Friday, August 22, 2008

Our Week

Rode the carousel on the boardwalk


Played in the ocean with my cousin Shenay


Finally let someone give me a haircut; no clippers though!


Went to Chuck E. Cheese and loved the pizza but hated everything else


Went to Seaworld and fell in love with Shamu



Snuggled up with my family at the end of the day (wish Daddy was here!)

Friday, August 15, 2008

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

DAN!

I talked it over with my husband and we have decided to go to a DAN! for a consult. Austin's appointment is September 11th.

To gear up for it, I'm currently reading Healing the New Childhood Epidemics: Autism, ADHD, Asthma, and Allergies by Kenneth Bock, M.D., and Cameron Stauth. It was recommeded to me by Molly over at Zavier's Journey. It's a great book and has given me some great information on why the DAN! approach can and does help a lot of kids with any of the above mentioned disorders. I see why healing the gut and providing supplaments can help and it's exciting to have something to look forward to and have some more hope although I know it is not a magical cure by any means. Dr. Bock himself says that it is a combination of diet, supplaments, therapy, etc.. that will help our children. Also it is not an overnight cure but rather a marathon instead of sprint.

A Big Surprise

I went away for a few days to meet up with my husband in Baltimore. I took Kaitlin and had my grandma fly in to keep Austin so he wouldn't have to miss any of those therapy sessions I worked oh so hard to get. And when I came home, I got the best surprise ever. Austin is now doing some nonverbal AND verbal imitation!!! This is so huge to me b/c I am so hopefull the sounds will one day become words.

For the "ba" and "mm" sounds they are just asking him if they are using objects or looking at pictures that begin with those sounds, like the Monkey book or playing with balls or getting him to say book. Then they'll say "ah", "oo", "ee", "ssss" and ask him to do the same and he is getting those expecially "ah" and "ee" and he is really trying to do they others. Then for the nonverbal imitation, they do things like patting their heads, touching their lips, opening and closing mouth, and sticking out tongue and he repeated them all CORRECTLY when asked. It's so very exciting!!!