We Go With Him

Commencement and My Post-Birthday Boy

At graduation on Monday for the small college I work at, I clapped and smiled broadly -- beamed -- as certain students filed by, some of whom I could still see sitting in my old office -- just arrived days before from Bulgaria or Nepal -- scanning lists of courses and listening to me explaining the core curriculum requirements yet again; others whom I spent 10 days with in Greece on three separate occasions; and yet others whom I listened to so often, talking about GPAs, closed courses, essay deadlines, their parents, the next test, the job that seemed so good that wasn't working out. I sang 'The Star Spangled Banner' and what I knew of my college's alma mater and took photos and clapped some more.

A colleague -- he and I started teaching at the college in the same year -- observed that he didn't express his congratulations so exuberantly.

It wasn't the moment to explain it to him, but, what else would you expect from someone who's spent 15 years cheering on a big-headed baby become a boy become a guy to hold up his head, put one foot in front of the other, say 'uh' when we said 'uh,' point to the letter W, keep his feet on the bike pedals, eat two bits of an apple? from someone who says to herself 'progress' about her teenager who throws a box of Classics books then sits, crying and moaning but sits, in a big brown chair, instead of slamming his head on the hardwood floor?

Charlie is always with me and so I felt no surprise when I saw the number for the Big Autism Center flash on my cell phone, as the 'College of Arts and Sciences/School of Business Administration' students were receiving their degrees. I got up, climbed down the platform and went backstage (graduation was held in a large entertainement venue): Charlie was having post-birthday syndrome: too much to eat of what he likes too much, lag after a happy afternoon of being social, anxiety because my parents leave on Tuesday.

His teacher said he just didn't look like himself. We also talked about the wet, rainy weather that was ruining most of the photo-opts for the graduates. Charlie's teacher said he would call in an hour and let me know how Charlie was doing and I went back to my seat and calculated that by the time I made a grand exit off the stage (yes, folks, the show always stops for Charlie), dropped off my cap and gown (so I wouldn't receive Reminders that I had failed to do so), driven fast up the Garden State Parkway, run home to get Charlie's meds (I know, never leave home without them), hurry up to Charlie's school, it would be 1.30pm at the earliest and Charlie would be almost ready to take the bus home.

I watched the students file by and four other people exit from their seats but not because they had calls from the BAC.

The BAC called after, as stated, an hour: No need to pick Charlie up.

He made it home fine on the bus and he and Jim got up to six miles of a bike ride before soaking rain led them to turn around.

That must have unsettled Charlie a bit along with everything else and he went from over-the-top happy at dinner to impassioned crying.

He sat in the chair. Jim and my dad and I sat near by and my mother finished what she was doing in the kitchen and came to sit too. After a half-hour, Jim and Charlie and I went on a walk-run and his stomach was better and he ate up the bowl of shrimp in special sauce my mother had made, dipping in a piece of sushi to get the last tasty drop.

Charlie and I walked and ran again and he stood looking around him and at everyone and went to bed.

Up Together (Updated after Charlie got a real sleep 2 nights in a row)

 

Charlie's blue blanket and yellow sheet were on his bed by 2am yesterday night(morning) but he was already thoroughly conked out on the blue couch.

He woke before 8am and waited for me to get up for a walk. Once back, he waited for Jim to get up and they went on their 12-mile bike ride.

After lunch, Charlie settled on the big brown chair and dozed off, his head lolled against the chair back until, 45 minutes having passed, he got up, stretched out on the blue couch and slept for about three hours -- just in time to wake and see Jim drive off to pick up my parents from the airport.

'Dad,' Charlie said a few times with an imploring look.

We kept the front door open and he stood at attention till Jim drove up with my parents, whom Charlie regarded somberly. Charlie said his his and stood still with his hands under his chin across from me as my parents went into the kitchen.

I noted that: Gong Gong was here, Po Po was here, Dad was here, Mom was here, and Charlie was here, Charlie repeating each phrase after me and then, for the first time, grinning.

I'm sure he feared that my parents showing up meant that I was to be off for Greece and that maybe Jim was going somewhere too. -- But no.

Two more walks and a bike ride later, Charlie fell asleep around 11pm. He awoke around midnight -- he did have a long nap in the afternoon so we've been anticipating a night up.

We may not (will not; are not) be sleeping but we are all together.

The next morning, 10am....Amazingly, given the experience of the past months, Charlie fell asleep after 1am on the couch and is still sleeping. Maybe he's been unable to sleep for the past several weeks (a month plus) in anticipation of my parents visiting? And fears that I was Greece-bound....

 

Midterm Images

 

Monday night I wrote an archaeology midterm and selected 6 images of ancient architecture and pottery for students to identify, and, as Charlie had done a few hours earlier, simply conked out. We are all indubitably better, at last coughing less (it was a over a week of coughs) though not quite out of the woods (cold) yet.

As Jim told me (I was already headed to work), Charlie said an unceremonious good-bye to my parents Tuesday morning before boarding the bus. It was a very good visit. With everything going on, my parents were in good spirits and Charlie spent his share of time just hanging around the house, watching my mom cook, listening to the different sounds with more people in the house (he likes to imitate my dad's coughs and throat-clearing but that just came naturally this visit, you could say). We'll see my parents again in May for Charlie's birthday (he will be 15) (!!).

Charlie was quiet getting off the bus and, after checking around the house to make sure things were where they should be (he has lately developed a fixation on making sure he knows where all of the black plastic spoons and white plastic forks are), wanted a bike ride. We made a trip to get some groceries afterwards during which Charlie spied a box of crackers we hadn't bought in a while. He opened it in the car and started munching away and Jim and I appreciated a few ourselves.

As for the archaeology midterm: The best part turned out to be the images as I felt that teaching students to look with care at a piece of ancient pottery to determine whether it was Minoan, Mycenean, Protogeometric or Geometric was all about them learning to look at things differently and use different senses and skills than they are routinely asked to in this digital day and age.

(It's something that more than a few of us have indeed sought to devote ourselves to do these past several years.)

Sunday Altogether

 

The high point of Sunday was not the trip to Jersey horse country and the 11 mile trail ride Jim and Charlie did in cold sunshine and snow flurries but the very pleasant, all-at-home evening after Charlie woke from a nap in his big brown chair. He hasn't really gotten his appetite back yet and turned down dinner but gave my mom a spontaneous hug, sat in the new blue chair (yes, it raineth new chairs here) with Jim, and said 'yes' when my dad suggested (after noting how Charlie could barely keep his eyes open) that he go to bed and offered to carry up the iPad. 

Once Charlie lay down in his bed, he rolled over and was asleep.

 

Waiting For His Grandparents

My parents' plane was 30 minutes early this afternoon, a good thing as Charlie had been awaiting their arrival since waking on Sunday morning. For some years, their visits have been preceded by at least one severe anxiety attack like this. We didn't write up a social story but mentioned the impending visit in a casual kind of way, while emphasizing that it would be fun and good times (but of course!) and that we would 'all be together' as, for the past three years when my parents have come at this time of year, it has been because I've been preparing to travel to Greece with students, an event which has evoked intense anxiety in Charlie.

We had also decided that, keeping the anxiety issues in mind, it would be best to 'stay local' instead of atempt one of our usual weekend long-bike-ride adventures. Jim and Charlie rode bikes on their neighborhood course; Charlie and I walked. We stayed in the house and, while Charlie looked as if he might ask to go somewhere, we did not and he was okay with it. While Jim went to get my parents at the airport, Charlie and I enjoyed making brownies after he found the red box of mix I had quietly snuck into the cabinet.

Charlie did all the usual things at my parents' arrival -- going through their suitcases, grabbing my dad's jacket -- and something different -- going down to the basement and retrieving the Winnie the Pooh beach chair my parents gave him when he was a toddler and that his stuffed Barney used to sit in, and setting it up in the living room among his things on the floor. He carried a suitcase upstairs as requested, watched my mother cook dinner, and placed a valentine card he had made on my dad, who was napping in the brown Laz-Ee-Boy.

My dearly loved father has cancer and has been through many treatments and procedures. He is bald now and, as anticipated, Charlie was flummoxed by this. But then, Charlie has been very attuned to my dad's health all along.

I know he is glad that Gong Gong is sitting in his chair.

 

Boy of Lots and Lots of Feelings

Jim took my parents to the airport on Wednesday morning and, before and after, Charlie had the usual, somewhat messy, struggles he has had, before an excellent cold morning bike ride and in the evening while were in the drive-thru lane of our local McDonalds, just as Jim was paying for a meal Charlie had asked for.

It really makes me wonder, how can anyone have ever said that autistic children and persons are 'withdrawn into the self' and feel no emotion? Charlie feels the most of all and expresses what he feels directly.

Inbetween, Charlie had his yearly physical and did ultra-fabulous, I'm not making that up. He had a full examination with the nurse practitioner who's been seeing him for years, after getting his stats (he's 68 1/2 inches, 143 pounds) by a young nurse who was my size (not quite 60 inches). He followed all the nurse practitioner's directions when he had his eyes, ears, reflexes checked, his heartbeat and pulse checked. He smiled, too.

Love and autism, all the time.

 

Christmas Past, Christmas Present

Once upon a Christmas in California (click on photo to enlarge):

Christmas Eve day, 2011, in New Jersey:

Whatever you celebrate, wishing you as peaceful-easy-feeling as possible a day!

Watching the Process

 

After shelling and deveining the prawns, my dad went to rest on the couch. Charlie stayed in the kitchen with my mom and watched as she cooked. At one point he sat on the counter to observe her stir-frying: I rather think he enjoys seeing the processes of cooking as much as he does eating the results.

 

In Which Charlie and I Have a Nightmare Before Xmas Experience

 

Jim picked up my parents at the airport and Charlie greeted them with a smile, unlike recent years when he has been in a super-high-anxiety state complete with tears when they've arrived.

After dinner, we went on a walk.

After a rest and some video watching, Charlie asked for another walk.

It was definitely warmish (it was the winter solstice) and, as we were walking, the wind really picked up and what leaves were left on the street flew in the air. I felt droplets and presumed the wind was shaking water from an earlier rain from the trees.

The droplets came down en masse.

The wind started howling, the rain fell in white sheets and Charlie put his hands over his ears and kept walking.

We walked past the house with several blow-up holiday decorations and reams of lights, the house with the snowman's head on a lamp post, the house with one reindeer. We had a brief respite from the rain under a breezeway by an elementary school then it was down a grassy knoll, past the playground, and into the muddy field with the trees swaying on the edges. The wind howled.

We turned onto a bike path by the field and headed home. A slowed down and Jim rolled down the window: 'Hi!'

Since we were only about 100 feet from home it was faster to just keep walking where my mom handed us towels.

Charlie dried off and went straight to bed.

We do this same walk day in and day out: Nice to have a bit of an adventure, once in a while.

 

 

 

A Little Night/Early Morning Post (updated)

 

Early to be and early to rise, they say -- perhaps as a bit of post-holiday, post-visitor recovery, Charlie went to bed after a good day at school (even getting upset and getting over it) at 6pm. It is indeed 3.30am as I'm typing this and he is awake and (so far) staying in his room.

He also had woken up at 4am on Wednesday morning, anticipating my parents leaving. Charlie said his good-byes without stress or excessive fanfare. Indeed, he's been very peaceful easy-feeling these past 3 days: That huge storm on Sunday was when all his feelings came out. 

Update, 9.30am. No, Charlie never went back to sleep! He was very amenable about staying in his room for awhile then fixed himself (well, put some frozen fries on a plate) something to eat (yes, he did microwave the fries), along with some fruit. Around 6.15am, he and I went out for a run-walk.

I had excused myself from yet another 8am meeting today which was a good thing as I kind of slept in 20 minutes increments after Charlie was up. But I did sleep (different from a year ago when Charlie woke up so early.)