Today I had the incredible opportunity to be at Utah Special Olympics send-off to the 2nd ever  National Games.  These Athletes are amazing.  They are competing in aquatics, bocce, golf, track and field, and basketball (united team meaning members with and without disabilities).  53 of of Utah’s 2,200 Special Olympic Athletes took off today from SLC.  The athletes are from all over Utah from St. George to Logan.  Their ages range from 14 to 62, I think it’s amazing a 62 year old is going to the Olympics!

This was my first appearance as Mrs. Utah and I had a fabulous time talking and taking pictures with the athletes.  I also had the opportunity to wish them good luck in their games.  The motto of the Special Olympics is ‘Let me win, but if I cannot win.  Let be be brave in the attempt.’   Isn’t that wonderful I think it’s a great motto for life!

Here are a few pictures of me with athletes.

I am a fan of TED videos.  Far superior to the debri that comprises most of the web, TED host talks and addresses that engage the viewer on a level that challenges ideas, conceptions and intelligence.

This particular post describes the exploration of the cause and neuro-medical symptoms of learning disabilities and abnormalities of the brain. Specifically, freeing children from possible misdiagnosis of Autism.

The embedded video doesn’t fit well and here is the link in case it doesn’t work in your browser on our blog. Link to Video
If you love science more than your free time, I know you will enjoy this as well.

On June 26, 2010,  I was crowned Mrs. Utah 2010!  The possibilities that come with this honor are still sinking in.  My voice is no longer just the voice of someone who loves her children and does everything she can for them and the special needs community.  A friend of mine who’s (adopted) daughter has Fetal Alcohol Affect put it best.  “You’re still the same person but you or what simply your presence can do has changed.”  September 9, 2010 is Fetal Alcohol Awareness Day in Utah.  We will be doing an event that day.  This is very dear to me my little brother who is adopted also has Fetal Alcohol Affect.  It is 100% preventable.  So let’s get to work getting information out there.  More info will be coming about September 9th.

Immediately following the Mrs. Utah America Pageant, we went to Hawaii!  Caleb, for some reason, seemed to think everyone in Hawaii spoke Spanish.  He would go up to people and say, “I can speak Spanish too!  Aloha see I can say Hi in Spanish.”  At this point they would laugh and say, “yes you can.”  No matter what Brian or I said to him to try and convince him that the people were Hawaiian and not Spanish he would not listen.  He’s watched Dora enough to know that in Spanish Hi is Hola.  I wonder what Caleb will think if we ever take him to Mexico?

Today, Caleb was officially released from the Special Education Program.  He is age appropriate in all the standardized tests and ahead in some categories!  Early Intervention WORKS!!!  This is why I feel promoting early intervention and other resources is so critical.  GO here for early intervention resources in Utah.

This is wonderful, and it’s what we have been praying and working towards for years.  But it is TERRIFYING.  My little boy, who is age appropriate in testing, still has Autism.  We still have melt-downs and most certainly does not understand pragmatics (Social Interaction).  He’s told me that he’s worried that there will be big kids in Kindergarten who will be mean to him.  This next year I’m going to try and be in his class twice a week.

Hooray for Caleb and the progress he has made in the last 3 years!  He is going to do AMAZING things, I just know it.

Insert Post from Brian: And Caleb played NERF with the neighbor boys yesterday and didn’t come home crying!  I was so proud that I didn’t even mind having to go all the way around the block to all of our neighbor’s backyards to get the darts.

I’m not sure how we’ve managed to avoid talking about hugging this long, but we are certainly overdue for it and this post will certainly not be conclusive on subject.

There are very few universal parenting techniques across the broad range of types of special needs (each with their own associated spectrum).  That being said, Hugging is one of the few things that seems to work for almost everyone.  My wife is better with it (and Caleb) than I am.  I’m more in the distraction and tough love school.   But I still believe in hugging.

When Caleb was approved for assisted schooling at the local elementary school, I had a very hard time with it.  Referring back to the Welcome to Holland post, I had spent my life planning to be in “Italy,” and while I had seen “Holland” a few times, I wasn’t really looking to go there.   I decided that it was time to re-evaluate my life and announced to the online communities I was apart of that I would be retiring from those communities.   I knew that a couple from Texas in one of those communities has twin girls that have disabilities.  I talked with them briefly, I was trying to get some travel advice for “Holland” (although I didn’t call it that at the time) and the advice that they gave me that always stayed with me was “Hugs are the answer.”  Time has proven them wise.

Now there seems to be some technique to the hugs that Caleb requires.  Perhaps some of you don’t examine the techniques of your personal interactions this much, but the rest of us could be termed “hug-impaired,” so bear with me.  They are long, tight (but not too tight) hugs.  Ashalon calls it giving him “pressure.”  And the positioning of the arms seems to be mostly upper and center back.   He loves em.  He usually comes and gets a hug from his mommy first thing in the morning.  They have also been known to avert or even help recover him from Melt-downs or upsets.

There are many types of hugging, and we will now reproduce a list of dad-perspective hugging types from Dad-o-matic:

Children:
Daddy’s Home – This is a personal favorite of dads. It only occurs at the end of a long day or when you return from a trip. The excitement and joy embraced in this hug often “quite literally” knocks one off their feet.

I’m sad daddy - There are times that nothing can cure the “sad” but a hug sure comes close. Sad hugs are generally full hugs with constant pressure but don’t contain the excitement that might be experienced in other hugs. The sad hug is honestly as much for the daddy as it is for the child because it gives the daddy something he can “do” to help in the situation.

Middle of the night scared hug – This is hug unfortunately is only given when the daddy is very groggy. Therefore it lacks the immediate emotional attachment that is often associated with hugs. However the emotional impact on the child is tremendous and usually helps the child return to sleep.

You’ve been bad but I love you hug – This is a hug that has to be administered most times a child ends up in trouble. The hug is only administered after the child understands the action they took that was “bad” and why they shouldn’t do it again. The hug provides reassurance that the child can do something wrong but still be loved. On the flip side this hug is often more necessary for the daddy who had to discipline the child.

Random Daddy I love you hug – This is another favorite of many dads. The child will run up to you and randomly give you a hug for seemingly no reason. This hug is often administered by the child from the side. The only problem with this hug type is with children who are approximately 5 years old and their arms happen to be around 3 feet of f the ground. If the dad is not careful he can end up on the ground when receiving this hug.

Baby hug – This hug is administered by the dad to an infant. It includes a big full baby cuddle and some strange language never before spoken by the daddy.

Tickle hug – Tickle hugs are a fun, laughter filled hug that are often asked for again and again. Daddies must be careful with this hug as intelligent children will often use this hug to procrastinate bedtime, or other unwanted activities.

Good night hug – Nuf’ said.

Go to work hug – Don’t forget this hug. It is very important and you will be called back if you are in a rush to get out the door to administer the hug. It’s much smarter to administer the hug without having to be asked. However if you do overlook this hug because you are in a rush and are called back you make up for it by calling yourself silly and increasing the intensity of the hug.

Ouchy hug – You can’t say enough about the value of a hug after a fall, bump, cut or other ouchy situation. However at the age of 2 -4 a hug is only half the cure often a band-aid is required as well.

The daddy go away hug – Not often give by children under 10 and is never given by children under 3. This is more of a yeah here’s your hug now leave please. Often given by children over 10 who don’t want to be seen with you but can also be given by children as young as 4 when they are involved in something and want to be left alone.

Sometimes there’s just nothing else to do but hug hug – Nuf’ said.

Wife:
Hello and welcome home hug – This hug is usually reserved for when the daddy has been gone on a trip. It is also often given when a daddy returns from a day at work. This hug is give because the wife is happy you are home. This hug can be encouraged by occasionally bringing flowers for no reason what so ever.

The kids are yours hug – This hug indicates that your wife has had a tough day and is ready to kill someone, so take the kids and give me ten minutes to myself while I get it back together. Oh and by the way you probably want to give the kids a bath and put them down and if you really love me you’ll tell me I can go shopping, NOW!

I love you hug – nuf’ said

I need your support hug – These hugs take all forms of administration and vary greatly. It is a fact that as life gets more complicated so do the variances and subtleties in a hug.

The makeup hug – YEAH, this usually leads to make up —. This hug is often accompanied with an I’m sorry by one of the parties. Usually the man.

The “it will be okay hug” – This hug can be administered by either sex although, it is appropriate that it be administered by the male in the relationship more often as a show of support and understanding. This hug will also relieve you of saying something stupid when you don’t know what else to say.

The Just because hug – This hug should be administered often. It feels good hug just because. This hug is also good with the just because flowers.

So remember your hugging folks!  Work on your technique, frequency and timing and we’ll make Holland an even cooler place to be.

As Mrs. Utah draws near I find myself contemplating my decision to be involved in a Pageant.  If you told me a year ago that I would be doing this, I would have called you a liar.  But here I am.  This is a journey I have decided to take because I passionately believe parents, especially those with special needs children, need HOPE.

I believe, with all my heart, in being an active parent that seeks out knowledge to help our children, acting on that knowledge and sharing whatever I can with whoever I can.  Its not always easy when your life is consumed with taking care of a child that needs lots of time and attention, but its always worth it.

This website is only in it’s infancy and will continue to grow.  My husband and I are continually searching for resources and information to pass along.  If you have you anything that you would like to share please comment or e-mail me at ashalon.goodrich@gmail.com.   We will also be looking to invite guest writers to post on Warrior Mothers.

Oh how I wish I had this 6 years ago.  Right before I had my son Caleb I did a 25 page research paper on immunizations.  I knew that immunizations are important, but with a family history with Autism (and the difference we saw in my sister immediately following an immunization) I was terrified about how to approach them.  Taking what I had learned in my research,  I spread out his immunizations, all the while praying I was making the right decisions.  Thankfully we had a wonderful Pediatrician that really believed in mother’s intuition and allowed me set our own schedule. Some will make you sign a form committing to follow their schedule or they won’t treat your child.  You may have to search, but there are still some Pediatricians who are willing to work with you.

Just a disclaimer I do not believe that Immunizations alone cause Autism, but I do believe that it may be a factor in some cases.  Other factors may also include genetic tendencies, and toxins in our environment combined with a individual threshold for toxicity.

Anyways here are some suggestions form the Children’s Biomedical Center of Utah by Bryan Jepson MD.

IMMUNIZATION RECOMMENDATIONS
Please understand that most DAN! Physicians are not against immunizations. They have been
one of the major advances in public health and modern medicine and have led to the eradication
of many infectious diseases resulting in countless lives saved. We do, however, believe that
vaccines could be safer and suggest caution in the administering of immunizations with the
following general guidelines (a more detailed description available on our website
www.cbcutah.org):

• Use only thimerosol-free vaccines

• Avoid all unnecessary combination vaccines

• Use monovalent measles, mumps and rubella in separate injections on different days as
opposed to MMR. (Unfortunately, this is not currently available) DTaP is currently not
available in monovalent form

• Space immunizations by as much time as possible; 6-12 months for live vaccines
(measles, mumps, rubella) is ideal

• Use single dose vials, avoids preservatives

• Use inactivated polio (IM, not oral)

• Do not vaccinate your child if he/she is sick or still recovering from an illness

• Ensure RDA of Vitamin A (1250-5000IU based on age—best source is cod liver oil) for
three days before and the day of a shot.

• Give vitamin C 150 mg twice daily for infants and 300 mg twice daily for toddlers for
three days before and the day of the shot.

• Prioritize vaccines that will be of most value to your child when he/she is most likely to
contract the illness. For example, hepatitis B is contracted through sexual activity and
drug abuse or from maternal infection at birth. There is no need to vaccinate most infants
for Hepatitis B, unless mother falls into a high risk category. Hemophilus B (HiB) is
probably highest priority because it causes meningitis and epiglottitis (a life-threatening
throat infection) often in the first year of life. Next is probably DTaP.

• Get immune titers if possible before repeating doses (these are fairly expensive blood
tests). Many children are fully immunized after the first dose and may not require
subsequent boosters. This is especially helpful for MMR as a positive titer infers livelong
immunity.

• Avoid re-immunization with a vaccine if there is a negative reaction to it.

• Do not immunize newborns.

A. Vaccine schedule
Below is an example of an immunization schedule that provides the required
vaccinations prior to entering school. Please understand that this is just an example
and does not constitute an official recommendation. I think that there are many
modifications that could take place depending on the individual circumstances.
Notice how difficult it is to follow the guidelines about limiting injections to two in
one day if all of the currently recommended vaccinations are included. You could
extend the schedule into to 10th, 11th or 12th month but this also decreases the chance
that they will get all of the necessary immunizations when they are most risk for the
illness, especially in the cases of Hib, DTaP and Prevnar. My feeling is that parents
should research each vaccine individual and decide if and when that vaccine should
be given based off of a risk vs. benefit analysis.

• Birth—Hepatitis B, if mom Hep B positive. If unsure, check titer in mother. If mother
involved in high risk behavior in last 6 months, give vaccine.

• 4 months—Hib, IPV

• 5 months—DtaP

• 6 months—Hib, Prevnar

• 7 months—DtaP

• 8 months—Hib, IPV

• 9 months—DtaP, Prevnar

• 15 months—measles

• 17 months—Hib, IPV

• 18 months—DtaP, Prevnar

• 27 months—Rubella

• 39 months—Mumps

• 4-5 years—Varicella (if not immune already)

• 4-5 years—Hepatitis B series (I would actually delay this until age 10-12 since they are at low risk of contracting the disease before that)

• 4-5 years—DtaP, IPV boosters

• 4-5 years—test titers for MMR and do not give unless low

• 12 years—retest titers, boosters if needed.

This WEEK is Autism Awareness Week!  So on Friday wear blue.

Autism Affects

1 in 110 children

1 in 70 boys

It’s time for everyone to learn the signs!

In clinical terms, there are a few “absolute indicators,” often referred to as “red flags,” that indicate that a child should be evaluated. For a parent, these are the “red flags” that your child should be screened to ensure that he/she is on the right developmental path. If your baby shows any of these signs, please ask your pediatrician or family practitioner for an immediate evaluation (local early intervention and school districts can help too):

• No big smiles or other warm, joyful expressions by six months or thereafter

• No back-and-forth sharing of sounds, smiles, or other facial expressions by nine months or thereafter

• No babbling by 12 months

• No back-and-forth gestures, such as pointing, showing, reaching, or waving by 12 months

• No words by 16 months

• No two-word meaningful phrases (without imitating or repeating) by 24 months

• Any loss of speech or babbling or social skills at any age

*This information has been provided by First Signs, Inc. ©2001-2005. Reprinted with permission. For more information about recognizing the early signs of developmental and behavioral disorders, please visit http://www.firstsigns.org or the Centers for Disease Control at www.cdc.gov/actearly.

I have been getting excited about the up coming Walk for Autism, BUT, it’s on May 1st the same day as Mrs. Utah United States (and I have mandatory all-day rehearsal at Kingsbury Hall).  I’m so disappointed that I can’t go, especially because it is raising money for Clear Horizons Academy, the amazing school I am so privileged to work at.  I strongly encourage you and your families to support and attend these events!

I found an article on the blog Simple Mom about Relinquishing Your Power on the Things That Don’t Matter.

I wanted to share it today, because its such a powerful idea for parents and the parent-child relationship.   Children with Autism often struggle a great deal with frustration and powerlessness before a world that refuses to be to understandable.

Sometimes, that sense of helplessness becomes overwhelming for our children and we enter the ever-familiar melt-down sequence.  Whether its at the grocery store, the playground, or even at the dinner table, we’ve all been there, and know how powerless a parent feels in front of the raging force of the melt-down.  Once you’ve entered the melt-down cycle, a child has become fairly helpless to control themselves and the parent needs to take charge somehow. Although for me, every-time I go toe-to-toe against the melt-down feels like putting on gloves in front of Muhammad Ali.

But that’s a different discussion for a different day.   Today, I want to talk about a method that can postpone or completely avoid melt-down scenarios by empowering our children.  Give up the choices that aren’t critical.  Don’t leave them open ended, children usually aren’t ready for that, they’re children!  But give them some pre-defined choices which will (should) result in parent-acceptable outcomes.

What I gave Caleb and Kylie last night: “Do you two want to watch Mulan now and clean up the downstairs?  Or do you want to go clean your rooms and then come watch Mulan with popcorn?”

(Not the clearest choice, and I had no idea what response I was going to get.  I admit, not my best work.)

Unanimously, “watch Mulan now and cl..ean..downst….” trail off.  Well, take what you can get.

Did they clean up? Yeah, some.  Not a lot, but they cleaned up both downstairs and in their rooms.  I had communicated to them that I wanted them to clean and expected them to do so while still giving them choice.  Which is still better than “Go clean your rooms!” and “No TV till I’m satisfied!” and almost instantly getting a tantrum and a melt-down.

We’ve been doing this with Caleb for years now and we’ve found wonderful success whenever we can remember to take the time and effort to do it.  Go see the link to simple-mom, she has some very important details on the techniques involved and they work well for all children.

For higher-functioning:

Link here!

This page on eHow has detailed methods for lower-functioning children:

Link here!

But really, just read both.  You’re gonna need it.

Unfortunately, our social event wasn’t very well attended, which was doubly unfortunate, in that we had volunteers and refreshments (and a chocolate fountain).  I had me a chocolate covered cookie.  We could’ve handled 50 families or more last Friday night!  Next time, we’ll have more time to get the word out, better fliers, actually post the agenda and it will be *awesome*.

But!  Good things still happened with those who came and we were able to discuss what Warrior-Mothers is planning in the next few months and get ideas and feedback from the area.

• A Special Needs Sports program will be starting in Eagle Mountain this summer.  Opening Date: TBD.  Opening Sport: Soccer!  Expected Cost? Currently, $25 for the whole season, but we’re looking for a new uniform printing service that should bring the costs down closer to $15, which will be *awesome.*  It won’t be tournament soccer or with a focus on competition, we’re getting the kids out there, get a chance to get a feel for sports with some very close one-on-one help from volunteers!  We already have the volunteers!  Wheelchair and mobility limited children welcome to participate!
• One of the families that came last Friday night brought to our attention the need for programs for older Special Needs individuals.  Work programs and social opportunities.  We’ve mostly been focused on teens and under, but the wheels are now turning and we’re grateful to have this need brought to our attention.
• A very special, but still very secret Warrior-Mother sponsored program is under-way for families with Special Needs Kids at Thanksgiving Point!  Details to follow, but keep some flexibility in your calendars for the beginning of May!  …. *awesome!*

(The word of day is “*awesome!*”… apparently)