Tyler is doing really great potty training at school. He was dry all day last Thursday at school and he goes potty within 30 seconds, typically, of them sitting him on the potty.  Really proud of him. In fact the other day, he was between potty sitting times at school and the parapro noticed him kinda squatting and he looked at the toilet and she said somethign to the effect of you can go potty so he jumped on the toilet and went poo poo. Now we just need to find a way to have time for this schedule at our house.  Sit on potty for 3 mins, off potty (no pants on for 10) back on potty for 3. That's a lot of potty and you gotta sit with him. 

This past weekend I took Steve to the gym with me.  I initially chose the place because it was inexpensive, all classes are included in the cost, and best of all they had childcare facilities and upon further review, staff with experience in special ed. So Saturday was the first time we all went, finally got all the paperwork together I needed to get the boys in there.  As we were signing in, the lady asked their names so I introduced them and then said this is Tyler, he has autism and is non verbal.  She hollers back into the play area, "ERIN".... so Erin comes running up.. teh lady mentions Erin is their special ed expert. So Erin goes.. hey, were you guys at splash camp last year? Um yep! She remembered Tyler adn me. She worked the camp last year, yeah, then I knew he was in good hands. The boys were there for almost 2 hours and did fantastic adn it was nice for Steve and I to be able to work out together.

Upon leaving there we went to lunch and luckily we've got that system down for the most part, then we took the boys to Toysrus to use their gift cards.  Tyler got a bike helmet which he's not at all happy about, school is helping us work with him on wearing it.  It's really becoming apparant to people in the outside world tha tsomething isn't quite right with Tyler due to his behavior. For example, Steve and I took turns hanging out with Ty at the front of TOys r us for the most part, wher ehe played with random toys but not the way normal kids would play. his nose is about 1 cm fron the floor as he crawls to chase a wind up toy for example. Then he screeches and squeals and runs in circles with delight. Got a few looks for sure. 

We ran another couple of errands and ended up at stride right, they are having a buy one get one 50% off sale and we needed to get the boys their summer shoes.  Tyler never functions well in stride rite, it's hot, bright lights, lots of people and kids in a small space, his idea of hell really. So he's melting down after we sized him (which by teh way the lady was awesome, we said right up front, Tyler has autism and doesn't understand shoe sizing and you need to be fast!! she rocked).  so she got the new shoes and tried them on tyler as I was doing my kisses/breathes to his neck and he giggled but this was all because hew as starting to melt down. Then he albeit refused to put his old shoes back on and was screaming and flopping around, he kinda becomes liquid and you cant' even get him to hold himself in any position. WEll supermom next to us kept staring an disgust like can't you keep your kids in order.  GRRRR.. I was just hoping she'd say something to me. I  mean for petes sake there was a 2 year period where we never were able to go out to eat as a family, and not only had we done that but Tyler had been in a new play facility, went to a toy store and was awesome the whole time so give the kid who is on sensory overload a frickin' break already. So she was lucky..ddin't mention a word to me because believe me I had a comeback. Then speech mentioned something to me. She had a mom once who handed out cards to people looking at them and never said anything. I made cards a while back, and I really liked this idae, want to revisit it.  Because I don't watn Tyler to be able to use "autism" as an excuse in life, I also don't watn Ben to constantly hear me tell people Tyler has autism, as if it's an excuse for bad behavior, not that it's not a reason. I just feel like if I can inform people quietly about the situation and provide a littel education in the mean time without the kids even knowing it, that's not such a bad plan.  Ok so we got shoes (they are finally in different sizes) and went to the play area.  Tyler went up to a complete stranger (mom) on the sidelines and wanted her cinnastick. I apologized for his behavior and she goes oh it's ok can he have it. I said unfortunately no, he's on a very strict diet but thank you so much. Then later he runs up to a lady on teh otehr side (must like the chics) and tried to pull her down to play horse with him. aweweee... and super dad Steve came over and played horse with Tyler :) what a great daddy.

Have been writing this update for a couple of days, cant' seem to find enough time to complete it. Both the boys seems to have colds, runny noses, coughs, a bit whiny...usually April is their last cold of the season, hopefully this is it :)

So Tyler's new medication

The new medication is on order. The names are spironolactone and naltrexone.

Sprinolactone: This drug takes several days to take effect. It is a synthetic steroid that acts as a competitive antagonis to alosterone.  Boys with autism tend to have higher than normal levels of testosterone.   Strangely enough, it's also used to treat PCOS (poycustic ovarian syndrome), hey, maybe I should take it too!

Naltrexone: is an opioid receptor antagonist used primarily in teh mgmt of alcohool dependendce (whoa). As you may recall from earlier posts, the biomedical beliefs of autism that these kids cannot break downt eh toxins and proteins properly in their bodies and they they become opiate type inhibitors in the brain, making them act as if they were on opiates, this drug essentially supposed to block this type of response.  Or maybe the doctor thinks ty is an alcoholic.. jk of course.

Ok, here is an intersting link to an article about the potential that autism is caused by a virus.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-kirby/is-autism-associated-with_b_316986.html

P.S. Ben woke up me at 4 a.m. to tell me he was taking a really really good nap! I said, good, keep sleeping. THen of course I couldn't fall back asleep..little bugger