Charles' and Wally's Autism Adventures

I tested positive for COVID-19 on Saturday, December 12th.  My isolation will end tonight 12/19 at midnight, as my symptoms began on Thursday the 10th, and the isolation order in New York State right now is 10 days.  It has been odd.  I'm fully vaccinated and thankfully my symptoms were medium to mild and then fell off quickly to very mild for most of my time in isolation.  I'm very thankful for vaccines.  Please get vaccinated and boosted if you can. There's so much more time to think in isolation than I've had in...years.  I've been reading the Bible a lot, catching up on shows I missed, and watching lots of football.  My wife has had the much more difficult task of quarantine with 3 sons and caring for my needs.  She is my hero.  Our church and community has shown up with all the help we have needed.  I am very grateful for life, my family and our friends.  Kim created the "Ficktastic Homeschool" in our new office room for this w...

Something amazing happened today: I went sledding with my sons.  Not at the same time, but I went with Leo this morning and Wally this afternoon.  There were many other parents and kids out sledding today.  But most days when the snow is perfect for sledding, and I see all those neurotypical kids and parents out there, I just want to look away.  I try not to think about what I am missing because both of my sons have Autism.  But today we figured out how to make it work and for the most part it worked very well!  Today I had lots of fun in the snow with my sons.  Part of me just wants to savor this and say no more. Selah. There were lots of other kids out there, which you can see at the top of the hill.  This is Wally observing them.  This picture captures a lot of how it feels being an Autism dad.  The neurotypical kids are playing... over there...and we are over here, and I have no idea what Wally will do or say.  He still has no u...

smile :) A smiling breakfast is not a big deal, but the longer I'm here at seminary and the longer I'm on this adventure into the world of autism (ASD) and being Wally's dad, the more I'm convinced of the upside-down nature of the universe.  One of these upside down things is that little things often matter much more than the big things.  Reflecting on my life with Wally has helped me see this.  A few of my recent classes have confirmed it.  Here are a few of these little things that make a big difference in my life. 1) SLEEP.  My sleep has not been what I consider "normal" for over 6 years.  Being tired has become my normal so most of the times when people ask me how I'm doing and mean it, I say, "I'm tired, but I'm always tired...I'm also..."      Part of having abnormal sleep patterns for so long is that sometimes you just wake up.  Energy is a mysterious thing when sleep deprivation is normal.  And when it comes,...

It's been a while. Wally has been growing and growing as children do.  His language skills are still far behind his neurotypical peers, but exciting new things happen every week. This week we had a poosplosion.  Most parents will not need an explanation of this term, but for those who have not experienced a pooslosion I'll elaborate.  Diapers have a certain capacity.  Poo is a certain size and exits with a certain velocity and direction.  At times poop exits at an angle or capacity that exceeds the diaper.  This results in poop being in the clothes, up the back, down a leg...anywhere.  The poop escapes. So my wife yelled, "Charles!", in that special tone of voice reserved for poosplosions and broken bones. I entered the bedroom and see my wife holding Wally's hands up, one with poop on half of it, and one still clean.  Poop was smeared across most of one of his thighs. I grabbed the wipes and got busy cleaning Wally while Kim kept...

"This is a profound mystery."  The apostle Paul said this about marriage and about the relationship between Christ and the church.  Well actually he wrote it...in a letter to a church...in Greek...about 2000 years ago.  But I thought it would be easier to just say he said it.  Now I see I was wrong. Mystery is always a part of life but it's become a daily part of mine.  I find myself thinking more and more about the mystery involved in my relationship with my son Wally.  His verbal skills continue to improve especially around letters, numbers and some colors but, his Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) means that he still has very few words in spite of the fact that he'll be 4 in December.  Another boy we know who has ASD was super verbal at this age showing ASD really is a broad spectrum.  Anyway, his largest vocabulary set is probably words related to the Cars Pixar movies.  "Ka-Chow!" counts as a word, right? Some days I get so frustrate...

     Wally likes climbing on rocks.  The beach we often go to here in Beverly, MA has a nice pile of huge boulders at one end of it.  Can you see the problem?  Well, this last time I could not keep him off them.  I know what you're thinking...Come on Charles, he's only 3 and half!  You're the parent so you're in charge.  Just tell him it's not safe and carry him back to the beach towel.  Above all, stay safe on the sand and away from huge sharp rocks that either of you could fall off of into the ocean!       Well, I didn't.  I couldn't.  He's forty pounds, very strong and doesn't really understand verbal directions.  So once he decided he wanted to climb on those rocks the situation escalated quickly.  He was pleading, crying out, reaching, flailing and as I picked him up bucking his head back (by far his most dangerous weapon).  I successfully avoided the head butt by carrying him sideways, but ...

Wally and I walked up to the main campus of the Seminary where my wife and I are currently enrolled.  It was a lovely evening so I thought I'd try it.  Going on walks with Wally is always a risky thing because he's very fast, and likes to wander and sometimes doesn't like to turn around.  Now that he's bigger and stronger, if he gets upset and starts kicking or head butting, you could be a mile or more from home with a bloody nose or worse and have to carry home 30 pounds of flailing, screaming, angry boy.  But the weather was nice...so I took the risk. Up, up, up the hill we went in silence.  When we got to the top of the hill this lovely flower arrangement of our school acronym GCTS appeared and Wally headed straight for it as soon as he saw it.  I guessed that he wanted to play in the mulch so it was a good thing bath time was next.  I sped up so that I'd be right next to him in order to at least minimize any destruction he might infli...