Posts Tagged autistic son
Wasn’t Me
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating, Daily Life, Silly Behaviors on November 3, 2010
If you think about it, even for just a minute or two, you’ll see that this was not my doing.
After all, I’m the one that suggested we take a break after we lost our dog last week. I was the voice of reason.
But then things started happening.
First, without a dog in the house, it suddenly became clear just how much food Clay drops on the floor. He takes heaping handfuls of pretzels or chips, much more than he can hold, then leaves trails of food throughout the house. He is also a master of what we call the “bite and toss,” an odd compulsion where he flings the last quarter inch or so of a french fry or apple slice or chicken nugget indiscriminately. It’s a miracle no one has lost an eye. Clearly, we needed another dog for housecleaning purposes. I couldn’t very well let the house be overrun with ants, could I? Read the rest of this entry »
Talking Geese
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating, Daily Life on November 1, 2010
The ducks and geese were chattering, honking and generally making a ruckus out on the water when we got to Clay’s favorite nature center Sunday afternoon.
“We’re so surprised about the geese,” Clay typed, sitting on a bench along the trail.
“What surprised you about them?” my wife asked in response. Read the rest of this entry »
Not Forgotten
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating, Daily Life on October 29, 2010
Maverick 1999 - 2010
When Clay was about six or seven, and still using speech to communicate, he came in the kitchen door one afternoon and announced that our dog, Maverick, had treed “an old cat.”
My wife dutifully headed into the backyard to check on the situation and found Maverick, a yellow labrador retriever we had adopted at the age of 1 1/2, barking at the base of a maple tree. When she looked up to see whose “old cat” he had forced up the tree, she saw, instead, a raccoon the size of a small bear, hissing and spitting and making a strange moaning sound.
She wisely got Maverick and Clay back in the house until the angry raccoon came out of the tree and waddled its way off our lawn. Read the rest of this entry »
Yo, Adrian, Part 2
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating, Daily Life on October 27, 2010
Sitting at our kitchen table a day after Clay surprised us by riding a horse during our trip to Water Stream Farm – bareback no less, the glow remained.
“Still feeling happy,” he typed on the keyboard he uses to communicate, when asked about his ride on Rocky.
“Would you like to write a story about it?” my wife asked.
“Sure.”
So, here is Clay’s first literary effort, written a sentence at a time, with breaks in between to wander through the house and into the backyard. (Hey, Hemingway wrote standing up, too.) Full disclosure: he did get a little assist with the “Once upon a time” part to get things rolling. Read the rest of this entry »
Yo, Adrian
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating on October 25, 2010
We had been at the sprawling horse farm for about 45 minutes, when the owners popped the question.
Do you think Clay would like to ride one of the horses?
Clay had loved almost everything about his trip on this sunny fall day so far, but we weren’t sure how he would answer that. Read the rest of this entry »
Nature Boy
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating, Daily Life on October 4, 2010
Clay loves the nature center near our house, so when we discovered one a couple towns over a few weeks back we figured it was worth a visit.
The first stop on the trail was a blind for bird watching.
My wife and I sat on chairs looking out through a wall-length picture window while Clay explored the room. Illustrations of birds ran above the glass. After a bit, the little guy joined us.
“What are your favorite birds?” my wife typed on the keyboard Clay uses to communicate. Read the rest of this entry »
Diving Butterfly
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating on September 13, 2010
The night before we met with Clay’s “team” at school last week, my wife told me a story. A story I hadn’t heard before. It explained how—after years of silence from the little guy—we wound up at our kitchen table preparing for a meeting to integrate a computer keyboard into his high school classroom.
A year ago, we didn’t know if Clay would be able to type. We weren’t completely sure if he could read. We certainly didn’t know he could do addition, subtraction and multiplication in his head. He hadn’t used speech to communicate in five years. I had my darker moments, but I don’t think my wife ever stopped believing that underneath Clay’s often distracted and hyperactive exterior lived a boy who was listening, learning and longing to do more with his life than he had thus far. She had spent a weekend at Syracuse University learning about typing with support. She read herself to sleep at night with books on the key techniques and stories of people with autism who had broken through the silence.
We had talked about the possibility of Clay learning to type, but hadn’t taken concrete action to get it started. Read the rest of this entry »
3,877 Hot Dogs
Posted by Larry Blumenthal in Communicating, Daily Life on September 3, 2010
This past Wednesday night, Clay was upstairs with the aide that works with him at home when I heard the robotic sound of the keyboard he uses to communicate.
“I am really hungry.”
Not surprisingly, moments later he and the aide tromped down the stairs to the kitchen, where I was chopping vegetables for dinner.
“What would you like to eat?” I asked. In her daily report, his teacher wrote that Clay was “very hungry” at school that day. He had been eating all afternoon, and already had inhaled a plateful of french fries. But it was 6 p.m., and I know he was looking for more.
“Hot dogs,” he typed.
“OK. How many do you want?” Read the rest of this entry »
Life With Clay 
