May 19th, 2006

I had the most wonderful night last night. I was invited to say a few words at the Kindervelt Annual Meeting where they inducted the new president and board and presented a check to Children's Hospital's Division of Develpomental and Behavioral Pediatrics..(where Jakob goes)

Sitting in that room and standing in front of those awesome women, I remembered the Autism Every Day video...and wow, I felt at home. In this room sat a whole lotta moms, most with typical kids, a few like me but all with an unconditional love for children. Not only do they take care of their own kids, they take a lot of time out of their lives helping other people's kids. And to be in that room with these classy ladies and know that each and every one of them can, at least to some degree, understand my life.........it was nice. Really nice.

I met a couple of autism moms and even Jakob's art teacher (who he'll have in kindergarten next year). One mom...who I've been told at least 23 times that I needed to meet...was there. What a doll. No lie...I walked up to her and she immediately put an autism awareness necklace and bracelet on me. She had made them herself...too sweet. She was something...so positive, so energetic, so funny. Her daughter is older than Jakob so she's been doing this for a lot longer than me. She gave me hope...hope for Jakob and a little hope for me. If her daughter can do so well and improve so much that this mom has time to take care of herself...then maybe, I can pull it off too. Honey, if you're reading this...thank you for being so strong and giving us newer moms hope. God knows, one thing we autism moms must always have is hope...

So anyway...

I was hoping that I could just bask in the warmth of last night for a few days...but no luck. The everyday stresses hit me smack in the face this morning. I still have hope...but I do feel a little beat up. I really did it this time and I just hope I can fix it. I think I can...I hope, I hope, I hope...I've thought about writing about my potential downward spiral...I just haven't figured out what to say yet...I'm working on it and I'll write about it soon...just not quite yet...

Thank goodness that over the emotional few days I've had, Jakob's been great. He's laughing, he's happy, he's definitely energentic and entertainly onery. There have only been a few squeals of disagreement or defiance and maybe 1 or 2 meltdowns...a big improvement. I'm still seeing some stimming behaviors but not as many and he's doing fewer sensory seeking activities...like chewing and crashing. All of his therapies are going well...he's been very cooperative. He sure could use some OT though (hint, hint, JA)...

Jakob is almost out of school for the summer and it will be interesting to see how he'll handle the change in his schedule...I'm hopeful that all will go ok...very hopeful.