Added 4 new videos to 18 – 19 Months and 19 – 20 Months.

* First of all: all of you fuckers and the “Wear Blue for World Autism Awareness Day” shit:

…we’ve been WELL AWARE of autism EVERY DAY since February 25, 2010. But thanks for suggesting I think about autism today! I was hoping I could forget about it for just a little bit, because I’ve got a long time to be aware of autism..

Sigh. 🙂

* Tristan is beginning to be interested in the pushing and pulling of the popcorn popper toy. Actually, he’d prefer we do it for him – he straight out requests help by bringing the item and putting one of our hands onto it. For some reason, he has trouble keeping the thing level enough on the ground to roll it back and forth, but he recognizes how it should go. This reminds me how he also doesn’t roll cars and carlike toys around, also kind of odd for his age. And he has plenty of opportunity and carlike toys.

* He walked up next to Daddy last night while he was washing dishes and very clearly said “up.” It’s no secret that Tristan loves the water and wanted his paws in there. I was so pleased to hear a verbal request in perfect context that I jumped up and lifted him so he could put those paws into the water, even though it’s technically a bad idea to get him used to interrupting dishes. 🙂

* We got him a shitload (figuratively; have to touch it to eat it) of Play-Doh. He loves to put the lid onto the canisters and have me help remove it.. but he doesn’t want to touch the clay. By “doesn’t want to touch,” I mean that I put it into his hands many times and he dropped it like a hot potato. We shall see, though. I figured it would be a nice tactile experience for him but it might just weird him out for now. Just remember – this kid used to not particularly notice bubbles, and now he babbles about bubbles in the bath.

* James has been working with Tristan on teaching him new stuff, specifically communication skills and items on the autism questionnaires. We’ve had some success teaching him (or letting him figure out) general problem solving skills.

* Not long ago, I wrote about how Tristan had two modes of diaper change: “cooperative” and “fuck that, you ain’t getting near me with a 10 foot pole.” He has decided to split the middle and start each one by screaming and protesting with the thrashing wet noodle body. However, he tends to calm down and be somewhat playful by the end. I’ve stopped mostly protesting his protests and have just started putting him on the table despite them.

* Tristan has been mostly sleeping well but he’s been going down to sleep poorly. To work with that, I decided to stop entertaining him while he is in his crib. I think what happens is that I tend to put him down, tickle and bounce him for 10 minutes, and then he’s pissed about me deciding to leave. It’s hard to reinforce behavior behind a closed door, especially when the end goal is sleep – can’t go in there and praise him for not screaming. We shall see how this turns out!

* Since two of my closer mommy friends went back to work this past month or so (and one of them is now across the COUNTRY as well), I’ve been feeling out of odds socially. Well, moreso than usual. I’ve been among my usual group of casual mommy acquaintances but I sort of feel “extra” around them now. And irrelevant. I suspect that they have just gotten to know each other better since I don’t communicate well enough to keep on par, so it stings just a little to hear them all making plans where I know we’re not invited. So I will have to decide whether I want to just suck it up and deal with it or find new casual mommy acquaintances. If it were All About Tristan here, well.. it doesn’t matter! Tristan doesn’t seem to even care whether familiar (or any) kids are around as long as we do fun things with him. I don’t especially want to teach that people are expendable but it seems to be the case! Wait.. why fight the notion that if your friends don’t work out, you move on? Sigh. Still looking to get to know geeky parents better, still terribly sucking at dashing out emails or phone calls about small talk and plans.

waking up slowly and babbling “dadadada”

Added 28 new photos to 18 – 19 Months and 19 – 20 Months.

Tristan’s grandma (my mom) is in town for the weekend. He’s taken well enough to her, but he is so very attached to us! We went to a park – Lakewood Park, I think – and she let Tristan wander around and explore, something we don’t often let him do anymore (I should make an effort to). We all went on the swings together and took pictures..

Later on, we put Tristan down for a nap and left his grandma in charge of making sure he didn’t teleport away from his crib, and then James and I went out shopping. Shopping and having lunch without a toddler is kind of nice, even when you forget to take advantage of this and go try on clothing while you’re at the mall. We got back to learn that poor Tristan had woken up from his nap with the Bloody Murder scream and she was sort of confounded as to how to deal with it – we forgot to mention his habit of waking up screaming at around 4:20 after going down for a 3:00 nap. They did not end up with him returning to the nap, so they had some peekaboo and other adventures and left us to our shopping.

As usual when we leave Tristan in someone else’s care, we have a ton of silly bad luck. This time, as we all regrouped, Tristan was lying on the chaise lounge. I noticed a large amount of liquid on his.. pants. Suddenly, he was soaking the chaise! His diaper had come loose. So we had a piss couch on top of the exceptionally fussy toddler on hand who missed half of his nap because he had gas pain, because we forgot to slip him the Mylicon. There are just too damn many things to remember in the care of Tristan. Or we suck at communicating them and remembering to do them ourselves. But in any event, one of our last possible remaining sleep surfaces has been urinated upon, so be aware if you feel the need to sleep in our home. (We advise against sleeping in our home unless you live here or are really good at not waking toddlers and being patient when said toddler decides to wake anyway and scream the Bloody Murder scream at 4:20 am instead of during his afternoon nap. That is a downside to the very concise floorplan we chose here.)

Tristan’s grandma put him in the bathtub (second bathroom, not the shower we normally use together) and splashed around with him for quite some time. He got fussy somewhere in there, but that’s no surprise – he’d managed to go more than two hours without food and drink. But before his fussing, they had lots of fun and many pictures were taken..

On Sunday, we all went to the Children’s Discovery Museum. My mom was thoroughly amazed with the intricacy of the place. James, Tristan, and I finally got to use the moving floor thingie as a family:

At a few other times, Tristan was observed doing something that resembled sitting quietly and playing. We were very confused:

Tristan took very well to his grandma. She also managed to not get him killed, which is a major requirement for getting to see him again. She spent a lot of time trying to stimulate him into talking and learning and doing all of the crazy shit that we’ve all been focusing on since the whole “maybe autism” thing. I’m sure he misses his play buddy – perhaps he will express that to us!

This is what I’d teach to my kid if he does learn to understand it..

Sharing is a good thing. If we bring stuff of yours out, you can take turns at it but you should pass it on. You don’t HAVE to, but people will like you better that way. I will show you often how to share, negotiate, and defend yourself so I won’t need to do it for you. Don’t ever pick on someone when the fight isn’t fair – as a toddler, this means you don’t steal shit from kids who can’t walk or whose parents are going to be angry with them for being in the situation in the first place.

Making people like you is a really good thing, even if you are not interested in people, because people can help each other. If you are nice to your friends and share with them, they will like you more and they will be nice to you and share with you more unless they’re just mean people, in which case you find other people. If you only think of yourself, they will stop thinking of you because there needs to be a balance. We are part of a community, and that is based on things we share.

So, as a toddler, I will compliment you when you share, but for one reason or another.. I don’t think you yet get why people share. That’s ok! You’re 19 months old. But whether you get it or not, I do want to emphasize to you that sharing gets you more attention than hoarding or stealing.

I’m about to take Tristan into this world of ours just like everything is ok, just like we did last week. But everything’s not as ok. I’m suddenly uncertain. What am I doing? Is this what is right for him? Does he even learn this way?

I had such a mindstorm yesterday that I don’t remember much of the day at all. I had lots of things I wanted to say.. to people who know us, to the world in general, to my family. Right now I am sort of blanked out, because it’s annoyingly early and Tristan woke up screaming. Thankfully, he’s settling back down again.

I appreciate everyone’s carefully crafted words of comfort. But please know this.. I am kind of socially awkward myself. I know you can’t tell that because I seem to be really friendly and happy and care for you a lot. But once I go to try to contact people, even my own family, something fails. Please continue to contact us. But don’t worry about the carefully crafted words. I specifically just want to be surrounded by life as it is and not by people tiptoeing and worrying what to say.

I repeat: if you have something you want to share whether that be “I noticed you and your kid doing some hand flapping” or “my kid just learned how to say complicated words” or “my relationship is doing horribly today” or “let’s talk about that health care vote.” Just please take the extra effort to tell me about your life and don’t worry about the words of strength. Or that I sort of suck at maintaining contact. That’s why I tell these stories via blog and not emails, anyway!

Anyway, a lot of what I think about is contrasting Tristan with other kids. The strange thing is that I really like him compared to other kids except when he’s just not interested in hanging out with me. I’ve been talking about these things I need to train him to do, like walking alongside me/us, and in some ways we have a free pass now. Who expects an autistic kid to be really good at doing shit like sharing and walking alongside a parent without extensive training by professionals? But the main point is for me not to stress out about it now and just go with the age he is..

We had the evaluation today.

The doctor spent a very short time with Tristan. The doctor pronounced that this is probably autism, and went on to say a “better than even” chance. The doctor said that Tristan probably will have a good life; grow up, have a job, have a family. The doctor said that he can learn to make sense of society but that this child really does think differently from the norm and has his own agenda.

We went to the KaiserPlex just like any other doctor appointment. Parking was horrible and we were lucky to get a spot by the rear of the building. We went in and Tristan had VERY high energy – it took me to chase after him while James signed him in for the appointment. Maybe five minutes later we were ushered in and put in an exam room, where Tristan started trying to flip out over being confined and measured. About twenty minutes later, the doctor doing the evaluation called us in.

We were led into a slightly larger office type room with toys. We got Tristan to work playing while Dr. Cohen reviewed Tristan’s file, and then he joined us all. The doctor spent a very short time playing with Tristan, trying to elicit responses to different toys and stimuli. No more than five minutes of such play must have passed. Then there was all of the talk.

Dr. Cohen came right out and said that although he’ll send out his report to us and refer us further, that Tristan’s probably autistic. He made it sound like another flavor of human, a flavor we’re quite accustomed to around here. He spoke hopefully of Tristan’s future. Once he pronounced the words, I was fairly stunned even though most of me was expecting them.

So, where things stand now is that we’re waiting for yet another phone call and appointment to be scheduled. This one’s going to be the half-day evaluation that will provide him with an official diagnosis or not.

What confounds me is that there’s all of this evidence that the brains of people with autism are different from the average brain. Why is all of this subjective bullshit required to tell for sure, then?

I’ve worked out all of the tears and “OMG why mes” but there’ll be a LONG way to go before everything’s OK. Even if he does not turn up autistic, he is significantly delayed in important sensory and social ways and will require special assistance with understanding the world and the people in it.

This is all that I have the clarity to write right now. Please understand..

* Tristan sort of points at small holes, like those found in metal benches and grate coverings. He especially enjoys exploring things like that, too. Anyway, he pokes the holes and I praise him for the “point.” I’ve seen a feeble point or two since then, but he doesn’t connect the gesture with indicating or thinks he does just fine or will learn suddenly or something. Or it won’t even matter. Or it’ll be the all important autism indicator. Who knows? I don’t. Anyway, pointingish behavior. Yay! It’ll be useful if he catches on.

* We have had a good day so far. We had a good evening yesterday. Before that, we’ve had some nasty temper crap that has been stressful. The “Fast Food Rule” from The Happiest Toddler on the Block is pretty remarkable at calming him down when we’re vigilant about it. We are still developing good strategies as situations with discipline change daily. For the most part, he is curious or bored when misbehaving as opposed to blatantly defiant or “evil.” Sometimes he’s saying something like “no, I waaaant it!!!” but without any of those words that would lead me to believe I’m right, so it sounds more like an overdramatic scream and crumpling of the body. I can pretty quickly stop that by saying to him “you WANT IT! You want swing!” in a very passionate voice (same method I use to sing, really). About thirty seconds of that over and over and he wanders off to do something else, bored, or tries his case again more quietly (walked over to the swing after stopping the tantrum). Yay! I can think of other ways to deal with that, and other ways I have dealt with it. Most of the “obey me now and stop screaming or we leave” sorts of methods do not work with him. He’d rather leave, so there is no lesson in stopping the behavior in that case. So silly-sounding toddler acknowledgement of feelings to stop tantrums it is. By the way, it’s useful for a lot of other opportunities to communicate.

* I think his teeth are really hurting him right now. This likely explains some of the nasty temper crap. We’ve been tossing him Tylenol for sleeptimes and will continue until those two bottom pointy teeth come through. And speaking of teeth, he tried to resist my cleaning his teeth yesterday – he tries to bite but I will open his enough to avoid him biting me. We still clean teeth with a cloth and mostly in the shower. I figure that I enforce teeth cleaning once every several days, so when it’s done I try to make it count. (Yes, we’re nasty like that and don’t necessarily bathe every day. We just spend an hour in the shower and play in bubbles when we do!) We’d been making headway on the cooperative teeth cleaning and with him even showing curiosity about his toothbrush. Anyway, teething sucks. I understand when these canines finish showing, we’ll have even more molars to work on. Le sigh.

* He seems to be understanding and trying to say more and more words. He’s trying to distinguish between “Ninja” for the cat and other things that could maybe be “no” or maybe even “mama.” He says “the” and “that” clearly. He’s starting to say “hi” to people sporadically but it sounds nothing like how humans say “hi” in English so they don’t know to say “hi” back (and he doesn’t learn to sincerely greet yet, and he rarely waves, like once per month.. le sigh 🙂 ) He tries to say “drink” and I will really be pleased when he has SOME way to say it.

* For a digression: I discussed a parenting methodology called Raising Godly Tomatoes with a mom from a web community I participate in. She’s Christian. Our family’s atheist/agnostic. The main impression James and I have is that the author does have some good points with discipline but that she’s a bit of an extremist. Applying most of the methodology is fairly counter to anything we believe in, but who knows if I’ll go back and eat my words later if Tristan turns out to not take our free spirit lifestyle properly? Anyway, we don’t spank as a general policy, but we do act swiftly when we mean business. We just don’t pick many fights with him. The author of this is dead on when it comes to being consistent as a parent in your goals with your children and that you must outlast a child if you intend to make a point of an order. But I personally like his spirit as it is and feel that training him to “obey me no matter what” will take a possible future engineer and turn him into a mindless servant, which is not what I need. I don’t mean that in a “my special snowflake” sort of way. I mean that I intend to train him to negotiate and demonstrate in order to work his way up, which is not really compatible with accepting my word no matter what. I also mean that in the sense that one who unquestioningly obeys authority does not take apart radios, learn secret passages, design innovative products.. that sort of thing. (I will require that he learn to speak to people as respectfully as the situation requires, at the very least, in due time and age appropriateness.)

Babbling about toddler accomplishments and parenting methodology takes up most of Tristan’s nap when I decide to engage in it. I can only hope that Tristan reads this in ten years and laughs at it, or is happy he knows who his mom is as a person and not just who he sees as mommy.

Added a metric boatload of pictures to 18 – 19 Months.