I just finished reading a great book!

Thinking in Pictures (Expanded, Tie-in Edition): My Life with Autism (Vintage); Emergence: Labeled AutisticI recently purchased  several books and a video by Temple Grandin.  She is a woman with autism, who has had some amazing accomplishments.   Her first book, "Emergence" was a real eye opener for me.   It tells of her childhood through adolecence and gives the reader insight from the viewpoint of the autistic person.   Most books I have ever seen are written by experts in the field.   This is totally different!    Lonnie has speech, but still has difficulty expressing herself sometimes.   It can be like playing 20 questions getting information from her.  She tries, I can tell she is struggling to come up with the right words.   The more I read in this book, the more sense I was able to make out of some of Lonnie's behaviors.

 I now have more tools in my "arsenal" to help Lonnie all I can.   

I am looking forward to starting the next book, "Thinking In Pictures".

The HBO movie about her life is coming out in August on DVD - looking forward to seeing it.    I don't have HBO service, but my sister & brother-in-law saw it and said it was wonderful.

Easter, 2010

All in all, a good day. I took Lonnie to the Easter egg hunt at our church and then during church service, they had all the children come up front and they brought in a group of baby bunnies that the children got to hold and pet. They do this every year and Lonnie had been so excited about getting to hold a bunny. Unfortunately, her bunny got scared and in trying to escape, managed to scratch both of her arms. Nothing serious, but enough to sting. She did not have a melt down (thank goodness), and I ran some cold water on them to take away the sting. We went to my sister's house after church and had good food and another egg hunt there.

Just when you think it's safe to go outside...

Lonnie has free rein to play outside in our backyard. It is fenced in and secure, so she is in and out all the time when the weather is nice. Yesterday she had been outside for about 15 minutes when my husband went out to check on her. She was standing by the wall between our yard and our neighbor's to the west and appeared to be distressed. When he got closer, he saw that she had gotten her hand caught in a hole in the wall and she didn't know how to react. Of course he got her free promptly and we talked with her about not putting her hand through the fence again. She had been trying to pet the neighbor's dog.



This is another reminder to never get too complacent about an autistic child's safety - because the inability to recognize potential danger seems to be a fairly common issue.

Well worth the read

I just read a wonderful essay by a woman with two autistic children. It made me cry.

It's called "My Children Want You To Know" and is on her blog is at:

http://staticvox.blogspot.com/2008/10/my-children-want-you-to-know.html

So much of what she wrote is true of Lonnie, how she processes the world around her. I have felt the sting of unspoken criticism from strangers and family members when they judge her behavior out of ignorance and intolerance.