4/13/09

Well coming off a great weekend, you'd think I'd feel fantastic but I can't help but feel a bit down today. So I'll go with the good news first. Ben is finally fever free.. he was still running a high fever on Friday night which had me worried since he'd been on anitbiotics for 3 days but he woke up Saturday fever free, yahoo! So he's definetly feeling better now. Tyler is also still feeling good and very chatty and talking up a storm. We got some video of him this weekend of saying "ahhh" to be on for the remote control car to go, hopefully I can get that loaded this week. I'm attaching video now of him reading a book, I'm a few feet away and since this was taken with my phone, the quality and sound isn't so great so I'm hoping it can still be heard jsut so you can hear how many sounds he's making now, he's just very vocal and I hope it stays!


As for other good news, since Ben woke up fever free on Saturday morning we were finally able to get to the mall and have the boys sized for new shoes. I think Tyler's boots were beginning to pinch his feet but since everyone was sick it was getting really hard to get to the store to get them sized and get new shoes. This was by far our best trip ever to the mall! Tyler was fantastic and I was reminded jsut how far we've come. I don't think anyone there would have ever known that TYler had autism. We had a game plan before we went, I was actually thinking about the supports and plan to put into place while I was with Clifford at the vet on Saturday morning. Tyler walked from the entrance to the shoe store and for the first time, actually stood in the shoe sizer and cooperated with the whole event, no one melted down and noone tried to leave the store early. Boys are still in teh same size shoe, however Tyler has wider feet than Ben. We try to get the boys shoes for summer that can be worn with or without socks and of course about 1/2 size too big to allow for summer growth. Tyler of course did nto like the way his shoes felt without socks but he'll get used to them. We go through this everytime we change shoes with him, he resists, the new way they feel, etc. and we work through it.

So from shoes, we walked to the play area, again both boys did great (adn I was obsesssively sanatizing their hands!!!!) after that we went to the merrygoround and let them ride one time and then headed off for dinner. We wanted to try somewhere new to expose Tyler to new envioronments, etc. Again, he did graet. without knowing it, the hostess sat us in what could not have been a more perfect table! Dinner went well. After dinner, Ben and I visited the toy store while dad adn Tyler went to the bathroonm to change diapers. I didn't think Tyler was ready to understand the concept that you can't play with toys at the toy store, you can only look. And then they were done we went to a store for dad who needed cologne and the boys and I played out in the hallway running up and down the stair ramp and they had a great great time. And then we left. everyone was sooooo gooooooddddd.. I'm very thankful for all the behavioral education that Carrie gave me. I can't express how much it has helped our lives, even with Ben. There was never a scream or cry or anything about having to leave one place for another or not being able to get a toy from the store or not wanting to get off the merry go round. We hear and saw many kids getting upset about all of those things but ours were so gooooodddddd!

On Sunday, we had an easter egg hunt and tried a new brand of gfcf brownies. Niether of teh boys liked them but we did of course! The egg hunt went great, Ben loved it as we had been telling him we were having one. But even Tyler participated. He only needed to see me do it once to understand teh concept and then as long as I walked around with him holding his hand, he'd pick them up and put it in his bucket. I'll try to get some photo's of this uploaded this week

OHHHHHH and he picked up new signs. yeah! He signed apple when I showed him a flash card of an apple and then when I was changing his diaper I was singing him the colors of the rainbow song and he was trying to sign all the colors and he got out purple and blue perfectly! so proud of him!

Ok, on to the news that has me down. I discovered today that if the insurance bills pass, we will still not be covered. It only applies to state funded insurance companies. The city of ann arbor is self funded and Steve's company, I'm pretty sure would qualify as small business so even if we were on his insurance (which isn't nearly as compreshensive as my insurance) so either way we would not qualify. My HR contacdt is looking into all of it for me but it's not really looking so good for us. it's so hard thinking, well one day, there may be a federal bill but again.. time is so so so important. we don't haev a lot of time to wait. I want more for Tyler than he's getting now. I want a good 10 hours at home of ABA in addition to school, I want private speech (he doesn't get specific speech at school very often) and I want music therapy if feesible although I'm flexible on it. I want this all before he turns 3.5. So Steve are gonna do a lot of planning and trying to figure out what to do from here cause he's doing so well and we have another 2 years to really really make a difference in Tyler's life and I want to keep moving forward.