Winter

Therapy has been going well.  We missed a day this week due to Andrew having the stomach flu but he has been pretty happy and isn't fighting too much to do what is asked of him during his sessions.  If he comes into therapy crabby they usually start with a letter or number activity to calm him down before getting to the hard work.  Andrew LOVES letters and numbers.  It's not anything new, but he loves to spell words and often we find him spelling things with his blocks or magnet letters.  It's almost as if he just sees the word a couple times and memorizes it, then becomes obsessed with spelling it everywhere.  After getting him on the school bus the other day, I walked into our basement to turn off the lights he had left on down there only to find he had dumped a bunch of our board games out all over the floor.  Then I saw this spelled out with the game letters.  Winter was one of his spelling words at school this week!  Instead I decided to leave the mess on the floor for awhile :)

Therapy update #2

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday!  After having a short week for the holiday we got back on schedule with therapy appointments.  Andrew didn't have a great day Tuesday and when we pulled into the parking lot he started getting crabby.  He wasn't very happy during the half hour session and didn't do as much which got me a bit discouraged.  I was so worried that he didn't like it anymore and wouldn't want to go.  Luckily, I was wrong.  When we got there Thursday he went in smiling again.  He worked hard with his therapist and when it came time to do this computer activity where he is supposed to listen to a sound in the headphones and then click a clicker when he hears something; he actually let her put them on his head!  In the past he refused to put them on because when he hears sounds in the headphones it freaked him out.  Granted he only kept them on about 30 seconds but after taking them off, a couple minutes later he voluntarily picked them back up and put them on again so it's at least SOMETHING!  Look at that smile on his face!  I'd love to tell you all we are seeing improvements but he's only had about 2 hours of therapy total so far so there's a long way to go.  I'm just glad he is happily participating for now :)

Our first week...

Andrew has had his first two therapy sessions this week.  He did pretty great.  He willingly ran to the back room when we arrived because he remembered all the fun things that were there when we previously went for the evaluation.  During the second session there was a pretty minor meltdown when he didn't want to do a certain activity.  He tried to head butt the therapist and then the floor.  She reacted amazingly by telling him she understood he needed a break.  She calmly sat across from him on the mat and gave him his favorite therapy putty for him to play with. Then she immediately joined in with the putty and within a couple minutes he was smiling and laughing with her!  She just seems to have a way with him. 

I LOVED watching through the little one sided window to see how Andrew is when I'm not around.  I've never been to a place that had that before.  I snapped a few photos through the window so hopefully they don't mind.  We also got some at home exercises that we'll be trying this weekend as well as a CD to listen to daily that is supposed to have certain sounds that stimulate certain parts of his brain.  We'll see how he tolerates that!  Keep checking in for updates with us.  We only have one session next week due to Thanksgiving but are excited to keep on going!

 

Here we go!!

    Well, tomorrow is the big day!  Andrew will have his first therapy session with the Brain Balance program tomorrow after school.  We are overjoyed with the generosity of all our friends and families.  We have officially raised $5420 as of this morning to pay for the initial start up costs with the program.  This will cover 36 hours of therapy for Andrew.  We can't wait to see how it goes.

   For "typical", verbal children the program suggests one hour sessions 3 times a week but with non-verbal children on the autism spectrum they like to start off a bit slower to see how things go.  They want to make sure that Andrew stays engaged the entire session and since he has a short attention span we will be going twice a week at 30 minutes per session, but will most likely increase as time goes on.  The good news is that no matter how fast or slow you go with the program, the results should be the same.  Kids don't "lose" the progress they make.  We will update at the end of the week to let you all know how it goes in his first couple of sessions.  He has not been a very good boy lately so pray for us that he is cooperative for the therapist!

Thanks for visiting!

   We are creating this page to share updates about our son's progress during his participation in the Brain Balance Program in Vernon Hills, Illinois. 
Our son, Andrew, was born in 2006.  He developed completely on track until around 18 months when we realized that he was changing.  He lost the handful of words that he had and started to drift off into his own little world.  He no longer noticed when people came or left a room and would just sit and play quietly, alone.
    It was just after his 2nd birthday that he was officially diagnosed with Autism.  We immediately started getting him speech and occupational therapies.  He began school at the age of 3 in a classroom with other autistic children for five hours a day where he also got therapy.  I began reading every book and attending every conference or support group that had to do with autism so I could learn how to get my child back.
   He has been through hell.  From having eye surgery at 6 months old for esotropia (crossed eyes/weak muscles), twice having upper GI scopes for stomach ulcers, to being put under another three times for MRI's and nerve conduction studies in regards to severe pain in his arm, that to this day exists (supposedly due to hyper mobile joints).  Coincidentally he also broke the same arm last year during the school day and no one knows how THAT happened. 
   I love this little boy so much, I can't even describe how much my heart breaks when I see him hurting.  He has very few words and mostly communicates now via a picture exchange system where he hands us little pictures of things he wants.  Despite all his troubles he is one of the cutest, sweetest, most imaginative little boys and; although he may bite you, I haven't met anyone that doesn't fall in love with him.
   We decided long ago that I would quit working and stay home to support Andrew and be available for every one of his needs.  It's hard to find a job that would allow me the time off needed to deal with everything that has gone on with him. 
   Andrew has shown progress each year, but as expected with children on the autism spectrum this progress is slow and far between.  We celebrate every new thing he does; from when he finally learned to point to an object he wanted at 5 years old to when he recently dropped something and accurately used the words "uh oh" to tell me about it! 
   I've recently learned of an amazing program that is available to him called Brain Balance.  I can't believe I haven't tried this already.  Instead of treating the symptoms of autism, this program gets to the root of the problems...by "fixing" their brains for lack of better words.  It sounds too simple but I have listened to so many testimonials from parents explaining the amazing results their kids have had with this program.   The cost is about the same as other therapies ($150 an hour approximately) but unfortunately insurance does not cover any of it so we will need to pay the entire bill.  We are reaching out to others to try and raise the money to pay for this program.  If you can afford to donate any amount of money towards Andrew's enrollment we greatly appreciate it.  If you cannot we thank you for following us on his progress and would love if you could share our blog or the fundraising site with your friends. www.gofundme.com/connectingourkid .  We are excited and finally are not afraid to think about his future and what may become of his life.  With the results this program has shown in other children, Andrew has a chance.
   For more information on the Brain Balance Program you can go to their website www.brainbalancecenters.com or check out the book Disconnected Kids by Dr. Robert Melillo
We are hoping to start the program in late November and need to pay $5500 up front to start.  Please check in with us after that to hear about how Andrew is doing! 
Thank you
-Dana