencies and also is very very defiant. So we were referred to the Behavioral Disorders Clinic at MUSC, as those people should know whether or not it is Asperger’s.