We haven’t been RDI-ing as much as we should since we’ve been in lazy summer mode.  We’ve pretty much mastered our most recent Child objective where Zip and I have been working on pattern regulation so that’s very very exciting. I’ve been giving him more of a role in the patterns and he’s been mostly handling it quite well. We can see him thinking and considering what we’re doing. Wonderful!

Since I’ve last blogged, we’ve had some real changes.

Zip is pointing much more and checking in with us for our reaction. Back when he was a wee 15 months old, I googled “child not pointing” and got the shock of my life when autism came up as the number one answer.  While that was the start of this long and complicated journey for us, I still remember that unexpected and scary moment.

Oh, how little we knew. It seems like I can just barely remember how we were then, like I’m peering backwards into a telescope. We look so young and unaware. Of course we were crazy sleep-deprived but we did not know how much more our lives were going to change, to veer off the path of normal childhood. I knew absolutely nothing about autism and next to nothing on brain and child development. I trusted my instincts when it came to my child and we were in an evaluation within a month or two, and then began private speech therapy. We waited six months for a developmental evaluation that led to Early Intervention.  We tried several types of standard therapies and an ABA preschool. Eventually we found RDI and finally feel like we are making progress, that we know where we are heading. Continue reading →

Hope you don’t have too many of those! Anyway, Zip and I were playing with some Yo Gabba Gabba stuffed toys. I was doing most of the work, being silly, and making funny noises with them. Zip had added “Sh” with his finger to his lips while giggling. Then he took the character’s hand and put it to it’s mouth while saying it. My heart be still – is that a little pretend play I’m seeing? <big grin>
It was a nice moment. Key to Me had worked with puppets with Zip and mentioned to me that he had participated some, but this was the first time I had seen it in action. So cute!

It’s sometimes funny to see how Zip controls the inputs he receives. He has a hand-me-down computer in my home office. It’s full of preschool and kindergarten games, and locked down with a whitelist for the internet. (I forgot to lock it once and he had a blast at YouTube. Kideos.com is a good alternative.) He plays the same things over and over again but seems to be learning from it, so we’re okay with it.

A few weeks back, I checked out what he was doing and he had the Windows Start menu and other directories open, covering most of the Starfall word game he was playing. (We love  StarFall – the extra paying section is worth it.) It looked so strange. I closed the boxes, thinking that he had just hit a bunch of keys by accident. Then, he did it again.

I was puzzled. He can’t tell me why he would cover parts of his game. He doesn’t do it everytime, just once in a while, mostly in a word-building game. My theory is that he is controlling and decreasing his inputs. Maybe it’s sensory? Continue reading →

We’ve learned the hard way that if you do the same thing in the same way, Zip will think that’s the only way and protest any changes. He gets stuck on certain things, like the same two pairs of fleece pajamas, even though before that he would only wear green cotton airplane pajamas. This may seem like pattern recognition but it’s just the autistic tendancy towards rigid thinking. Since we prefer him to have a more flexible approach to life, we try to change things up.

When I sat down with him today to do the “me-you-put” activity with the squares in the jar, I chose a different container. Very different. I had an empty bead box with small compartments and we put as many squares as would fit into each space. He adapted great, sat for the whole thing. At the end we had a cute colorful filled box. It gave us a nice ending point, too. I only wish he would pay more attention when I take a turn, but I’m sure that will come.

So here’s where we are right now… Zip is just beginning his 4th and final loop of Dynamic Listening (more on that later). We’re continuing with RDI though it’s been frustrating. Today, I signed Jamie up for a new Virtual Charter School for next fall. We’ll see if we get a spot and how that goes.

Eventually I’ll do the obligatory “What is RDI” post. Suffice it to say that Relationship Development Intervention is a developmental therapy we’re using to help my son become a more flexible and dynamic thinker and problem-solver, able to handle  myriad challenges throughout his life. For more info, visit the official RDI site.