Tate's Texts

My thirteen year old son Tate has autism. He also has 3 brothers and 3 sisters and an iPad with a texting app. Tate loves to text. Often we can hear clearly in the texts things he could not communicate orally. When conversing orally with Tate there are delays while he processes and tries to catch up. There are distractions and we can totally lose him. We interfere with his processing by repeating questions or becoming impatient while we wait on him to process. We try to put words into his mouth and finish his sentences sometimes to speed him up. We often think we know what he is trying to communicate to us and we are not always correct. Tate's written communication is not always easy to understand, especially if he is uninterested in what he is writing about (school work.) However, when Tate is focussed and invested in what he wants to converse about, he nails it. Just as his favorite conversation topic is movies when he is speaking, movies are the number one thing he texts us about as well. Following are some of the best of the best texts Tate has sent us. 

A penny for Tate's thoughts...

This was one of the first texts Tate ever sent. It was sent to his oldest brother Titus. Tate came home from school sick. Tate's science teacher had given him a penny they had used in an experiment. That was two years ago and the penny is still a favorite treasure. Notice how resourceful Tate can be. When he cannot spell the word "picture" to Titus' satisfaction he switches to the word "photo." This photo of the screenshots strung together is a little harder to read than the others. Stick with it. It's worth it. 

               #1 of 3

                  
                  #2 of 3

                           #3 of 3

Tate's thoughts on Jack Black, Goosebumps, and Halloween...

This is a very recent text, sent to Tate's oldest sister Regan. It is an example of what Tate does when he hears of a new movie he'd like to see. He fills someone's inbox with images and texts. The target lately has been Regan. She's so patient with him, even though he misspells her name every single time. Ha 

Tate picks random numbers out of the air when he wants to count something. You might have noticed he says this is Jack Black's 27th movie and he mentions a 26th book. He could have latched onto those numbers from a website but he often just "guesstimates" and has no basis for this guesses. Did you note that October is "4 months, 14 weeks, 24 days" away just a few texts before he says October is "3 months" away? And the name Cooper caused Tate some confusion because it is used more than once by the same actor? Who else would even remember a character's last name was the same in the last movie they saw him in? Words like "niece" being spelled as "nice"," "donkey" instead of "don't," and "vary" when he should have used "very" make these texts even more endearing to me. The joke about the dummy being made of wood and using the word "wood" instead of "would" cracked me up. I seriously doubt it was his own joke. He probably saw it somewhere else. But once in a while Tate really does surprise me with something original. Oh, and the reference to Levi needing to read the books is so funny to me because Levi and Tate neither one like to read much. Both would much rather see a movie. Tate is saying Levi should read the book first but he will not offer to do the same! Tate looks out for Number One! Ha

After all that commentary, Tate still felt the need to send another the next day. 

Tate's birthday is October 11 and Halloween is a favorite holiday so I'm pretty sure the 16th has never been his favorite day of October before. And speaking of Halloween...

#2 is clearing the calendar. I lost it on that one. #4 and #5 are in reference to a Halloween 2 or 3 years ago when we didn't make it to the pumpkin patch and ran by a store to get the kids' some pumpkins to carve after a church service. Tate can hold a grudge for years. 

And speaking of grudges. If he gets mad at Mom for something then his brothers and sisters hear about it. I put his teeth "in danger" in this text. Oh, and things he does not want to do are often "illegal." I wondered where the "bedding" (betting) reference came from and a Facebook friend clued me in. (Thank you Amanda Z.) It is a Big Hero Six reference. Tate uses so many movie lines and they often fit right into a conversation quite appropriately. Sometimes I can identify them but often I cannot. I just know that many of Tate's thoughts are not original but "borrowed." 

Tate's thoughts on braces...

Tate's thoughts on righting a wrong:

and then the next morning....

This was a big deal in Tate's world and made the rounds in our family. It is one of my all-time favorites. The last nine weeks of 7th grade bike rides were part of Tate's Physical Education program at school. He'd just learned to ride a bike at an iCan Shine Bike Camp the summer before and I'd hoped they could work on it at school some. Tate was so upset his bike was "out of place" and being kept at school. When I wouldn't come to his rescue, he planned a bike heist and wanted Levi and all three sisters to assist him in his efforts. They were "gianna" get his bike back. He often texted me pictures of his bike sitting on the front porch "where it belonged" and reminded me that keeping bikes at school was "illegal."Ha

Tate's thoughts on The Tablet of Ahkmenrah:

Most texts are about movies and Tate can become very persuasive (demanding). The Night At The Museum Movies are a favorite. He is obsessed about the tablet of Ahkmenrah and of all the things he misspells, that is not one of them. 

 

Tate's thoughts on justice, and my typos:

What a little hypocrite. His spelling is so much worse than mine!

Tate's thoughts about the care he was receiving in my absence recently:

Notice how Tate reassures me he's okay in the first text. He does that when he's stressed and he wants to reassure himself. A day or so later he texted me to tell me he was too busy to text me. By the end of the week he was hardly missing me. He did great. We'd only been apart that long the two times I travelled to Russia to adopt Sydney. He was 3. I think it was much harder on him back then. Tate's sisters sure will be glad when he learns to spell their names correctly. 

  

And I'll end with my personal favorite. It was so random and I loved how he thinks I'm clueless and need guidance in these things. HA

I have more texts saved but these are my favorites. I may update this post from time to time as I do his photography. If you'd like to see some of Tate's photography...  If you'd like to see Tate's "P I T C H U R S" then here's the link to that: The pictures from Tate's camera

"Why" Questions, With No Answers

I read somewhere that a mother of a five or six year old child answers around 300 questions a day. Multiply that by the number of days in a year and the number of children around. Sometimes moms get tired of answering questions. Sometimes a mom might even tune some of those little voices right out and stop answering some of those questions. I’ve done it.

The where, how, what, and particularly the why questions can get tiring. And it is especially trying for a mom when a child questions her instructions with “why.” I have been known on occasion to use the old “Because I said so” standby that my own mother sometimes used.

My youngest two are eleven and thirteen so I should be done with the constant questions, but I am not. Because of Sydney’s developmental delay it seems we are stuck there, never able to move on to the next stage. I’m almost certain Sydney is still asking me 300 questions a day, much as a five or six year old would. Sometimes I feel like I am living a life like Bill Murray lived in the movie Groundhog Day. It gets so repetitive. Sometimes, I find myself tuning her out and even asking her to stop asking questions for a few minutes so I can concentrate on the task at hand.

Although Tate also has a developmental delay, his is a different story. Due to autism Tate rarely asked me the why or how questions, or much of anything else when he was younger. And when he did, it was something I celebrated by letting everyone close to us know that it had happened. But lately, Tate has surprised me several times, almost grilling me, about a subject. His why questions are coming more often but they are not usually the typical why questions a younger typically developing child would ask. Tate often wants to know the answers to questions that many of us would not ask.

Yesterday Tate asked me where his older sister was. I explained she was on a road trip, travelling to visit friends. So he pressed me for details, wondering exactly where she was. I was taken aback just a little but was happy to answer. I told Tate what state his sister is in right now. He then said, “How come she wanted to visit friends?” and after that one, “When will she be home?” Because Tate very seldom is interested enough to ask questions about these kinds of things, it was surprising to me. And as often happens, when Tate does something he did not do “on time” it is a giant reminder to me of all the things he SHOULD have done. And it reminds me just how far behind he really is, on more than one level. He truly did not understand why his sister would drive hours to see friends. He would not inconvenience himself like that to see someone. Knowing he could not comprehend the WHY behind my daughter’s trip made me sad. But I still celebrated his interest and the fact that he had asked.

Because of Tate’s lack of social skills, sometimes he loudly questions things the rest of us would not because it would be considered rude. For example, when we have visitors in Bible class (Sunday school), he demands to know WHY they have come. No matter how many times I remind him we want visitors to feel welcome and invite them back, he treats them as if they are intruders who need interrogating. I know his questions have a lot to do with the change in his routine. A visitor causes him a little unease. But, I have found myself wanting to ask Tate, “Seriously? Now? Now is the time you decide to ask questions? You did not ask them at all the appropriate times, but you can come up with this many questions when the time is not right?”

Alas, it would do no good to ask him because Tate answers questions with less reliability than he asks them. His receptive language is so much better than his expressive language so he cannot explain the motives he has behind much of anything. He cannot usually tell me why he does anything he does, nor can he put into words how he feels about things. When Tate uses the word “because” in a sentence it seldom really fits. He might explain to me why he paces when he is anxious by telling me, “Because that is what teenaged boys do.” If I ask him why he does not like the braces on his teeth he will tell me something like, “It is illegal to put braces on thirteen year old boys.” I think I know the answers to those questions and I suspect he also knows the answers to those questions but he cannot communicate those things to me with words.  

And just as I was typing up the end of my thoughts on this subject, my husband came from Tate’s room chuckling. He had just asked Tate to speak to his grandparents on the phone. Tate, totally baffled as to the reason his dad was interrupting his movie viewing to speak on the phone, asked, “Why?” Reasons like, “Because they’d like to hear from you.” or  “Because they love you.” do not really solve the mystery for Tate. So the first thing Tate said in the short phone conversation he had with his grandparents was of course, “Why’d you call here?”

You might also enjoy this post: Lost in the Translation or this one: Speaking Tate's Language

A Happy Camper or Not?

The blog is mostly about my two youngest with special needs but this particular post is a little different. Don’t click out when you see the word “bible.” I’m not going to preach to you here. Although my religious beliefs and convictions are extremely important to me and I’d love to share those with you, I am not going to do that here. I’ll get around to my autism related thoughts on this post eventually but you’ll have to take a walk down memory lane with me first. And by the way, if you do want to know more about my religious beliefs then private message me. I only have one topic I like to discuss more than autism. It’s the bible.

I just spent a week in Texas at a bible camp for young people. I was a part of something great there. This particular week at this particular camp was focused on leadership. There were classes on how to lead a song, study the bible, and how to outline, write, and present a lesson. At the end of the week many of the campers presented their first devotional or led a song or public prayer for the first time. Their enthusiasm was so encouraging.

Bible camp has been a huge part of my life as long as I can remember. I loved going as a child. There were bonfires, hayrides, and late night devotionals, crafts, pranks, and silly songs, old friends reunited, and new friends made. We had ping pong tournaments, played card games, and even had watermelon seed-spitting contests. I fell asleep in a rustic cabin with the sounds of girls giggling and crickets and frogs singing. The perfume of the week was always bug spray and sweat. Going to camp was as exciting to me as Christmas. I would pack a week ahead, unpack, and repack. Before I was old enough to go to Little Blue Bible Camp in Missouri, at age nine, I jealously watched my older siblings gather their swimsuits, flashlights, bug spray, ball gloves, and Bibles every year. I’d follow them to their cabins and watch them choose their bed for the week, anticipating the day I would be able to do the same. I remember the first year I was old enough to stay. I got a top bunk and was ecstatic. The abundance of spiders was hard on me but even those spiders could not deter my enthusiasm for camp. As I got older I also went to camp in Kansas and in Nebraska. I loved every one of them. 

When I aged out of going to these camps as a camper, I began going as a counselor. Between my sophomore and junior year of college I spent a whole summer working at a camp in Arkansas near Harding University where I attended college. That was an amazing summer. Three of my kids have chosen to spend their summers working at a camp after they were too old to go as campers. Currently, two of my children are working at Green Valley Bible Camp in Rogers, Arkansas all summer. They are the lifeguards and kitchen help there. They love their jobs.

The camp I attended this week was near Maud, Texas. It is called Camp Ida. I was in charge of crafts. I also worked in the kitchen and it was exhausting work. It was hot and I am covered in mosquito bites, but I am so glad I went. I made some wonderful new friends and heard some great lessons. The bug bites will fade but the friendships and wonderful memories will last.

I was asked the same question many times this week: “Why didn’t you bring your kids?” It is a fair question. Tate is 13 and Sydney is 11. They should be going off to bible camp each summer just as their older siblings have, right? Oh how I wish I could have taken them with me. Most of my readers “know” Tate and Sydney well enough to understand why I did not take them to camp. Sydney actually would have loved camp. Once we got past that first hour in the morning and her medications took control of her hyperactivity she would have been able to sit for most of the daytime activities. But in order to really participate in things she would have needed adult support. She may actually be able to go to camp one day.

It makes me sad but Tate will most likely never go to camp. Tate’s autism and the anxiety that comes with it keep him from doing so many of the things his older siblings have loved. Tate is miserable even visiting the campgrounds his older siblings have attended. He’s grown up watching his older siblings happily ready themselves for a week of camp but instead of anticipating the day he can go, he lives in fear of us sending him to camp too. Recently a friend asked him if he was old enough to go to camp this year. Tate immediately said, “No. I am home-camped.” It cracked me up. He knows what homeschooling is and extended that to camp. I celebrate when he is creative or original because there was a time when he was not able to communicate that way.

As I looked around me this past week at the beauty of the campground and I heard the children playing, singing, and participating in bible classes, I tried to picture Tate there. He would have been using stims to cope and he would have appeared very odd to the other campers. Being the great kids they are, they would have tried to include Tate but he would only have wanted to talk about how many days and hours there were left until he could leave. He would not have been able to sleep at camp and he would have not eaten most of the food available to him there. He would not have enjoyed the pool because he only swims at home when it is quiet and there is no splashing. He would have hated the smells, the sounds, and the heat at camp, but more than any of that he would have hated not being able to have a dvd player in one hand and an ipad or ipad in the other. His movies are as important to him as the food he eats.

I got several texts from Tate this week and a few phone messages. Although he was being very well cared for, he was anxious because I was not home. He went into crisis mode when one of his favorite movies stopped playing due to a scratch on the disc. Of course the scratched disc is one that is not commonly sold at stores so it had to be ordered. Thus he has worried, paced, rung his hands, missed out on sleep, and talked of little else for the past few days. Tate will check the mail each day until it arrives, insisting the date of arrival we were given is probably a mistake and it will actually come earlier. This is our life. This is autism. Autism has robbed Tate of so many precious things, bible camp included.

Want to read more about autism? Try this one: Unpredictability

Unpredictability Means Anxiety

When Tate was a toddler there were many things that caused him anxiety. Taking an alternate route to a familiar place could set him off. A power flicker would guarantee a meltdown. There would be crying, hyperventilating, and lots of stimming. I did not understand the real issue behind the anxiety when Tate was small. I assumed he was afraid of the dark or afraid of thunder as many young children are. He seemed so terrified at the first sign of raindrops. I wondered if he could be afraid of the color orange because detour signs seemed to cause him pain.

Because Tate did not really have conversations but mostly just talked AT us, it was hard to understand what he meant when he tried to tell us things. It was also hard to reason with Tate about anything. I was often left scratching my head, playing detective to decipher what he was trying to tell us.

Being so anxious when it looked stormy left me wondering if maybe Tate had a fear there might be a tornado since we do live in Kansas and have warnings fairly often. I also assumed he was afraid of the dark because of his reaction to a power flicker. I bought flashlights that charge in the outlet and stay lit so if the power went out it would not be completely dark. I wrote a social story about storms and the dark. I reassured him anytime he seemed anxious about the weather that our home was very safe. Yet, I could not see we had really helped him at all.

I eventually discovered Tate’s anxiety was not really about the darkness or the storm outside and definitely had nothing to do with the color orange. As I watched him react to detour signs in the road and light switches that would not respond, I came to realize Tate was really afraid of the unpredictability a power flicker or a detour sign brought. He had to be able to COUNT ON the lights when he flipped the switch. He needed to be able to COUNT ON the road that took us to his school or to the store. Tate’s world revolved around routine and sameness. When we drove a different route to a familiar location, he panicked. When the lights went out, the television stopped and the video games stopped it was all out of his control. The meltdown was not out of anger and never about the fact that a power outage had caused his movie to prematurely end, as it might have been for a typical toddler. The meltdown was out of anxiety because he did not KNOW when the power would come back on or the road would open back up. Tate could not handle the fact that the television and lights were no longer reliable or our route to the store had changed. Tate has to KNOW what comes next in order to feel secure. He needs to be able to hit “play” on the DVD player and know it will play. He needs to know we take two rights and then a left to get to his school. His world is much smaller than yours or mine. 

Tate is 13 now and barely has a reaction these days when our power flickers or goes out during a storm. He never becomes anxious if we see a detour sign now either. I am elated at the progress he has made. The last few times we have had power outages at home, he retired to his bed with a flashlight and a battery operated game. He stims a little more but he does not cry or panic. There is light at the end of our dark tunnel… pun intended.

Tate still has anxiety often and sometimes there is little I can do to help. The last nine weeks of this past school year, Tate’s bicycle was at school. Bike riding was incorporated into Tate’s P.E. class at my request. Having his bicycle at the school upset Tate. His anxiety level skyrocketed and his number one topic of conversation for three or four weeks was about his bicycle. And then he stopped obsessing as if it had never been a problem. That is progress.

Our school district’s Extended School Year (ESY) began recently. ESY is just another name for summer school. We actually do not call it by either name at our house. We call it math camp. Tate does not go to SCHOOL in the summer but he is willing to participate in MATH CAMP. And as every other child is walking through the school doors to have summer school, Tate is going to “math camp.” Anything to avoid the anxiety.

Ten years with the autism diagnosis and I am still learning. The same week ESY was to begin I was going to be away from home for four or five days. I needed to prepare Tate for what to expect while I was gone. I explained he would be escorted to Math Camp by an older sibling. I showed him I had bought his favorite snacks. The more I talked the more he stimmed. His eyes were beginning to water and his face was going splotchy. I assumed he was upset because I was leaving or because summer school was starting but that was not the problem. Tate reminded me the new Sponge Bob movie would be out on Tuesday while I was gone and I had promised to take him to buy it. As soon as his older sister assured him she would take him straight from the school to Walmart, his face cleared up and his stimming stopped. It was all about the movie, of course!

A few years ago the conflicts and the anxiety were much harder to manage. Tate’s communication and my detective skills were not as developed a few years ago. Tate could not calm himself as quickly then as he can now. That light at the end of the tunnel keeps getting brighter!

If you liked this one you might like to read: Don't Touch My Skin