connections.

Maddy had her hearing test on Friday. It went way better than I could have ever envisioned. This girl has a tendency to prove me WRONG when I think things are going go a certain way. Thankfully, she tends to prove to me that she CAN behave rather than she can't.

Her hearing was fine. Perfect. Great. No issues there. So cross that off the list.

I didn't think there were any issues but I needed to be able to cross off something from the ever growing list of things that need to be assessed.

She did great. Turned her head to the sounds, looked at the lights, and was just a joy. The amazing thing was she had 100% name recognition when we were there. She looked every time her name was called. Consider her name recognition was like 20% in April...this is huge to us. We were out of there in 15 minutes. It took longer to wait in the waiting room than to do her test (typical, right?).

We came home and had another round of speech therapy, this time implementing PEC and ABA. I still don't remember what PEC stands for...and I could google it but I'm sick so I'll just explain it at this point as picture communication. They hold up a picture to explain to Maddy what they are want. Sometimes it's a question...like choosing which picture she wants or it's a request. We start out slowly (just like ABA) and start with the concept of "more". ST (okay, yes it sounds horrible to refer to someone by their job but I'm afraid if I gave her a fake name at this point...I might actually start calling her by that name instead of her real name and yeah...so ST it is) wrote "more" on a piece of paper and made Maddy hand her the card when she wanted "more" m&ms. It took 2 turns of hand over hand (where I hold her hand and her hand holds the card and together we do the action) before she began doing it on her own. By the 6th try, she said "more".

Let's stop for a moment.

I've never head Maddy say "more" before in my life. And to any other parent, it may just be one word out of the thousands that their kids say but to me it was incredible. I couldn't think of anything more beautiful (besides I love you, mama) for her to say at this point. I had chills of excitement through my body as that little girl sat on my lap waiting for her candy.

She didn't repeat the word, though we tried to get her to say it again. But continued with the card. Nice to see it is there and she is connecting that part of her brain. We continued on to another task which involved a Polly Pocket and spoon. She was to give the item to ST depending on what she asked for. I was a bit surprised by this because it's a bit more advanced in ABA. I have read that you start with just her giving you something and then only putting one other thing in there but never asking for it and then finally asking for either item. She did well though. Once she understood what was what then she was right on.

She played for the remainder of the time showing how much of a visual learner she is. As soon as ST would do something, then she would copy that. I have always known how visual she was from a baby but now it really seems to be working in her favor....for now. It will make understanding the concepts of what we want her to do and to make those connections in her brain easier. I can predict that it might be a challenge when we start requiring her to do things with only a voice command (like bring me your shoes from another room or something like that) but that's later. Let me be happy about now. And feel a sense of joy since I too am SUCH a visual learner that I can relate to her.

Her twin sister didn't have such a wonderful time at speech at her first session, but Maelle is quite shy. And stubborn. And at this age, Eva didn't talk to anyone other than her family either. She could speak paragraphs as long as no one else was around. And sure enough, as soon as we left that room, Maelle babbled away happily down the hall holding my hand. Stinker.

Otherwise, things are going well. The melatonin has worked a magic for us as far as bedtime goes. It really is amazing the change we have seen in her. She sleeps in her bed. She hasn't been rocking to sleep. The only downside we have noticed (aside from getting her to TAKE it in the first place) is that she is waking up at 6am now. Ugh. Some mornings it is 5am. She is getting to bed earlier so she is waking earlier. I'm not sure which one I like more...but I do know that I am glad that at least she isn't rocking against the door for hours at night.

Behaviorally....she has developed some issues there. I can say that I am not at all surprised. I expected all of this change on her to manifest in some way and I had also expected it to be her mood and it has been. Don't get me wrong, she is still happy Maddy. But if she doesn't like something, the tantrum has become very physical. She is hitting, pushing, kicking, throwing herself around like a 2 year old bully. And the biting. The biting is bad. Oddly enough, I'm thankful that Eva was a biter so this isn't foreign territory. But she was much younger with her biting (which makes sense with Maddy's developmental age being around 18 months - that's how old E was when she bit) so she was easier to contain. And she didn't have anyone other than me or herself or Justin to bite. So you can imagine that Maddy's main biting target is.....Maelle. Who in turn has started to bite as well. Ah yes. Why is it that bad behaviors are easier spread than good ones? But we're dealing with it. It's challenging and frustrating but I know her frustration is the root of all of it and once we break through the communication wall we are up against, it will get better. I know this. Sometimes you have to accept some bad that comes with the good, knowing that the good will later eliminate the bad.

And we're waging a war at this point. A war against Autism. Autism that is trying to immerse Maddy in a world where only she exists. We want her in our world. With us. We will win. But it will not be easy. So I have to remember that when she is at her worst...and when she is at her best. It's a fight to drag her out of Autism's grip. I can thank Catherine Maurice for giving me those images to trudge forward with. She fought a battle and won twice....rare, but it can happen.

For now, we are in the midst of chaos. Really. Sometimes I don't even know where to begin because we went from being stuck at home to running from appt to therapy to appt to therapy and back. My house. My life. My mood. My brain. My world shows it.

Case and point: I was at the salon finally getting my haircut (it's been since February...yes, i deserved that one) and at the end of my appointment, I took out my day planner to schedule my next cut (hoping if I schedule then I won't wait half a year to do it) and the stylist admired my planner.

"oh I need to get one of those! How great, you have your own planner."

and I looked up at her and started with "Yes...." and then stopped. I was about to tell her that my child was recently diagnosed with Autism and she has so many appointments now that I needed somewhere to write them all down or I would forget and I can't forget these very important- and then I thought. STOP. This woman doesn't need to know any of this. Just say thank you.

"yes, thanks, it's nice to have" I responded and that was all. A seemingly normal conversation, thankfully to her. And that made me realize just how out of it my brain was getting. Just how immersed I am.

So forgive me if I don't stop myself in the future and we have a really odd conversation like that one could have ended up being. I realize now that my brain isn't totally connected either.