Yay!! I wanted to comment while the first ad was playing so I could be one of the first ones!! I love your channel still!! Im so happy to see a large family be happy. Still dont have any kids myself being 24 years old, but I have hope that one day my future husband and I can be successful with a large family as well.
Congratulations! I am so glad that you are getting the evaluation done! We are going to be waiting a year to get ours done because we are in a rural area with only one center that does it.
I have 4 kids and the youngest two 5&4 both are autistic. The 4 year old is none verbal. Both are so different 😩 it’s so hard ... people just see bad behaviour when we know they’re meltdowns. Love watching you guys x
I wanted to add that my kids are only ten months apart. Congratulations on your new baby!! Blessings to you and your entire family. I admire your love and patience for your family. You give me so much hope. Thank you for sharing your daily joy and struggles as well. I went through one 5 years ago with my son, when he wasn't talking at 18 months ago. We were advised to have him evaluated. The process was an emotional ride. I cannot stress out how you handle everything with such patience and love. I enjoy watching Noah. He is a shining star. Sending you so much love.🤗🤩🤩🤩🤩
You are such an amazing mom, I'm a new subscriber from the Philippines. Thanks for the motivation. I wish i have the same energy like yours, loving your family already 😍
I’m new to your videos and just wanted to say that you are such an inspiration to me. I have 3 kids and my 2 1/2 year old son has a very severe speech delay. Basically the only word he’s saying right now is “mom”. We have him in speech therapy and he’s currently on a waiting list for an autism assessment. So I’ve really been trying lately to find as many resources as I can to kind of mentally prepare myself for his possible diagnosis. it’s really nice seeing someone else be able to handle all this as well as you do. You’re definitely a rockstar mom!❤️
That's me next week! Calling for a developmental pediatrician since our last just retired as well as paper work. It's never ending!!! So glad it's been a positive turn around though with finding help and Noah is doing good. :)
I’m special needs with OCD, Anxiety, Mood Disorder , Panic Attacks , Sensory processing Disorder and Autism. I’ve been in school in since 2 and a half. I did three years of Preschool and I’m also Develop Mentally Dalayed. I didn’t walk until 2 months before I started my first year of Preschool. I’m 24 years old now and I’m on a Preschool to 1st Grade Level on Homeschool work. I’m not able to drive because I suffer from Essential Tremors and Severe Dizziness that cause headaches and Sleepyness. Anyways love Noah’s Haircut and congrats on Baby number 6!
loving all the updates on the boys,liam is the cutest,a teeth coming in already liam slow down sweetheart.lexie poo,lexie poo i love him,and that hair.noah is the sweetest,so helpful,can;t wait for the next adventure stephanie...
I definitely understand how busy and tired you are. I know how Alex feels about regressing back to wanting to be a baby. This is very commom when a new baby arrives in the household. Regression is common for autistic children because they are stressed out.
I am just starting to figure out stuff for my son who is 32 months. I am glad I discovered early intervention. Thought last week we would find out if he qualifies, but there's another evaluation first. After a month of waiting on speech referral they just called yesterday, to tell me there is a wait list 😆 I said we were working on getting early intervention but to put me on the wait list because I am sure he will need more passed 3 years. (My husband and I have speech delay and disorder history so not shocking) I was diagnosed with aspergers over 15 years ago, my parents never really did much to understand it and kept me in a public school system that didn't offer me any assistance. They even used my IEP as punishment for being autistic "Oh you are smarter than your peers and bored all the time in regular classes? You need to be put in lower classrooms and we need to make your only goal that you can't fail so when you do fail a class it's your fault, not ours." In elementary school I got wrote up for flat out telling teachers not to touch me or be over my shoulder all the time because I didn't like it. Apparently that's my problem not their's for doing it. I am not putting my son through that.
Anytime you feel like you're taking steps back or not moving with things youre struggling with just remember you'll take 100 steps back to take those 1,000 forward 💖
Does Noah have any eating issues my daughter who has autism is so picky w food n is limited to what she eats due to sensory issues just wondering if any other mom have the same issues thanks again for sharing 😊
The baby is due in February??? Coolllll......I’m born on the 8th of February. Aquarius rule. And good news for the kids and you guys of course. Curious on how this all goes.
Hi love your videos... my daughter is 18 with a rare chromosome abnormality 4q deletion she is the only child in Ireland with it!! I was put on to a group called unique and I started talking to a mom with a daughter with the same chromosome abnormality as my daughter Danielle... you should look into the group it’s nice knowing other people with children that have the same chromosome abnormality as your child 😀
My son Tatum is 3 was diagnosed with autism an learning disabilities this June I'm not saying Lex has autism I am just saying I see so many similarities between my son an Lex an I also love Lexs hair he looks so precious!!!!
Hes so cute! And congrats on new baby also good job at sharing the boys evaluations and therpy even rhough u get hate for it❤❤ u r a great parent! I dont have autism but i do have ADHD and anxiety and i heard some of ur other kids also have ADHD if so could u do a vid on that if not its fine❤ godbless btw i think its going to be a girl
Why are there WAY more boys with Autism than girls with Autism? I'm a girl with Autism, but I have mostly guy friends because I can barely find any other girls with Autism, and NT girls don't understand my Autism! The thing is, I want to be able to have the girls night out at the mall experience with friends and things like that. I can't go into my favorite girly stores at the mall when i'm with my guy friends! Sorry for ranting! I'm just wondering! Instead of making it so MOSTLY boys have Autism with only SOME girls having it, why couldn't Autism be a male-only condition? I'm tired of having only or mostly guy friends as a girl. I want girl friends in case I need someone to talk to about female-only stuff and things like that! What if I want to go with friends to get our nails done or have a beauty related birthday party, or something like that?
As an autistic person who sees a lot of misinformation about about autism, I wanted to write a short description of not only what autism is but what it is like to have it. This is based off of my own experiences as well as other autistic people I have talked to. Autism is a different way the brain can be "wired". Some observations may lead an outside observer to think one way, but without the rest of the context it can be very misleading. People with autism take in more information from their surroundings. While doing some activity the neurotypical person (not autistic) may take some time to process said activity and some of their surroundings, an autistic person takes in everything around them that is going on while doing an activity. Take eating lunch in cafeteria for example; while sitting with their friends a neurotypical person will be eating food, talking with their friends, and listening to what they are saying while an autistic person will be doing the same while taking in every sound difference in their friends voice, eye movement, body language, and doing all of these things with anything they also see and hear. Because of that a delay in time to respond may occur as they are taking in and processing more information before they can respond. A lot of autistic people also have Sensory Processing Disorder, which is a disorder that manifest itself in such a way that the individual with it processes their senses either more dramatically or less. Let’s use the cafeteria example again: the autistic may be hearing every noise and conversation at once in that room, and while the lights may be fine for some people, they may be so bright for an autistic person it is physically painful. This can get overwhelming as all of this stimulus can be too much. Stimulus is any information gathered by any of your 7 primary senses: sight, touch, hearing, smell, taste, proprioceptive (sense of where you are in space and movement), and vestibular (sense of balance). While these are external stimuli, internal stimuli can affect an autistic person in the same way; internal stimulus being things such as stress or anxiety to name a few. It is important to let an autistic person know how they live and process information is normal and fine, there is nothing wrong with them. They are perfectly normal people, just with a nerotype that isn't typical. Too much stimulus can cause a meltdown sometimes, or a shutdown. A shutdown is straightforward as they just shutdown like a computer and need to rebute away from all that stimulus. A meltdown is when the autistic person goes into a fight or flight response, where they will act accordingly as does anyone when their subconscious feels threatened. Keep in mind, too much stimulus is painful, and can be drastically so. You could say that a shutdown is when the fight or flight response goes so extreme they freeze. To combat all of this stimulus an autistic person needs to do one of two things, and may sometimes need help doing them: 1.) Remove the negative stimulus, say like going somewhere darker or quieter 2.) Stim. Stimming can be with any of the 7 primary senses as it replaces bad information, or stimulus, with good. This may be repeating some sound, rocking back or forth, touching some textured object, or hand flapping. These are just a tiny few examples of stimming. Stimming is good stimulus, so an autistic person may stim sometimes just because it feels good to do so with no other reason or maybe to express themselves as is natural and feels good to them. Sometimes when an autistic person has too much negative stimulus they may become nonverbal, or in other words may not be able to talk or use their words. Sometimes they may still be able to make sounds, write, or communicate in some other alternative fashion. Some autistic people take in more stimulus than other autistic people, and can be prone to experiencing more meltdowns and being nonverbal. Nonverbal occurs when the mind and body has to divert resources to dealing with other tasks. An autistic person may normally not be nonverbal but become so during a meltdown or when overwhelmed. Sometimes instead of being nonverbal, there might be a stutter instead. An autistic person has a certain amount of “spoons” they have for every day. Spoons are the resources (mentally, emotionally, physically) you can use to do some task. Some days you may have more spoons, and other days you may feel like you have none. Getting up out of bed cost spoons, dressing oneself cost spoons, brushing your teeth, showering, eating breakfast, going to work, going to class, anything you do cost some amount of spoons; with little resources of spoons available, you may only be able to accomplish only a few tasks, and that is perfectly okay. Sometimes a task can cost a lot of spoons, and sometimes the same task may cost more spoons than other times. Sometimes looking at a person's face or communicating with someone can be difficult. Communication is like a dance, and can be very difficult to follow. There are 3 ways of communication: what is said, how it is said, and body language. A person's face goes through a lot of changes over a short period of time to reflect how they are feeling, and looking at a person while talking can take a lot of spoons at time. It can be very overwhelming to try to pick up on a lot of cues people have in any form of communication. A lot of times an autistic person may only focus on one form of communication, if any, to be able to communicate. Communication in of itself (talking, listening, changes in subject) yet alone looking at some, taking in all the noise, and light, among some many things happening at once can be too much. If things feel that way, that everything is overwhelming, it is okay to remove yourself from that situation or choose not to be there in the first place. There is nothing wrong in taking care of yourself.
To give a more indepth example of SPD (Sensory Processing Disorder), this is what it is like for me. To preface this, SPD is very individual on what senses it affects, how it affects them, and to what degree. For me sound and light isn't just uncomfortable, it is physically painful. I find some issue with making a person have to "push" through the pain so they can go do what other people think they should do. That is really unfair and what I'd call mistreatment. It is still painful, regardless if you can learn to manage the pain. What is a normal level of conversation for the average person sounds like what you would call a loud rock concert; it really hurts. Sound is a wave of disruption through some medium. When moving through an atmosphere, such as ours, it is easier for sound to travel due to how far away atoms are to each other in a gas like state. When sound moves through water it is harder to travel due to how close the atoms are to each other as compared moving through a gas. Sounds is commonly referred to in two ways: how loud it is (decibels) and the size of the wave (frequency), which we also call pitch. There is a decible exaplme chart at www.industrialnoisecontrol.com/comparative-noise-examples.htm. On this chart there are two decibel ranges I’d like to refer to: 60 and 110. 60: “Half as loud as 70 dB. Fairly quiet. Conversation in restaurant, office, background music, Air conditioning unit at 100 feet.”. 110: “Average human pain threshold. 16 times as loud as 70 dB. Steel mill, auto horn at 1 meter. Turbo-fan aircraft at takeoff power at 200 ft (118 dB). Riveting machine (110 dB); live rock music (108 - 114 dB).” I wanted to point out these two examples because as I mentioned before, what sounds like a normal conversation to me sounds like a rock concert to you. I am able to say this with confidence because at 110 decibels is when sound starts to hurt the average person, for me it starts to hurt at 60 decibels on an average day; some days are worse than others. That would mean on average I hear sound at about 32 times as loud as the average person. Like I said some days are worse than others. When ever I started to need to stim, the more I have to stim to more sensitive my sensory processing becomes. There have been times that at 40 decibels (“One-eighth as loud as 70 dB. Library, bird calls (44 dB); lowest limit of urban ambient sound”) sounds was too loud and started to hurt. During those times in which sound at 40 decibels starts to hurt me; that would make my hearing at around 64 times as loud as the average person. When ever I am in an area I can hear every little thing around me at once; this, ironically, makes it hard to hear what an individual is saying. There are so many sounds coming at me I can’t decipher where what is coming from sometimes, and when someone is trying to talk to me I can’t hear them over everything else going on around me. It is hard enough to carry on a conversation already, then with all the noise around me it can make it practically impossible. Light, oh boy. As a kid being outside, period, all I could see was white light. It wasn't till I was in my later years in high school I didn't need to wear sunglasses inside, though I still prefer to. Unless I'm in an isolated area in the middle of night (and I mean around 10pm-3pm, or else there is too much sunlight) I prefer to always be wearing my sunglasses. When ever I start getting close to a melt down any light is just like looking at bright white beams in my eyes. I have a black bandana I wear over my eyes like a blind fold and put my sunglasses over it and close my eyes. Even at night time that usually isn’t enough and the light still bothers me. Something people confuse is how light works. Photons are particles of light. In the day time there are more photons from the sun to light up the sky, which is why it is brighter during the day time. During the night time there are less photons so it is darker, but when photons are there they are still really bright. At night time it is like looking at a very contrasting picture. Where there is light there is alot, where this is not there simply isn't any light to be seen. Flashlights, or objects that illuminate in a similar fashion (like a phone, laser, or light bulb) have focused light, or in other words photons are focused in a specific area. During the day time, when directly at me, yes that is very bothersome and does does hurt, but because of the contrast at night it really hurts even more. It's like having a migraine in your eyes. As far as taste, I can't have bitter things in my mouth. They make me want to throw up. I happen to also have ASD, when ever I have to stim, outside what textured object I'm feeling, things, especially people, rubbing up against me or touching me is really uncomfortable and distressing. Tags on my clothes feel like knives on my skin and heat is a lot hotter for me. I feel comfortable more in 30°-40°F weather. To clarify why, cold doesn’t actually exist. Cold is the lack of heat, so cold and are the same thing. I wouldn't call these problems. In certain circumstances they make things difficult, but in others they help. I look at the sky and see where the atmosphere ends, I can see the physical curve of the earth in the sky. I can see light from stars no one else can. I can see every color of the night sky and how they all blend together. I can see details no else will ever see. I use my hearing subconsciously to help me know I'm breathing, I can hear everything around me so I use my ears to guide more than my eyes, using my ears I can "see and feel" everything around me. I can hear air move, and if I focus hard enough and hear my partner communicate in code using her nostrils to push out air so only I can hear her. I can see amazing things you can only imagine, hear everything and everyone, feel everything, and it is the best thing in the world. As far as language goes, verbal communication extremely difficult for me, I hate it. Communication via body language is what makes sense to me and how I primarily communicate. Look, you don't cure autism and you don't get "better". By the way, that pursuit of fixing autism is just trying to make autistic people not autistic. To put this into context you may understand, what people do to autistic people is like telling someone to never smile when they are happy, never cry when they are sad, never express themselves in a natural way, never feel emotions, shame someone for being who they are in a natural reflective way. ABA forces extremely unnatural behaviors on autistic people and tries to erase the natural ones. It is like telling someone you have to speak this way, walk this way, emote this way, feel this way. It creates So many issues. Try to never smile when you are happy and click your tongue 3 times in a strange order. Whenever you smile you get told over and over again how wrong it is and shamed for doing so. Imagine that is life for you growing up as a kid. That stupid manner of communicating happiness via tongue clicks and never smiling is very unnatural, very distressing, and very displeasing. When ever you do it, it gets rid of all joy you may of had. ABA does that to autistic people. Not literally making you click your tongue, but do completely unnatural things for the sake of someone else because people don't like you, find you uncomfortable when you express yourself naturally, and are scared of you for just existing (as is autism is a bad thing and it is a disease). It is awful. Looking at someone in the eyes in an example of that. When I look at you in the eyes I can't pay attention to what you are saying or what is going on around me, but people get upset when you don't. Looking at someone in the eyes is extremely unpleasant like electric shocks running though your body that causes an anxiety and stress, yet people still want me to look at the eyes. Going through ABA has forced that extremely unnatural and unpleasant behavior on me, and now I can't stop doing when I talk to someone because of the shaming people have done to me to force me to do so. Now, wether I look at your eyes are not, causes distress, heavy stress, and anxiety no matter what. As I said verbal communication is fucking hard for me, and forcing these kinds of behaviors only makes it harder to express myself, feel happy, and communicate to you.
Stephanie, since you mentioned about ALexander’s hair, I am going to say that you need to look into a haircut you like that also will let him not have his hair covering his eyes. Don’t get me wrong, I love boys to have longer hair cuts than teens or men. But his hair covering his eyes needs to have a Mommy change.
I can’t get over how adorable the two youngests hair are. 😍
Yay!! I wanted to comment while the first ad was playing so I could be one of the first ones!! I love your channel still!! Im so happy to see a large family be happy. Still dont have any kids myself being 24 years old, but I have hope that one day my future husband and I can be successful with a large family as well.
I have always wanted to go to Clearwater, FL.! It sounds like your family is finally catching a break. That is great.
Beware of all the Scientologists because Clearwater is their flag base.
I live in Clearwater, lol. It's funny to see it on your channel. Love your videos and congrats on the new baby!
Congratulations! I am so glad that you are getting the evaluation done! We are going to be waiting a year to get ours done because we are in a rural area with only one center that does it.
I have 4 kids and the youngest two 5&4 both are autistic. The 4 year old is none verbal. Both are so different 😩 it’s so hard ... people just see bad behaviour when we know they’re meltdowns. Love watching you guys x
I wanted to add that my kids are only ten months apart. Congratulations on your new baby!! Blessings to you and your entire family. I admire your love and patience for your family. You give me so much hope. Thank you for sharing your daily joy and struggles as well. I went through one 5 years ago with my son, when he wasn't talking at 18 months ago. We were advised to have him evaluated. The process was an emotional ride. I cannot stress out how you handle everything with such patience and love. I enjoy watching Noah. He is a shining star. Sending you so much love.🤗🤩🤩🤩🤩
I love the way your so real and I've missed you so much. Love you Stephanie
I'm so excited for you guys that you guys are getting services for Noah.
You are such an amazing mom, I'm a new subscriber from the Philippines. Thanks for the motivation. I wish i have the same energy like yours, loving your family already 😍
I just love your accent. Could listen to you talk for hours😂
All of your kids are so sweet!
I’m new to your videos and just wanted to say that you are such an inspiration to me. I have 3 kids and my 2 1/2 year old son has a very severe speech delay. Basically the only word he’s saying right now is “mom”. We have him in speech therapy and he’s currently on a waiting list for an autism assessment. So I’ve really been trying lately to find as many resources as I can to kind of mentally prepare myself for his possible diagnosis. it’s really nice seeing someone else be able to handle all this as well as you do. You’re definitely a rockstar mom!❤️
That's me next week! Calling for a developmental pediatrician since our last just retired as well as paper work. It's never ending!!! So glad it's been a positive turn around though with finding help and Noah is doing good. :)
I love his curly hair!! Omg!!!
I’m special needs with OCD, Anxiety, Mood Disorder , Panic Attacks , Sensory processing Disorder and Autism. I’ve been in school in since 2 and a half. I did three years of Preschool and I’m also Develop Mentally Dalayed. I didn’t walk until 2 months before I started my first year of Preschool. I’m 24 years old now and I’m on a Preschool to 1st Grade Level on Homeschool work. I’m not able to drive because I suffer from Essential Tremors and Severe Dizziness that cause headaches and Sleepyness. Anyways love Noah’s Haircut and congrats on Baby number 6!
loving all the updates on the boys,liam is the cutest,a teeth coming in already liam slow down sweetheart.lexie poo,lexie poo i love him,and that hair.noah is the sweetest,so helpful,can;t wait for the next adventure stephanie...
I’m so excited for the new baby, I feel like it’s a girl but that’s probably wishful thinking. 😂
Our LANDing Crew I think it’s going to be a girl as well
Super mom !! Really though your amazing!! NEW SUBSCRIBER
I definitely understand how busy and tired you are. I know how Alex feels about regressing back to wanting to be a baby. This is very commom when a new baby arrives in the household. Regression is common for autistic children because they are stressed out.
Your day went like mine! Lol love the payback time! Lol
I am just starting to figure out stuff for my son who is 32 months. I am glad I discovered early intervention. Thought last week we would find out if he qualifies, but there's another evaluation first. After a month of waiting on speech referral they just called yesterday, to tell me there is a wait list 😆 I said we were working on getting early intervention but to put me on the wait list because I am sure he will need more passed 3 years. (My husband and I have speech delay and disorder history so not shocking) I was diagnosed with aspergers over 15 years ago, my parents never really did much to understand it and kept me in a public school system that didn't offer me any assistance. They even used my IEP as punishment for being autistic "Oh you are smarter than your peers and bored all the time in regular classes? You need to be put in lower classrooms and we need to make your only goal that you can't fail so when you do fail a class it's your fault, not ours." In elementary school I got wrote up for flat out telling teachers not to touch me or be over my shoulder all the time because I didn't like it. Apparently that's my problem not their's for doing it. I am not putting my son through that.
Anytime you feel like you're taking steps back or not moving with things youre struggling with just remember you'll take 100 steps back to take those 1,000 forward 💖
Does Noah have any eating issues my daughter who has autism is so picky w food n is limited to what she eats due to sensory issues just wondering if any other mom have the same issues thanks again for sharing 😊
The baby is due in February??? Coolllll......I’m born on the 8th of February. Aquarius rule.
And good news for the kids and you guys of course. Curious on how this all goes.
Feb 8th is my sister AND my daughter's birthday. Good day to be born!
Mine is Feb 22
February 2019!!!
Do you get SSI for your boys? I know having. If will get them more help
Sounds like good news! :)
Hi love your videos... my daughter is 18 with a rare chromosome abnormality 4q deletion she is the only child in Ireland with it!! I was put on to a group called unique and I started talking to a mom with a daughter with the same chromosome abnormality as my daughter Danielle... you should look into the group it’s nice knowing other people with children that have the same chromosome abnormality as your child 😀
When you are going to livestream
Hey Stephanie! Loving your videos as usual. Can I ask... what was Lonnie's reaction to the pregnancy? I bet he was excited haha Hugs xxx
hahaha perfect! What about Danielle and Lonnie Jnr?
My fav family
where does lex get his curly hair?!
I understand all too well
I am team Noah I’m exactly like Noah with the same diagnosis
When is your due .....my birthday is on February 22
yaaa for progressive days💛
Has Lonnie junier change his name to bubby because it says bubby in the descriptsion
She calls him bubby but his real name is Lonnie :)
I really think you should apply Noah to JSA, Priscilla and Asa are so happy with that school for Abbie.
Guacamole 6 Pretty sure that they have said it is very expensive. Times that times two and it’s probably quite pricy.
Why aren’t the oldest two in the vlogs much? You should put them in more if there isn’t a certain reason
Where’s Danielle
Has Noah ever tried a LEGO game? He might enjoy it! There are so many different ones!
My son Tatum is 3 was diagnosed with autism an learning disabilities this June I'm not saying Lex has autism I am just saying I see so many similarities between my son an Lex an I also love Lexs hair he looks so precious!!!!
Hes so cute! And congrats on new baby also good job at sharing the boys evaluations and therpy even rhough u get hate for it❤❤ u r a great parent! I dont have autism but i do have ADHD and anxiety and i heard some of ur other kids also have ADHD if so could u do a vid on that if not its fine❤ godbless btw i think its going to be a girl
Oh. If you wanna stick with The L theme for the boys I will go with Lucas, Logan, Landen, Leanard or Lyle
Have you told your husband about the new baby yet? 💖
Miranda Powell I would assume so since she has announced it to the internet lol
Good job Mama, negotiating the Special needs world is hard. Keep pushing through. Babies red hair is divine, love it.
Liam dont wirry when you get teeth you can have all the food you can eat lol😂
Worry*
Why are there WAY more boys with Autism than girls with Autism? I'm a girl with Autism, but I have mostly guy friends because I can barely find any other girls with Autism, and NT girls don't understand my Autism! The thing is, I want to be able to have the girls night out at the mall experience with friends and things like that. I can't go into my favorite girly stores at the mall when i'm with my guy friends! Sorry for ranting! I'm just wondering! Instead of making it so MOSTLY boys have Autism with only SOME girls having it, why couldn't Autism be a male-only condition? I'm tired of having only or mostly guy friends as a girl. I want girl friends in case I need someone to talk to about female-only stuff and things like that! What if I want to go with friends to get our nails done or have a beauty related birthday party, or something like that?
Hi I'm female and I have autism
STEPH, left you a message on FB
weres ur daughter? ..too cool for the cam now lol?
im not looking forward to it with mine lololol
I'm early! Yaaaaay!! Look at meeeee.
I hate the new Pepsi label it looks so much like throwback I miss throwback
Lex needs his bangs cut. Can’t see his beautiful eyes.
As an autistic person who sees a lot of misinformation about about autism, I wanted to write a short description of not only what autism is but what it is like to have it. This is based off of my own experiences as well as other autistic people I have talked to.
Autism is a different way the brain can be "wired". Some observations may lead an outside observer to think one way, but without the rest of the context it can be very misleading. People with autism take in more information from their surroundings. While doing some activity the neurotypical person (not autistic) may take some time to process said activity and some of their surroundings, an autistic person takes in everything around them that is going on while doing an activity. Take eating lunch in cafeteria for example; while sitting with their friends a neurotypical person will be eating food, talking with their friends, and listening to what they are saying while an autistic person will be doing the same while taking in every sound difference in their friends voice, eye movement, body language, and doing all of these things with anything they also see and hear. Because of that a delay in time to respond may occur as they are taking in and processing more information before they can respond.
A lot of autistic people also have Sensory Processing Disorder, which is a disorder that manifest itself in such a way that the individual with it processes their senses either more dramatically or less. Let’s use the cafeteria example again: the autistic may be hearing every noise and conversation at once in that room, and while the lights may be fine for some people, they may be so bright for an autistic person it is physically painful. This can get overwhelming as all of this stimulus can be too much.
Stimulus is any information gathered by any of your 7 primary senses: sight, touch, hearing, smell, taste, proprioceptive (sense of where you are in space and movement), and vestibular (sense of balance). While these are external stimuli, internal stimuli can affect an autistic person in the same way; internal stimulus being things such as stress or anxiety to name a few. It is important to let an autistic person know how they live and process information is normal and fine, there is nothing wrong with them. They are perfectly normal people, just with a nerotype that isn't typical.
Too much stimulus can cause a meltdown sometimes, or a shutdown. A shutdown is straightforward as they just shutdown like a computer and need to rebute away from all that stimulus. A meltdown is when the autistic person goes into a fight or flight response, where they will act accordingly as does anyone when their subconscious feels threatened. Keep in mind, too much stimulus is painful, and can be drastically so. You could say that a shutdown is when the fight or flight response goes so extreme they freeze. To combat all of this stimulus an autistic person needs to do one of two things, and may sometimes need help doing them: 1.) Remove the negative stimulus, say like going somewhere darker or quieter 2.) Stim. Stimming can be with any of the 7 primary senses as it replaces bad information, or stimulus, with good. This may be repeating some sound, rocking back or forth, touching some textured object, or hand flapping. These are just a tiny few examples of stimming.
Stimming is good stimulus, so an autistic person may stim sometimes just because it feels good to do so with no other reason or maybe to express themselves as is natural and feels good to them. Sometimes when an autistic person has too much negative stimulus they may become nonverbal, or in other words may not be able to talk or use their words. Sometimes they may still be able to make sounds, write, or communicate in some other alternative fashion. Some autistic people take in more stimulus than other autistic people, and can be prone to experiencing more meltdowns and being nonverbal. Nonverbal occurs when the mind and body has to divert resources to dealing with other tasks. An autistic person may normally not be nonverbal but become so during a meltdown or when overwhelmed. Sometimes instead of being nonverbal, there might be a stutter instead.
An autistic person has a certain amount of “spoons” they have for every day. Spoons are the resources (mentally, emotionally, physically) you can use to do some task. Some days you may have more spoons, and other days you may feel like you have none. Getting up out of bed cost spoons, dressing oneself cost spoons, brushing your teeth, showering, eating breakfast, going to work, going to class, anything you do cost some amount of spoons; with little resources of spoons available, you may only be able to accomplish only a few tasks, and that is perfectly okay. Sometimes a task can cost a lot of spoons, and sometimes the same task may cost more spoons than other times.
Sometimes looking at a person's face or communicating with someone can be difficult. Communication is like a dance, and can be very difficult to follow. There are 3 ways of communication: what is said, how it is said, and body language. A person's face goes through a lot of changes over a short period of time to reflect how they are feeling, and looking at a person while talking can take a lot of spoons at time. It can be very overwhelming to try to pick up on a lot of cues people have in any form of communication. A lot of times an autistic person may only focus on one form of communication, if any, to be able to communicate. Communication in of itself (talking, listening, changes in subject) yet alone looking at some, taking in all the noise, and light, among some many things happening at once can be too much. If things feel that way, that everything is overwhelming, it is okay to remove yourself from that situation or choose not to be there in the first place. There is nothing wrong in taking care of yourself.
To give a more indepth example of SPD (Sensory Processing Disorder), this is what it is like for me. To preface this, SPD is very individual on what senses it affects, how it affects them, and to what degree.
For me sound and light isn't just uncomfortable, it is physically painful. I find some issue with making a person have to "push" through the pain so they can go do what other people think they should do. That is really unfair and what I'd call mistreatment. It is still painful, regardless if you can learn to manage the pain.
What is a normal level of conversation for the average person sounds like what you would call a loud rock concert; it really hurts. Sound is a wave of disruption through some medium. When moving through an atmosphere, such as ours, it is easier for sound to travel due to how far away atoms are to each other in a gas like state. When sound moves through water it is harder to travel due to how close the atoms are to each other as compared moving through a gas. Sounds is commonly referred to in two ways: how loud it is (decibels) and the size of the wave (frequency), which we also call pitch.
There is a decible exaplme chart at www.industrialnoisecontrol.com/comparative-noise-examples.htm. On this chart there are two decibel ranges I’d like to refer to: 60 and 110. 60: “Half as loud as 70 dB. Fairly quiet. Conversation in restaurant, office, background music, Air conditioning unit at 100 feet.”. 110: “Average human pain threshold. 16 times as loud as 70 dB. Steel mill, auto horn at 1 meter. Turbo-fan aircraft at takeoff power at 200 ft (118 dB). Riveting machine (110 dB); live rock music (108 - 114 dB).” I wanted to point out these two examples because as I mentioned before, what sounds like a normal conversation to me sounds like a rock concert to you.
I am able to say this with confidence because at 110 decibels is when sound starts to hurt the average person, for me it starts to hurt at 60 decibels on an average day; some days are worse than others. That would mean on average I hear sound at about 32 times as loud as the average person. Like I said some days are worse than others. When ever I started to need to stim, the more I have to stim to more sensitive my sensory processing becomes. There have been times that at 40 decibels (“One-eighth as loud as 70 dB. Library, bird calls (44 dB); lowest limit of urban ambient sound”) sounds was too loud and started to hurt. During those times in which sound at 40 decibels starts to hurt me; that would make my hearing at around 64 times as loud as the average person.
When ever I am in an area I can hear every little thing around me at once; this, ironically, makes it hard to hear what an individual is saying. There are so many sounds coming at me I can’t decipher where what is coming from sometimes, and when someone is trying to talk to me I can’t hear them over everything else going on around me. It is hard enough to carry on a conversation already, then with all the noise around me it can make it practically impossible.
Light, oh boy. As a kid being outside, period, all I could see was white light. It wasn't till I was in my later years in high school I didn't need to wear sunglasses inside, though I still prefer to. Unless I'm in an isolated area in the middle of night (and I mean around 10pm-3pm, or else there is too much sunlight) I prefer to always be wearing my sunglasses. When ever I start getting close to a melt down any light is just like looking at bright white beams in my eyes. I have a black bandana I wear over my eyes like a blind fold and put my sunglasses over it and close my eyes. Even at night time that usually isn’t enough and the light still bothers me.
Something people confuse is how light works. Photons are particles of light. In the day time there are more photons from the sun to light up the sky, which is why it is brighter during the day time. During the night time there are less photons so it is darker, but when photons are there they are still really bright. At night time it is like looking at a very contrasting picture. Where there is light there is alot, where this is not there simply isn't any light to be seen. Flashlights, or objects that illuminate in a similar fashion (like a phone, laser, or light bulb) have focused light, or in other words photons are focused in a specific area. During the day time, when directly at me, yes that is very bothersome and does does hurt, but because of the contrast at night it really hurts even more. It's like having a migraine in your eyes.
As far as taste, I can't have bitter things in my mouth. They make me want to throw up. I happen to also have ASD, when ever I have to stim, outside what textured object I'm feeling, things, especially people, rubbing up against me or touching me is really uncomfortable and distressing. Tags on my clothes feel like knives on my skin and heat is a lot hotter for me. I feel comfortable more in 30°-40°F weather. To clarify why, cold doesn’t actually exist. Cold is the lack of heat, so cold and are the same thing.
I wouldn't call these problems. In certain circumstances they make things difficult, but in others they help. I look at the sky and see where the atmosphere ends, I can see the physical curve of the earth in the sky. I can see light from stars no one else can. I can see every color of the night sky and how they all blend together. I can see details no else will ever see. I use my hearing subconsciously to help me know I'm breathing, I can hear everything around me so I use my ears to guide more than my eyes, using my ears I can "see and feel" everything around me. I can hear air move, and if I focus hard enough and hear my partner communicate in code using her nostrils to push out air so only I can hear her. I can see amazing things you can only imagine, hear everything and everyone, feel everything, and it is the best thing in the world.
As far as language goes, verbal communication extremely difficult for me, I hate it. Communication via body language is what makes sense to me and how I primarily communicate.
Look, you don't cure autism and you don't get "better". By the way, that pursuit of fixing autism is just trying to make autistic people not autistic. To put this into context you may understand, what people do to autistic people is like telling someone to never smile when they are happy, never cry when they are sad, never express themselves in a natural way, never feel emotions, shame someone for being who they are in a natural reflective way.
ABA forces extremely unnatural behaviors on autistic people and tries to erase the natural ones. It is like telling someone you have to speak this way, walk this way, emote this way, feel this way. It creates So many issues.
Try to never smile when you are happy and click your tongue 3 times in a strange order. Whenever you smile you get told over and over again how wrong it is and shamed for doing so. Imagine that is life for you growing up as a kid. That stupid manner of communicating happiness via tongue clicks and never smiling is very unnatural, very distressing, and very displeasing. When ever you do it, it gets rid of all joy you may of had. ABA does that to autistic people. Not literally making you click your tongue, but do completely unnatural things for the sake of someone else because people don't like you, find you uncomfortable when you express yourself naturally, and are scared of you for just existing (as is autism is a bad thing and it is a disease). It is awful.
Looking at someone in the eyes in an example of that. When I look at you in the eyes I can't pay attention to what you are saying or what is going on around me, but people get upset when you don't. Looking at someone in the eyes is extremely unpleasant like electric shocks running though your body that causes an anxiety and stress, yet people still want me to look at the eyes.
Going through ABA has forced that extremely unnatural and unpleasant behavior on me, and now I can't stop doing when I talk to someone because of the shaming people have done to me to force me to do so. Now, wether I look at your eyes are not, causes distress, heavy stress, and anxiety no matter what. As I said verbal communication is fucking hard for me, and forcing these kinds of behaviors only makes it harder to express myself, feel happy, and communicate to you.
Stephanie, since you mentioned about ALexander’s hair, I am going to say that you need to look into a haircut you like that also will let him not have his hair covering his eyes. Don’t get me wrong, I love boys to have longer hair cuts than teens or men. But his hair covering his eyes needs to have a Mommy change.