"Bye"

Andrew, as I'm sure is obvious by now, is largely nonverbal. This makes the phone calls he has three times a week with his father (we're divorced) a bit of a challenge as I'm sure you can imagine. But three times a week, his dad calls and Andrew takes the phone for a few minutes.

He's actually much better now than he used to be. He no longer whines or fusses over the call, but takes the phone, holds it to his ear, says hi, and listens for a few minutes.

I try to leave the room when they "talk" because if I don't Andrew thinks he's done and wants to give me the phone back. However, whether I stay or go, eventually we end up in the same situation, which is the fun part of this post.

Andrew says (into the phone) "bye" and then looks at me. I generally shake my head no, so he says "hi" and I nod. Then he tries again. Generally this goes on 10 or so times, then I nod when he says "bye" and he gives me the phone so I can tell his father that Andrew is done. However, one day last week, Andrew decided he wanted more control over this process. :)

After one or two of our "bye" "hi" routines, he reaches up for me, so I kneel down to see what he needs. I assumed this was for a hug, but I was wrong. :) Andrew then said "bye" again, and put his hand on the top of my head, trying to force me to nod. I managed to shake my head, but with a little hand pressing down on it pretty hadr, it was a bit of a challenge. Andrew, it should be said, looked thoroughly annoyed, but he did say "hi" again and hold onto the phone. :)

The door chain

Andrew has figured out how to open the front door. Because of this, and the fact that he rarely sleeps all the way through the night, there is now a chain on the door as well, high enough to be out of Andrew's reach, and fairly high even for me (though I'm only 5'2" so that's not so terribly high). It's shiny and new, so of course it gets Andrew's attention.

He doesn't have a problem with the chain lock. On the contrary, he appears to think it's a pretty cool item. The first time he saw me lock it, he instantly wanted to be part of what I'm sure looks like a wonderful experience. :)

So now, when we come home, Andrew closes the door, turns on the light, and then needs to be picked up, so HE can put the chain on the door. It doesn't matter if we're just inside for a moment, or even if we just came in to use the potty or something trivial. When that door closes, the chain gets locked. At least we're safe, right? hehe

Come on!!

So Andrew is getting more words, weekly he has something new in his vocabulary, and while it's often hard to really understand it, he's trying. He is fairly patient about repeating what he is trying to say until we get it, and if he gets frustrated he just grabs someone and pulls them to what he wants. However, his independence and impatience in general is coming out with a new phrase he has picked up. that phrase is "come on".

It's impossible to describe just how he says it, but I'm going to try. It's got that impatient tone that you expect in a young child when they are tired of waiting for something, where the "on" portion is almost whiny, and gets higher pitched as the phrase goes on. Anyway, you get the idea.

Well the funny part is, Andrew has learned the phrase, and the tone, but not really the intent behind it. So he will request something, and immediately follow it with "Come on!", even if he's not anxious for it, or not in any hurry. He also uses is constantly, so his requests have now become standard of the form "I want more juice please, Come on!".

It's actually hilarious, and it's all I can do not to burst out laughing when he asks for things that way (occasionally I fail and I do laugh). He never looks agitated when he asks for things this way, it's just become part of his speech, and a very amusing part, at that. :)

Peek-a-boo

It's amazing how someone's perspective impacts so much. This happened with Andrew recently, or more accurately, with Andrew's thearpy.

Andrew has an amazing therapy team, through our school. These people are wonderful, friendly, and truly have Andrew's best interests at heart. I couldn't imagine a better team to work with, and as much as Andrew enjoys school I know he shares my feelings.

We had a meeting yesterday to keep everyone on the same track. These happen monthly, and are invaluable. This particular case shows just that. Among other things, we discussed Andrew's play program. One thing that happens a lot with autistic children is that they don't play appropriately, either with objects or with people. What is automatic for many children just isn't for them, and requires more work. So he has a program designed to teach him how to race cars, play simple board games, and simple games in general. One of those games is peek-a-boo.

Andrew's aides commented that Andrew had not mastered peek-a-boo yet, which was a surprise to me. Mostly it was a surprise because we play it at home, and he's awesome at it. He enjoys it, he hides from me in different manners (behind his hands, under a blanket, behind and under a towel after baths . . you get it), he takes turns telling me when it's his turn, or mine, he does generally great. So I was surprised to hear them tell me not only had he not mastered it, but that he got frustrated every time they tried to play. They said they even worked on adding the phrase "peek-a-boo" to his vocab so it would be easier, and suddenly the light went off in my head.

See, at home, we don't say "peek-a-boo" per se. We say "Where's Andrew? There he is!" and "Where's Mommy? There she is!". So I asked Andrew to come over to me and we started in on our version, which of course he did well and enjoyed. :) The person overseeing his program laughed and decided he had definitely mastered peek-a-boo. I'm sure glad he has. :) I'd hate to think we were playing it wrong . . . hehe