2 Year Autism Anniversary

June 20, 2010July 16, 2017 Jean Myles

This is a positive! If not, what would we do, sit here and wallow? No, we need to accept what we are given and enjoy life!!! Each and every day!

Today is not the official 2 year anniversary of the day the word Autism was thrown out there, but it marks the anniversary of Jaylen’s very first therapy session! He was actually evaluated for the first time on May 22nd, 2008, and then the word Autism was brought up.

That was the day our world fell apart, but also the day we picked ourselves up and moved forward! I will never, ever forget that moment. The world actually stopped spinning for a few seconds, you may have felt it, and I looked down at my baby and started to cry. As he played with the toys in the evaluation room I felt almost every negative emotion known to man. And that is not an exaggeration; I felt:

sorrow,
guilt,
pity,
anger,
frustration,
confusion,
loss,
fear,
worry,
and many others.

But shortly after came understanding. The understanding that this didn’t change anything. Actually, it did. We were going to get help. We were going to do the best we could every day from then on out. But it didn’t change my baby. He was the same, just now had been given a label; a diagnosis.

There is no way to convey to you the feeling of that day, it is impossible. But that day and the day Xavier was born and they took him away and told us something was very wrong to go down as the most memorable of my life. Who knew motherhood would be like this?

Back to the subject at hand…So therapy began at the house about 3 weeks later. We had a Speech teacher who came for about 1 month. After just one month she suggested there was something more, as they had hinted at during the evaluation. The coordinator, one of the greatest people we have met through this process, came to the house and did a session with him and knew right away that he needed more. Once again the word Autism was mentioned several times. And it was decided Jaylen would start ABA (Applied Behavior Analysis) DTT (Discrete Trial Testing) in a classroom daily. My baby was going to school and he wasn’t even 2 yet. But that started in September so we can visit that later…

Early Intervention was a miracle. An absolute miracle. Jaylen is now very high functioning, verbal, can do many self-help skills, understands the basics of emotion and socialization, and has improved behavior wise. We still have a long way to go. Autism will not go away for us. But we are OK with it and as I said, are doing the best we can every day.