Hobos, Goosebumps and Wiffle Balls

When my youngest son Tate was diagnosed with autism, he was around two and a half years old. Our story is similar to a lot of others I’ve heard over the years. There was an initial frantic search for services and therapies, years of early intervention that were hard to pay for, then denial that my son would be forever handicapped. Much progress was made and there were hopes of a “recovery” and then finally, there was acceptance.

Some days are a little harder than others. Most days we do okay. A sense of humor helps. A lot. Knowing we are not alone also helps. I like to blog about our experiences in hopes that I can make things a little easier for the parents who are coming after me. Lately I’ve been illustrating some of the things Tate does that may seem a bit odd to others in an effort help people understand autism a little better.

At age fourteen, Tate still sometimes misses things that are very obvious to the rest of us. And sometimes he is sure he understands things the rest of us are confused about when the reverse is actually true. Because Tate sees the world differently than I do I am often learning things from him. I have learned to appreciate his unique take on things.  

Below are a few of the illustrations I have made so you can have a peek into our lives. There are many more to come so watch for future posts. 

He technically knew what he was talking about here.

Tate's tries hard to make jokes. He thought telling his sister that she was not really seeing cows was so funny to him. He sure schooled us on what a hobo is too.

Wiffle a ball? 

This is one of my favorite happenings ever. Tate was so excited to share his discovery.

He sure thought he was helping here. 

Figurative language is often a problem for Tate. 

If only we all said what we really mean...

Goosebumps have nothing to do with geese? 

I learned never to try to teach Tate about figurative language unless there are no distractions.

If you liked this post you might also like: There is no ham in hamburgers.

There is no ham in hamburgers

I have been a mom for 27 years. I was 25 years old when I became a mom for the first time. As almost every mom will tell you there is no describing the overwhelming love a mother feels for her child. You really cannot know that feeling until you become a parent. As a young mom of a typically developing child, and then two, and then three, and then four.... I got to do a lot of amazing things with my kids. I enjoyed my time with them very much. When my sixth child was born I was not quite so young anymore. I had children at home, aged 13, 11, 8, 6, and 3. I'd had enough experience to know what I was doing. I had taught a lot of kids to walk, talk, use a spoon, brush their teeth, dress themselves and all the other things moms teach their kids to do. I really knew what I was doing. Except this time I did not. This time my baby did not learn the things I tried to teach him. This time was different. And around age two and a half the things he had been able to learn he seemed to forget. And that's when I knew. That is when I knew that something was really not right. And I first heard the word "autism." Autism has robbed my son Tate of a lot of things but autism has not robbed us of everything. Autism has never been able to limit our love. Autism has not taken our sense of humor. And in spite of autism, we have a really good life. Tate, not autism, is celebrated every day. Tate makes my heart smile. He does that in a lot of ways. Sometimes even the obsessions, struggles and misunderstandings are an endearing part of our lives. Tate is different than his siblings but different is not always bad or wrong. Different is just different. 

I have tried to illustrate some of the ways Tate thinks differently. 

Tate, being a very literal thinker is often struggling to understand figurative language. Words with more than one meaning are also often misunderstood. Here are just a few of the things I've had to try and reconcile for Tate recently. 

If Tate believes someone is upset with him he becomes anxious. It is not often I lose my patience with Tate. I know it will take him longer to get past a conflict than it will me and usually if I have to correct him I do it with a smile on my face so he understands he is not "in trouble." Sometimes though I slip. The following illustrates the results if I lose my cool.

...

Nine months of each year for the past three, Tate insists on wearing a hoodie. He has several, his favorite have a Kansas University Jayhawk on them. He becomes upset if he is asked to take the hoodies off but sometimes I must insist. His hoodies are as important to Tate as a blanket or pacifier can become to a baby. A hoodie seem to be his comfort item. 

Tate, like many people his age would rather not help with chores. Sometimes he can be coaxed into helping out but most of the time he is ready with an excuse. The exception is laundry. A few months ago he discovered he likes to do laundry and he takes his job very seriously. 

Tate's little sister drives him crazy but he is also very protective of her. He can yell at her himself but he sure does not want anyone else saying a cross word to her. Sydney was born in Russia and we adopted her before her first birthday. Tate tells me often that her Russian heritage should exempt her from behaving. It makes perfect sense to him.

If you liked this post, you might also like Tate's Texts.

Scripting Sponge Bob

One of the things we lived with long before Tate got his diagnosis of autism was Echolalia (repeating words, phrases, or whole dialogues). Although we had no idea it had a name or it was a sign of autism, we thought it odd. Tate would repeat the last word of my sentences or sometimes my whole sentences. He often repeated what he said too and sometimes the second time it was whispered.

Tate, age 3

As a toddler Tate said, “Mommy” all day long and I would usually answer with, “What?” He started calling me, “Mommy What.” He echoed my “What” right into my name for months. I thought it sounded really sweet but still had no idea why he did those strange little things that his five older siblings had never done.

When Tate was a little older he would repeat advertising jingles, lines from cartoons, or pages from picture books randomly throughout his day. I have heard others recently calling this scripting instead of echolalia. Either way it seems to be very common in kids with autism.

I follow a video blogger called Autism Hippie. Look for her on Facebook. Her son Mike scripts all day long and he starts early. He wakes his mom with a line from a movie or a video game and she hears the same line for hours at a time sometimes. One of my favorite blogs is Conversations With Casey. It is also a video blog. Casey does not script verbally much but scripts in a different way. He memorizes the movements of a musician in a video or of an actor in a scene of a movie and then repeats the actions over and over with the audio in the background. His violin “playing” fools people sometimes. His violin is silent but Casey sure looks like he is a virtuosos. I would highly recommend finding this blog on Facebook as well.

Tate has scripted for years but these days he usually only scripts with one-liners and it is not always evident to people what he is doing. He can cleverly fit lines from movies into situations where they often apply. Sometimes they are very random though, unfitting and odd. When Tate pipes up with a one-liner I can sometimes recognize it as one he has used before or I can even remember the movie it came from. Sometimes though, I cannot. Often I will hear it later in a movie he is watching and say, “Aha!”

A few days ago I got a phone call midday from Tate’s resource room teacher whom I appreciate very much. She is wonderful with Tate and she is a great communicator. She called because Tate had said something very inappropriate to his paraprofessional and she thought I should know how they handled it. Tate had randomly said, “Let’s get naked.” Of course this kind of thing could become a real problem in a public school setting! Tate’s teacher and I knew his comment was not of a sexual nature but also knew others might not be so understanding. Tate needed to realize that he could not ask people to “get naked.” She said he was very receptive when she told him that he could not say that anymore. He said he would not. I told Tate’s teacher that I was sure he probably got the line from a movie. I hung up the phone and a few minutes later it rang again. Tate’s teacher decided she would ask Tate if his offensive line had come from a movie. Without missing a beat he said, “Sponge Bob, Season 3.” I searched online immediately and up popped a scene in which Patrick said, “Let’s get naked.” to Sponge Bob.

This incident reminded of a book I had read by Sean Barron, an author with autism who has written about his experiences. He reminisces in one of his books about being young and memorizing lines in shows that were followed by canned laughter. He’d try out the line on his classmates or teacher the next day but rarely get the response he wanted. He did not understand that not all of those lines were funny when out of context. I am not sure that Tate is doing the same and delivering lines to get laughter but he is delivering lines so that he can interact with people. When Tate said, “Let’s get naked” I can be fairly certain that he had no intentions of doing so and did not expect his para too either. Sponge Bob’s answer to Patrick was “No” in the episode. I imagine Tate fully expected his para to say, “No” and then Tate would have had a “conversation” under his belt for the day.

Tate, January 2015

When you meander through life not understanding how to start a conversation, yet wanting to engage people, I can imagine that scripting would be what kids like Tate would turn to. I think Tate was just trying to “converse” with his para and this is how he tried. Of course, it could also have just been a random stim too. Tate does do a lot of stimming and scripting is a stim. I could just inquire of Tate as to why he asked his para to get naked. But Tate cannot tell me the whys. And if I did ask it would cause him anxiety because he cannot answer. If I try to have a serious conversation with Tate he usually sees it as discipline and becomes very stressed. I say it often, “I’d love to get inside that head of his for a while and see what is going on.” ha

This is a much older post, also about Echoes. You might like to read it if you want to read more about echoes or stimming. 

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