Denial

I forgot that looking back before when my son with diagnosed with autism how I was denying the red flags spotting that there were definite signs of autism. His little sister was born and everything he was accomplishing as a toddler stopped.

The very thought that crossed my mind was that he wants to be the baby. "This is why he's doing what he is doing. That's not autism. That's regression." It took the day of the screening and the final diagnosis of him being autistic that it finally hit me. There is something wrong. Time to accept those facts. Now what?

We are dealing with this one day at a time. I have a hard time accepting that when he get's older that more things will change. I have heard that when autistic children get older, they can get worse. That scares me.

I've been seeing this with his sensitivity. It's hard to wash his hair. He freaks out when I pour water over his head to rinse. I slowly and gently put shampoo on my hand and run it through his hair. He hates it. He screams. Cutting his hair is hard to. I use the clippers and the sound drives him crazy. I have him plug his ears shut while I trim. Afterwords I give him ice cream and tell him he did a good job. The whole time he is just trembling in fright. He is in sensory over-load. Also recently he has been flapping his hands in front of his face. Another symptom that has started coming into his life.

After its all done he is a happy boy playing and fighting with his little sister. Usually he plays off in the corner by himself. It has taken daycare and schooling to help him include himself with other children, especially his little sister. When she wants to play with him, he'd just ignore her and continue to play with his cars alone. He has gotten better to play with and be included in other childhood games. That's good news knowing that he is beginning to socialize.