As many of you know,I am a big fan of the 6 word memoir project, and asked Larry Smith, it’s creator, if I could run another 6 word memoir contest on my facebook autism page. The top 25 (I was the judge) won a signed copy of my book A REGULAR GUY GROWING UP WITH…
Category Archives: Day In And Day Out
Ignorance At Its Best
I’m having a particularly difficult week, and decided to share a blog post from my archive. I promise I will get my act together in time for next week’s post! ******************************* My buddy, Esbee, over at the Life in Forsyth blog, emailed me to let me know about one of her blog posts that she…
The kindness of friends: how have yours helped with your child?
Last week, I got an email from my friend Rob. He said that a yoga teacher who works near where we live was going to be at an event he was planning for Saturday night that I’d be at, too. “Maybe she could help Max!” he wrote. “I’ll make sure to introduce you two.” The…
Unbelievable
Again Wendy Portillo has been accused of discrimination against a child with special needs in her classroom. The fact that Ms. Portillo continues in her abhorrent actions is not surprising to me. What is surprising is that she is still teaching, still in the classroom with children with special needs. In May of 2008, I…
A kid who can’t stand crowds
Max is a pretty social kid—but crowds? They freak him out. This weekend, we were at an event and we had to take an outdoor group photo. It was a very, very large group. Max started wailing at the sight of everyone standing there. My husband was holding him, and even though he was talking…
The World Doesn’t Get It…
Recently, my husband applied for a new job. This job would have taken us out of our current situation (No family, no help, no children’s hospital unless we drive 3 hours…one way) to another state. This state currently holds all of our family, and most of our friends. Convenient, eh? So, he interviewed. It went…
Comic relief, autism style
It was one of those weeks when the phone rang constantly, and each was a “crises” call. My 24 year old son Matthew, who has autism, was on a bad roll. “Matthew lost his wallet, Matthew is calling a girl obsessively, Matthew called 911 because a girl hung up on him, Matthew needs this, Matthew…
Autism: Living with the looks
I was at Barnes and Noble the other day and believe that I witnessed an autistic meltdown. A father was in line with his teenage son when the woman in front of them sneezed loudly. The noise took the teenager by surprise, and he covered his ears and yelled “too loud, must leave, too loud”…
Insensitive
As many of you know, I have a 19 year old daughter named Jessica. I adopted Jessica when she was 9 years old. She had spent most of her life in foster care, and along the way was both physically and sexually abused. In addition, she was diagnosed as an infant with brain cancer. She…
That “You think YOUR life is so hard?” feeling
This weekend, I visited a relative who may or may not be my sister, and I pretty much felt like I could smack her. She started it! She started it! (To quote an oft-repeated refrain from childhood.) She kept stressing out. First, she got irritated at her husband because he was in the kitchen preparing…