Andrew, as he is

First and foremost, a huge thanks to all of you for your contributions to Andrew's new SonRise program.   The Start up costs are all set now!  Further contributions will go toward my next trip to the Option Institute or supplies for his program.    Thank you thank you thank you.  We are overwhelmed by your support.  

Peace.  That's all I feel these days, peace.   Wow is it welcome after this year. 

One of the fundamentals that SonRise teaches is that you must come to a place where you accept your child, as he is, and love him totally.  Even if he were not to improve one little bit more.  Being 100% accepting of him as he is and content in it. 

That is pretty easy for me to do right now,  he is so awesome.  He hugs me spontaneously, he kisses.  He's so happy, aware, able...  

Could I have had this attitude before we did biomed?  Could I have accepted the little boy forever who was so unresponsive we thought he might be deaf? Who couldn't make eye contact or bear much touch?  I really don't know.  Thank God we found biomed and he has been so responsive to each and every intervention. 

My little boy. Such a sweet little boy who laughs and sings and is beginning to prefer people over objects, not just me, others! He is blossoming before my eyes.  He does new things every day that literally amaze us.  

So yes.  I am 100% able to stop fighting against myself and accept Andrew, my bright little sunshine, exactly how he is. To stop comparing and daydreaming of recovery. To live in the now with him and be fully present, accepting, and loving.  To celebrate whatever he does when he is surrounded with my attitude of total acceptance. 

It's been a year, it's hard to remember him as anyone who he is now, and I am choosing to be OK with that.  I am through grieving.  I am through with the anger and the sadness consuming me, literally around me like a dark cloud day in, day out. I am choosing to move forward.  

Andrew's SonRise Program -- A Request

Family and friends, 

As you may be aware, our son Andrew was diagnosed with autism this last January.    Ever since, we have had him in full-time therapy with CT's Birth23 program.   He has been doing intensive ABA for six months without a single gain.  His therapists and I have spent many hours brainstorming and problem solving, but he remains resistant to ABA therapy. Without an effective therapy option, Andrews future ability to gain meaningful relationships and function to his highest capacity will be limited. 

We sought out other options (of which there are few, unfortunately), and we found what we believe will be a good fit for our family.   The program, called SonRise, is based on the philosophy of joining the child in HIS world, so then he might venture into ours with us.  It is a gentle, intuitive approach that we are very drawn to.  Even in using just some of the very basic techniques we are seeing wonderful rewards from our son.   Lindsey is going to the Son-Rise start up programOctober 6-11.  The high levels of success acquired by those who have done this program give us hope for Andrew's future. 

The problem is that to run a SonRise program for Andrew will cost several thousand dollars each year.  With Lindsey home with the kids, this would be a big challenge for our family.  The monthly costs for the biomedical supplements that have helped Andrews body and brain heal have made things tight.  While we believe in doing for ourselves, we also believe that our family and friends desire to see Andrew succeed as much as we do.  

We are asking, if you are able, please consider making a donation to Andrews SonRise program.  Every single cent donated will help fund his program.  Please do not feel obligated to donate if you are unable or uncomfortable in any way.   We do not wish to offend anyone with this request, or make you feel awkward. It is very difficult for us to humble ourselves to make this request.  

If you are able and willing, please consider forwarding this request to anyone who might be willing to help.  

We thank you, 

Lindsey and Michael Articolo

PayPal for Andrew's SonRise program:Lindsey.articolo@hotmail.com

Address: 3 Amaryllis lane, South Windsor, CT 06074

Phone: 860-648-9359

Sent from my iPhone

What's Happening

After months of stressing because Andrew is resisting ABA therapy .... Hardcore resisting....  Shaking head no, signing "all done", saying "no,no, no, no, no!" Over and over.   And losing play skills when our primary goal has been to teach him to PLAY, we have had to make some tough decisions. 

Through my research, I found an alternative therapy to ABA.  Through fate, my sweet friend Eileen happened to know someone who has done the program. 

The rest was basically convincing Michael.   But it didn't take much, because there aren't a lot of choices, not good ones!!  We can continue forcing ABA down his throat and be stressed before, during , and after those many hours each week.... Or we could find something else. 

Our therapists are Angels.  They've supported me over this last year in ways you can't imagine unless you've been there. They are autism experts, they've worked with dozens and dozens of kids with special needs, and I have only ever known one: my son.  They've assured me and lifted me up day after day after day.  I adore each of these women, and it will be hard to say goodbye.  What they do for a living, it's a special calling, and you have to be a special person to do it. 

But it's time for something different for Andrew.   It's called SonRise.   The idea, very simplified, is that you must join the child in his world, build trust and love with intensity, and he will venture into your world with you. 

I know. Sounds a little kooky.  But if you spend any amount of time watching the videos of these therapists break through with these kids, you will believe.  

Many recover and go on to a life without autism. This therapy requires their brains. 

I go to the training in October.  More to come. 

Julys update

It's almost as though every event in my life so far was a clue, a stepping stone to the full circle where I have landed, that is my current space. 

When I was in the latter part of my teens I worked in a new age bookstore partially out of pure rebellion against the way I grew up.  Partly for the shock factor.   

And I learned a lot more, incidentally, about my spiritual self in those years than I expected.   I learned to watch for synchronicities.  I learned that there are no coincidences, that I manifest my own truth and purpose.  I learned about visualization and positive energy and true peace. 

Ten years later I found myself revisiting these notions with Oprah (ha!) as I battled some fairly nasty PPD after the boys. 

And I am now deeply and truly depressed, and for the first time in my life it has nothing to do with the chemicals in my brain and everything to do with the fact that my baby is simply collateral damage to the world, sacrificed unknowingly, by me, on the alter of the greater good. And it's simply too much to bear. 

It's a year later, nearly a year since the cat burglar that is  regressive autism started stealing my baby, bit by bit until his smile was gone, his eyes flat, and I knew something was terribly wrong. 

I am tired of explaining why we would have rather gotten whooping cough than autism. 

I am tired of syringing supplements into him 8 times a day, though they are undeniably helping his health, and pulling him out from his isolation, giving us bits and pieces of him back. 

I am tired of worrying every minute of every day how he feels right this moment, and what will become of him.  How much Andrew will we get back? We have already lost a year of what we could have had. When will I stop counting my losses?  

And if I fold and say, as long as he's healthy I am ok, am I dooming him to never fully recover? Am I dooming myself?

They say this is a marathon, not a sprint and that couldn't be more true.  And I have only gone the first mile and I am tired. I want the damned finish line. 

So there's this thing, this program that promises to help me help myself and my autistic son.  It is all about embracing and joining him and reshaping the way you think about the world.

And I dare say my brain could use even more re wiring  than Andrews.  That damned dtap damaged me even more than him. 

Why I'm blogging.

Why am I blogging?

Because when you have a child, diagnosed with a life changing condition, there isn't a rule book to follow.  You don't know what to you.  There is a ton of information, but you have to go looking.  You have to find the right people. The right places.  The right information.  You have to dig, and it's freaking scary.  Meanwhile, surviving with your normal day to day activities, pushing through for all of your children, it's extraordinarily overwhelming.  More than you can imagine unless you've been there.  Making meals, changing diapers, cleaning the bathroom.  Very difficult.

When one day your world is normal and average, and yes, not that easy, but still, you're pushing through and headed down one path, and the next day your entire world is changed, it's very unsettling. 

When you learn that people you trusted (not just individuals; I'm talking institutions) are not trustworthy.

When you learn that what turned your world upside down and what HURT your child, forever, was a decision that YOU made.  That's a hell of a load to carry.

THAT is why I am blogging.


I have been writing a post in my head for a good week now.   Having children with disabilities is isolating.  We don't have as many playdates as we used to have because of our therapy schedule. We still get out and about quite a bit, though, but we usually have a therapist with us, so my socialization is limited.   So, it is hard to not view the therapists that come into your home weekly (or more than once a week) as your friends.   But they're not. They can't be.  They are working.  And I am very very blessed to have a great team of ladies working with my boys.    I am even more blessed to have family and friends who reach out and lift me up, and try to understand.     But it is still an isolating thing.  We don't know a single other child with autism.   Not but over the internet.  Not personally.  There are many who share my story, or similar stories, but they don't know ME.  And I don't know them.    In the day to day of caring for a child with special needs, it is ALL me.   Every syringe of supplements. Every diet-prepared meal and snack.  Every distraction from stimming, and every bit of work all day long on strengthening his muscles and his brain.  It's all me.  How could I not feel isolated?  Every decision I make impacts him in an enormous way.

I have a beautiful, sweet, and smart 12 month old nephew.  He came to visit me this week.  He is so sweet and full of joy and so beautifully, wonderously ....   healthy.  At 12 months he is developmentally on par with Andrew, not terribly far behind Ben.   And while I am thrilled with him, and he is joy to me, and I love him deeply, it hurts a LOT to watch such a healthy little boy.   When my boys were 12 months, they were healthy too.   What I wouldn't give to turn back the clock and make different choices.   I can't help but be reminded of that when I am with him.   And I hate that.  (Ry, Ashley, these are my issues, not yours.)

He effortlessly points at what he wants to communicate.  We just spent five months, FIVE months, teaching my son to point. 

It isn't fair.  I wouldn't wish this on ANYONE.  I will be devastated to know more boys with autism as the years go by; it's inevitable.   But it isn't fair.  We make the same choices as so many other people and Andrew has to pay a price that is way too high.

Isn't he getting better? YES.  Because I found the right people and the right information, right away.  But at BEST, we will have lost a piece of him forever.  And at minimum more than a year of our lives while we abandoned everything else to fight for his future.   Do I appreciate his milestones all the more because they are so hard won? Yes of course.  And we celebrate.  But the cost?

Andrew's milestone dates in my head are not the date that he learned to walk or talk or went to this place or that place. His milestone dates in my head are the date of his sedated hearing test, his diagnosis, his first DAN appointment.   My memories of his babyhood are not of being in love with a beautiful infant, but of a mercilessly screaming infant in pain because his body was already reacting to the poison we were injecting him with.  He wasn't happy for the first 8 months of his life.  He didn't sleep til he was 14 months old.  If you can count 10 pm to 6 am sleeping. 

It's not his fault he's sick. It's mine. It's the world's. 

And I HATE IT.

And that's why I blog.

Every Day is his Best Day Ever

That's what's happening now.

Every day is Andrew's "Best day ever!". Every single day he's doing more, saying more, looking more, expressing more, laughing more. With every day that goes by we are getting closer to getting him back.

Look at these videos. He spent his afternoon today running back and forth through a sprinkler. No big deal for a two year old, right? Well, this two year old probably wouldn't have noticed a sprinkler two months ago. ANd he definitely would have spent his entire afternoon trying to escape from the yard. Today, he made a few halfhearted attempts, but mostly, he PLAYED.

http://youtu.be/onzKUozlJnM

And then, my friend Jen's cat, he kept trying to look into the cat's eyes, and laughed with glee.

http://youtu.be/IVIfysR8DAM

That went on for ages. It never gets old to hear him laugh.


We got Andrew's lab tests back. Next week we go to the DAN for interpretation but preliminarily, he has two genetic mutations that are very very common in kids with autism. Indicates, as I've been saying all along, that he is having problems methylating, processing toxins.

Our whole family will have to be tested.

I'm so happy to have this major, major clue in working toward recovering him.


Focusing, hard, on the little victories that maybe aren't so little: Our Occupational Therapist not believing the changes in him in a two week period since she last saw him. His BCBA pronouncing how he's seemingly at a different level of awareness this week.

The smiles. Oh I am a sucker for that smile.

Outside

"Outside" he said to the therapist as she walked through the door today. "Outside!"

"Outside?" She asked Andrew. "We will go outside."  

And we did.  we went outside and hopped in the car and went to tour our police station with our local mom's club.  

Andrews communication has been so outstanding, we are all thrilled.

And then, he proceeded to cry, for the entire hour we were at the police station. You guessed it, he wanted to be "outside".  He cried so much his entire body was bright red, there were real tears coming out of his eyes, I had to use the tissue on his nose. 

I had nothing to distract him, nothing to make it better, because all he wanted was to go outside, and he can finally communicate that need to me, and he didn't understand why he didn't get exactly what he wanted. Because he's two.  

All of the  Autism moms have told me that tantrums will come, to expect this. But I didn't believe them, because Andrew has basically not cried since last summer. He doesn't care about anything enough to cry about it. Until this week.

So, how did I keep my cool for an hour of him crying? I guess because I can see the beauty in it?   Because all it is to me is progress?  To me it shows that his awareness of the world and his ability to communicate our growing, and that is what we are after.

But, A sincere apology to all of the moms and children who had to listen to it this morning!