Oral Book Report

Ollie had an oral book report this week.

His assignment was to dress like your favorite character and tell your class about the story.

He choose a Thomas the Tank Engine book, his favorite.

He wanted to dress like Thomas, but I couldn't figure out how to do it, so we settled for Sir Topham Hatt. Ollie took Josh's black dress shoes and his grey tie and my felt hat to school. He also took a Thomas engine.

He told me that he wasn't going to put the stuff on, but I guess he did, long enough for his teachers to get a picture.

He also told his class about the story. Everyone at school was so surprised and proud of Ollie because he did so well. I am so proud too.

Fall Plays

Today Ollie had Fall Plays in his classroom with the rest of his first grade class.

The parents were welcome to come today as well.

Knowing that Ollie doesn't like crowds... all the extra parents, I was not sure how it would go.

It went well!

He was in two plays.

In one he was a scarecrow.

He kept his hat on the whole time. Ollie hates wearing hats.

He really didn't sing, but he stayed up there the whole time. That is amazing.

He was also a goblin? in the 13 days of Halloween.
He was the 13 ghosts.

he looks so cute with those ears on.

here he is holding up his ghosts.

He did good here too. He did say 13 ghosts after the little girl beside him told him to say it. It was great!

Great Job Ollie, mommy is so proud of you!

The Little Engine that Could

Ollie's favorite book, since he was one year old, has been The Little Engine That Could.

When he was one, he had a little chunky book with the train that counted to ten. 

He loved it!

Well, we still have all those books, but he wasn't paying too much attention to them until he discovered the 2010 move on Netflix.

Now, Avatar and Bakugan have taken a backseat to this movie, at least for the moment.

Ollie seems to really like the little boy in the movie. I don't know if he relates to the little boy or he is just reliving an old friend, but he loves this movie!

photos

When Ollie was little, he used to love having his picture taken. He would smile and say "cheese" with the biggest grin on his face. For about the last two years, that has changed. He will say "cheese" but he will try to hid his face, look down, stick his tongue out or any number of things. Sunday I tried to get a picture of Ollie with his brother Van and his dad. The above picture is the second picture I took, and I just love it! I love his big smile and his jump!

priceless.

here is the first picture:

lost tooth

Ollie lost his first tooth last week. To be honest, I did not know how that would go, like all new things with Ollie. The loose tooth went fine. He came home Friday after school and told me his tooth was loose and started moving it. Sure enough it was loose. He wiggled it all weekend and kept saying "ouch". Monday after school, he showed me it was really loose, I told him it would come out soon. Half an hour later, he starts yelling for me. I come down stairs and he tells me he can't find his tooth. "It fell out!" he said. Well, I found it on the floor and showed it to him. He looked at it, shrugged his shoulders and went back to playing on the computer. No big deal. Ollie is always surprising me.

self portrait

Ollie made a self portrait of himself in art last week.

pretty cute I think.

somewhere over the rainbow

Here is a picture that Ollie made at school. I love it. In fact I am going to frame it and hang it on the wall. It is a picture of Ollie standing under a rainbow. He looks happy. That makes me very happy. It makes me feel like everything is going to be alright.

First Grade

Yep, school has started. Actually, school started about six weeks ago. I was really nervous about school starting. Ollie was going to have to adjust to a longer day. He was always going to have to eat lunch at school. There was going to be more homework and a more difficult curriculum.There was going to be a new teacher and Ollie just loved his kindergarten teacher.

Well, after three days Ollie was doing good with being at school for a full day. In fact, I think he adjusted better then his two older brothers had. 

Lunch time was probably the thing that I stressed the most about. Ollie only eats about ten foods, if I try really hard, I could probably stretch it to twenty. This drastically limits my options for packing a healthy lunch. Not only did I worry about what I could pack for Ollie to eat, I also worried about what others (teachers, ect.) would think about his meals. Ollie eats one vegetable and that is lettuce. ( yep, with nothing on it just like a rabbit.) When he was younger, he used to eat peas, all the time, but he will not eat them any more. I decided to pack trail bologna for his meat. For those of you who don't know what that is, it is deer meat in a roll that you eat cold. Ollie has been eating that since he was one year old. He also likes chicken nuggets and hot dogs, but he prefers both of those things warm and I was unsure how that would be in his bucket. He used to eat bologna, but that is one of the things that he used to eat, but no longer does. Yes, those ten things that he eats does change from time to time, but it seems like if he picks something new up, he stops eating something else. I also pack chips in his bucket, again I know not very healthy, but my choices are chips, popcorn, pretzels or french fries. The pretzels and popcorn can be substituted in but Ollie really likes to keep a routine. If I changed his bucket food for the day, it could throw his whole day off. Before you ask, there is not one fruit that Ollie will eat. Not one. The last thing that I pack is Chocolate pudding, you know the kind that is supposed to be made with real milk. Finally a bottle of water for a drink. In fact water is the only thing he will drink. Ollie drank milk until he was about three and a half years old, then he just stopped and switched to water. That is it. Eating lunch at school for Ollie is going great. He eats everything that I pack. There have been about two days were he just didn't eat a lot, but everybody has off days. 

I have no problem getting Ollie to do his homework with me at night. In fact, I think that he likes it and I enjoy that time with him. He also is having no problems keeping up with the rest of his class academically. Ollie also seems to like his his new teacher, even though he doesn't say much about her. 

After six weeks in school, I am relieved that things are going so well. I am looking forward to the rest of the year going as well.

ETSY: Autism Awareness

I just stumbled across this cute little ETSY shop : Autism and Aspergers Awareness  Jewelry

Lola has a son with autism and is committed to spreading awareness.

She makes beautiful jewelry, and if you happen to be a buckeye, she makes beautiful Ohio State jewelry too. 

I love this one!

beautiful !

just a quik update

I just wanted to give a quick update on Ollie for now.

For the most part, he is walking on his leg normally again.

 He will walk across the yard normally, then it is like he stops and thinks about it and limps a couple of steps. He also says he can't run, but I have seen him take off with his brothers and run and not realize it. Silly boy, slowly things are returning back to normal. 

He has also started a new thing where he relives or "plays" breaking his leg.

 He will sit on the floor and cry and yell, "ouch it hurts, it hurts" and other things that he said that night. I know it is the night he broke it or the next day because when I hear him, it takes me right back to those moments like deja vu or something.

When you aks him what's going on, if he is alright, he just stops what he is doing and looks at you like nothing is wrong.

 He says "I'm playing". 

At first I thought that he was bothered by it and kept reliving it, but now I think he is just sort of playing what he lived through. He really doesn't seem upset when he is done. He just moves on to play something else as happy as can be.

Anyway,on a different note, today is Ollie's birthday an tomorrow is his big party!

frustrated to tears

There has been no real improvement since my last post. We worked Ollie's knee and ankle joints a little bit, he was wanting to keep them locked like they were in the cast. For two days after that Ollie laid around on the couch and slept. Now, some of this could be due to the fact that I was giving him Tylenol for his sore joints. After that I made him go outside. He enjoyed it once he was out there, but it was a fight to get him there. He still does not want to put weight on his leg. At first Ollie told me it was broke, but after repeating myself many times, Ollie finally agreed it was 'fixed." Today, Ollie went outside, but still scooted around. After watching him sit there in the dirt moving his foot, toes and ankle all around, I knew that it was all in Ollie's mind and up to him to decide that his leg was ok and he could walk on it again. Then later tonight he decided he had to go to the bathroom and got up and went by himself. Now, he was still hopping along, but asked for no help. I felt like doing a little happy dance. See, the trick with Ollie is letting him think it's all his idea. There is no way that Ollie will cooperate  unless he wants to. He is just to stubborn. So maybe he is not walking on it like nothing ever happened yet, he is taking the steps to get there. One day out of the blue I expect to wake up and see him walking because that is just how Ollie does it.

all that glitters isn't gold!

Do you remember my last post about Ollie's broken leg? How I said that good things have come out of that? Well, I am going to tell you that it has been six days since Ollie's cast has been removed. In these last six days, I have become on frustrated momma. Ollie for the most part still wants to hold his leg as if the cast is still on, I know that this is normal. However, its the little things that he lost when he got his cast that have not come back either. For example, Ollie loves to take baths. We used o have to yell at him to get out of the shower or bath. Well, seven weeks with a sponge bath only has changed that, at least for now. He doesn't want a bath anymore. I practically have to wrestle with him to get him in the shower. ( I don't really wrestle him, I jut get a lot of No's.) Ollie has always been my child that enjoys being outside. He would go out or sneak out every chance he got. Almost the entire time he had his cast on, he begged to go to the playground. Now, after the cast is off, he shows little interest. He has tried a couple of times, but doesn't seem to know what to do outside and gives up and goes back in the house. There are some other things too, like bathroom habits have changed a little. I know that Ollie just has to readjust to not having a cast just like he had to adjust to having one. However it is a struggle to get him to do the things that he once did for himself and knowing Ollie, when things change, Ollie changes and that is that. He is a very strong willed little boy and he does not take to change well. In fact he kept his two cast and Friday after he had his cast removed, he tried to put the old one back on after failed attempts at asking the doctor and nurse to put a new one on!

Ollie's broken leg

I don't want to say everything happens for a reason, because if we could do it all over again, I would definitely choose for Ollie to NOT break his leg. However, I have seen some good things come out of this fiasco.

I can still remember it very well. It happened almost six weeks ago. It was Thursday night. The busiest homework night of the week. The weather had been beautiful. The kids had been playing outside ever since they came home from school. Josh had worked on the garage and I had taken a much needed hour walk. Dinner had been eaten and dishes put in the dishwasher. The boys had finished their homework. Tatum was tired and already headed to bed. It was eight o'clock. Ollie headed to the shower while I gave Van a practice spelling test. Josh was downstairs on the computer and Petey studying for his spelling test next.

Van does great on his test and we hear Ollie get out of the shower. I tell Van to jump in the shower next and start to give Petey his spelling test.That's when I heard Ollie yelling. "Mommy help!" Help Mommy Help!!!!"

I tell Petey to hold on, I have to run up and check on Ollie. He is laying in the middle of the floor, on his back, both of his legs pulled up to his chest. When I get there, he tells me that he has a boo boo and asks me to kiss it. Ollie points to the bottom of his foot. I kiss he bottom of his foot, not seeing anything wrong.

He stops crying and I think everything is ok. I try to stand him up on his foot and he falls straight down. I know something is very wrongs and yell for Josh. I move Ollie to the bed and there I see that around Ollie's leg is swollen. I call my dad to come over and watch the rest of the kids and Josh and I take off to the hospital with Ollie.We reached the hospital by eight thirty. We carried him in and the hospital staff worked to get him back to the doctor as fast as they could.

 Ollie in the ER

We still didn't know what had happened for sure. Ollie told us that he fell. He told the doctors and the nurses that he fell. The doctor looked at Ollie's leg and said that it was definitely broke.

The nurse put an IV in Ollie's hand. Two tries and two hands later, she got it. Then she gave Ollie some morphine and he calmed down and went right to sleep.

I was so very proud of Ollie. We had told the hospital staff that Ollie had autism. Ollie worked well with everyone. He answered their questions and listened to them. Ollie was in lots of pain and her really never cried. He would tell me that it hurts. "ouch, ouch it hurts" he would repeat over and over but no real yelling or screaming

Next we headed to get an xray of his leg.this went very well too. His leg was not as broken as bad as the doctor first thought. They decided to put Ollie's leg in a splint and send him home for the night and he could get a cast put on in the morning. 

Having he splint but on was very painful for Ollie, but again he did a great job. Then he got to leave. He told the nurse he was happy to leave and that he was going to sleep in mommy and daddy's room. The hospital gave Ollie a little blue teddy bear that he named Lumpy and a Spongebob magnetic book.

Ollie made it through the night fairly well in not much pain.

The next morning we took Ollie to get his cast put on. Ollie did a great job getting his cast put on too. He choose an orange cast. I know he was in lots of pain when they put the cast on, and he tried to move around from the pain, there was no crying and screaming, just a lot of "ouch it hurts" and I heard some Spanish in there too.Thank you Diego. ( so now I know when Ollie is upset he starts spouting out Spanish.)

Ollie was happy to leave the office and seemed to be doing much better with his cast on and seemed to be in very little pain.

I should say something about medicine here too. Ollie will not take liquid medicine. If I need to give him Tylenol, I have to give him the chewable pills, but he won't chew them. I have to place them at the back of his throat, he swallows and takes a drink of water. This process would go pretty smooth, until one time he gagged. Then he decided he didn't like it anymore and there is a little struggle now. After the first couple of days, Ollie did not want any Tylenol, at all.  He was to take Tylenol every six hours and Tylenol with codeine if pain worsened. Well, Ollie never had any of the codeine at all and basically went without medication. I think he may have a high tolerance for pain. If Ollie whimpered around that his leg hurt, I would ask him if he wanted medicine, he would always answer 'NO!' I would say "you would rather your leg hurt then take medicine?" and he would answer "yes!"

Ollie has seven weeks in a cast and he has almost six weeks down.

During this time, I have noticed Ollie talking a lot more. At first, Ollie was very immobile and if he didn't talk or ask for want he wanted, he didn't get it.Even after he started getting around more on his own, Ollie is still talking more. He has even started talking more in speech at school. Actually I think he has just started talking more at school. It may be a small step, he is not a social butterfly yet, but he is talking more and more and I am so very proud of him. I am proud of the way he has handled this whole thing.

My whole heart is filled with pride.

the signs

It's funny, how there is really not one particular sign. No matter how much information you read, look at on billboards or see on television. There is not one thing that tells you my son is autistic. It is a collection of signs. Many of those signs may seem insignificant by themselves, but when you add them all up, they mean something else. There is not one autistic child that is the same.

Last summer, while I was attending a class, a fellow student of mine was having a rough evening. How the whole conversation started, I cannot remember now, but she was seeing signs in her preschool son. I told her about what we went through only a year before. I remember not realizing till that moment how long it had been. I am sure that night I seemed like a pro. I was calm and confident. I was ok. She wanted to know every step we had taken. Every doctor we had seen. What was said. How we handled it. How Ollie is now. My fellow student was a preschool teacher herself and was aware of many of the things I was talking about, but it all seemed new to her too, or a little unreal maybe. She was describing the signs that her son was showing to me. All I could tell her was that Ollie didn't have any of those signs and of course her son didn't have any of Ollie's signs. What I did do was explain to her how everything happened. What to expect. How many doctors we had seen and from what she told me, she was on the same track and doctors that we saw. I think I helped her a little that night. She seemed a little more at ease when we were leaving. I hope I did help her a little. I could only remember how confusing that time had been for me. In some ways that time was a short time ago, and in other ways it had seemed a very long time indeed. Oh, and yes, her son did have autism to.

doctors and sensory issues

Part 2

When Ollie's oldest brother Van was ready to start preschool, he was evaluated with a development delay. After our pediatrician referral, Van was evaluated by a occupational therapist (OT) and a physical therapist(PT). Van's results were that he was slightly sensory integrated ( his brain did not process sensory information the same way that ours does). What did that mean? Well, Van went to either an OT or PT appointment once a week for half an hour. He did this for more then a little more then half a year. For the most part, Van has learned to adapt to his sensory differences. For example, Van would hate loud noise. Any really loud noise would confuse and scare him. Now, Van has grown to realize what those loud noises are and he is no longer upset by it.

Therefore, I had some point of reference when Ollie was going to appointment after appointment. Ollie's first two evaluations were done by the county that we lived in. Then we were sent to our pediatrician. Our pediatrician sent us to different doctors. The first doctor was the eye doctor, where we learned that Ollie did need glasses. Ollie improved some just by being able to see. His world opened up to him a little. The next appointment was with a hearing specialist. We learned that Ollie's hearing was fine. Then we had another evaluation by the county and a home visit by the county school physiologist. Next, we headed to a child physiologist at the nearest children's hospital. Followed up by another trip to the physiologist. We then went back to the pediatrician.Lastly, Ollie was evaluated by a language specialist. All of this happened in the span of about six months. Ollie was a trooper. Every appointment he did better and better. Ollie was evaluated by OT and Pt, but that was through the county after he had already started preschool. He showed just a small amount of sensory issues, with loud noise(same as his big brother).
By the time Ollie started preschool, he was used to being evaluated. Ollie's first two to three days at preschool were rough ones, getting used to being away from home.After that, Ollie began to enjoy school. He started opening up a little more each day.

Welcome

For those of you who do, and for those of you who don't know, my son Oliver has autism. He was diagnosed over a year ago, but of course the journey does not begin there. There were several evaluations and several doctors appointments with different kinds of doctors first; over a time frame of longer then six months. Needless to say, that was a very stressful time in our lives. All the different terminology and tests were hard to keep straight and I felt bombarded with different information everywhere I looked. My moment of clarity came at a doctors appointment. See, Ollie's results on all those first tests were very confusing. He would score in the typical range in some areas and slightly dip down below in others. It was all very frustrating and there was no clear answers, did he or did he not have autism. No one would give me answers. All I got was more referrals for more tests and more doctors. My clarity came not from the psychologist, but from the speech therapist. I practically broke down during our visit. She took her time and explained every test that she was giving Ollie. Then she explained where Ollie fit compared to other typicals and other autistic kids. What I learned with Ollie was that he scored in a very high range for autistic children and a low range for typicals, but not severe range. However, what I really learned was an understanding of where my son was and for the first time, I felt like everything was going to be fine.

stay tuned for the next part of the story