I lied

So I am a big liar lair pants. I was really struggling today and I can't really explain why. Everything hit me at once. HIS APPOINTMENT IS TOMORROW! I was an emotional mess on the verge of tears all day, but I couldn't actually cry.

I dropped Andrew off at Preschool with Ms. Stephanie (We LOVE her) and I met up with my friend Kassie so she can follow me back to my place and we can chat about what is going on in our lives. Her son, N, not quite a month older than Andrew,  has already been diagnosed with Autism. He reminds me SO much of Bug and that just solidifies the reality of tomorrow for me. I love my time with Kassie and her sons and truly cherish her as a friend, but I SO wish we could have found each other under different circumstances. At the same time I love having another Mommy to go though this with.

After they left, I tired to take a nap because I actually didn't sleep at all last night. But instead I just laid there, looking at the background picture of my phone. My beautiful son.

I tried to cry, I had to get some of this emotion out, but I couldn't. I was completely numb. So I listened to "It Won't Be Like This for Long" By Darius Rucker. That song ALWAYS makes me cry. By the time he sings the chorus for the first time I am bawling like a big baby. It was almost comical. I was blubbering, sobbing, had snot running down my face, the whole shebang. I spent a good 20 minutes crying like that before I had to go pick Bug up. As I am driving to go pick up that beautiful kiddo,  It hits me again. Another wave of comical crying. I actually had to sit in Stephanie's drive way for a little while to pull my self together.

When I walk in the door, Andrew comes RUNNING up the stairs to get to me and gives me a kiss. He knew just what I needed, then he just laid his head on my shoulder and we walked out.

Just like that.

Just like that, that beautiful creature that I had growing in me for 8 1/2 months, that beautiful creature that is going to be 3 in 3 months made me day all better.

We got home and he had fallen asleep in the car, so I carried him up the stairs and  put him in our bed. I sat there looking at him, wondering what his future was going to be like, when I had to remind my self.

One day at a time, Shauna.

I go and get some coffee, sit down on the computer and log in to facebook and this pops up.

We worry about what a child will become tomorrow, yet we forget that he is someone today. ~Stacia Tauscher

It's almost like it was waiting for me. With that I am back at this place of acceptance. I know there will be hills and valleys in this for all of us, and that some days will be better than others. But at the end of those days I still have my amazing child.


... and you know what? That makes everything better :)

Andrew's Birth story

I have told you guys in a previous post that my pregnancy, labor, and delivery of Andrew was not an easy one. Here is the story: This is a long and somewhat descriptive post. So there is your warning!

I found out I was pregnant on March 13th, 2009,  It was a Friday the 13th actually.  I already knew I was pregnant before the test came back positive. Long story short, Andrew is a DOUBLE birth control failure baby.  I started getting sick, I kid you not, the next day. Little did I know that was only the beginning. I threw up every.single.day. for 27 weeks. I lost 20lbs and almost got my self hospitalized because I was so dehydrated. I ended up with something called Hyperemesis gravidarum. I had never been so sick in my entire life. It was all I could do to get out up bed in the morning, If I left my apartment and then came home, the smell of my apartment made me puke. It was that bad.

When I was 25 weeks, one of the kiddos I worked with at the time, kicked me in the stomach. My OB had me come in, even tho she wasn't there she wanted me to see the on-call Dr. I get there they take my blood pressure and it was 160/100. At first they thought it was just because I was nervous. They put me on the Non-stress test machine, and left me alone to relax. While I was relaxing, my OB's nurse just happened to stop in. When she found out I was there, she came in and explained what was happening. I had protein in my urine and elevated blood pressure. They put me on weekend bed rest and told me to come back in on Monday when my regular Dr. would be back.

At 26 weeks, I was diagnosed with Pre-Eclampsia, and put on modified best rest. I was told that I can shower, go to the store if I HAD to, but to lay low. After 5 weeks of that I was put on strict bed rest and began to have BPP's ( a fancy ultra sound  ) every other week and Non-stress tests every week. On the plus side I got LOTS of ultra sound pictures :)

Baby feet

Baby face

Baby hands

Profile

Around 33 weeks they noticed I had WAY more amniotic fluid than I should have had, and I was monitored even closer... I was seriously GINORMOUS!

This was at 37 weeks, when I was induced. You can see how huge my belly is and how swollen my face was

 On 11/3 at 6:00 P.M. I went in for my induction. I REALLY did not want to be induced, But my blood pressure was out of control. It was getting in to the 200's, I could not get rid of the head aches, and it was starting to affect my liver function. My body was not ready to have that baby. I was only 1cm dilated and I was not effaced at all. My Dr started my induction with Cyetoteck that evening and I was on it all night. I woke up the next morning (11/4) 2cm dilated, and then they started shitocin...I mean Pitocin. Soon enough they were upping the dosage every 20 minuets until I got in to a contraction pattern. An induction meant that I could not labor in the water, They needed me on the heart rate monitors 100% of the time. I needed to walk or move to get through contractions. They put me on a portable monitor so I could walk the halls with Erik.  Because I had SO much fluid Andrew kept falling off the stupid machine and pissing off the OB nurse. She told me I was restricted to bed so they could keep an eye on him, EVEN THO HIS HEART RATE WAS FINE! Around 10:00 that night My OB came in and broke my water. Things picked up right away. She told me that I was STILL at 2cm and that if I didn't make any more progress by 3 AM, they were going to do a c-section. 3AM came and the nurse checked me. THANK GOD! I was at 3cm. NO c-section! At this point I have been in labor for 33 hours. Up for way longer. I was exhausted. The nurse suggested that I got an epidural. I said no, but that I would take some other form of pain relief. They gave me a shot of something and I passed out for about an hour. I woke up to crazy contractions one right on top of the other. The nurse suggested again that I get the epi, and at this point I agreed. Soon enough I hear the nurse talking to the anesthesiologist. She said that I would probably end up with a c-section, so she talked me in to one... The dude came in, gave me the epi and I fell asleep again. 5 am I fell asleep. I work up at 8, to a new nurse. Her name was Maria, and she was amazing. She cheked me and told me that I was 8 1/2 cm. She no sooner to the garbage to throw her gloves away and I told her I NEEDED her to check me again, I reallllly needed to push. She checks me again and told me I was 10, To start giving 'practice' pushes. As soon as I was done with the first one, she told me that I NEEDED to stop, that it was her first day back from maternity leave and she wasn't particularly keen on the idea of catching Andrew lol. She put a call in to my Dr, who was at the other hospital she practices at, told her that I was ready to go. my dr told her to have me give practice pushes because I was a first time mom. Maria stepped in to the hall and I am not sure what was said. But she came in and told me that the Dr was going to see a few more pregnant ladies and then she would head over, just to let me labor him down. It was around 10 by this time and Maria checked me again, She hadn't really left my side this entire time. She said that she was going to call Dr. P again. Maria but have made it to be pretty urgent because my Mom, who was waiting in the hall told me that the Dr was literally running down the hall to get to my room when she got there. She got in my room, 3 pushes later at 11:05 AM Andrew Marshall Robinson was born earth side.

Now, in case you thought my birth story was boring, here is where it gets REALLY exciting! :::WARNING::: THIS IS DISGUSTING!  While Andrew was in utero he had passed miconioum. AKA He pooped. When he was born he inhaled some and got what is called miconioum aspiration. The NICU team was in the room working on getting him breathing. He was grey, limp and completely lifeless. It was single handedly THE scariest moment in my life. While all of that was happening, I wasn't concentrated on my self until I started to feel really dizzy. I looked down to see my Dr pulling handfuls of blood out of me. I was hemorrhaging. Some point during all of this they got Andrew breathing and they gave him to me.  I was shaking so bad that I gave him straight to Erik.
I lost over 2 liters of blood. They gave me some medication and I eventually stopped I was told that if I lost any more I would have had to have a transfusion. Andrew and I did get to go home 3 days later

So there it is. To sum it up 41 hours of labor, 3 pushes, a grey baby and a hemorrhaging mama.

P.S. I am not going to re- read this, so sorry for any spelling/grammar mistakes.

September until now

Our Apt. at the Lily Center: We went back in to this room, with a table and some toys. Sara, the woman who was 'testing' him asked us some questions about his development, why we were thinking Autism and then observed him playing with toys. She told us based on his current age (22 months) he was too young for a diagnosis. She told us that there are a lot of red flags, but she wants us to come back in 6 months. From there we had his hearing tested and started with Early Intervention / Birth to 3.

Andrew eventually passed his hearing test and then we started our testing for Birth to 3.

I need to start this by saying that our Early Intervention team is AMAZING! They are caring, supportive and they LOVE my bug (Let's be honest,  have you seen my child? He is pretty Loveable)

Adorable Child!

To qualify for EI your child has to have a 25% delay and one area or multiple areas. Andrew qualified for speech and OT services. He was testing at 15 months for expressive speech and 17 months for receptive. He receives Speech 1x a week and OT every other week.

In June of 2012 Our speech pathologist Kristin, Service Coordination Lyn, and Occupational Therapist Sue came to us and told us that while Andrew was making a little progress, it is not where they hoped he would be. That with him going to be aging out of Birth to 3, They were /strongly/ ugring us to seek a second opinion because the people at the Lily Center were giving us the run around. Sue said that his SPD (Sensory Processing Disorder) was getting worse and Kristin said that he really isn't making progress with his speech despite us working with him.

ANYWAYS! We then made an apt. with Dr. Linda Steffen at the Behavior Health Clinic. Per EI's recommendation.

We go to that Apt this Wednesday. Aug. 1st 2012.

I know an official diagnosis is coming. I have know for a long time. But still, to hear the words. "Your child is Autistic"  is going to be like a stab in the heart. I KNOW it's not a death sentence, I KNOW that he can still lead a productive life, I've seen if first hand! I KNOW that is he still going to be the same Andrew that I love, adore and wake up for every day. On Aug.1st he will be the same kid that he was on July 31st. A diagnosis and becoming one of the  1:88 children that are diagnosed with ASD ( 1:54 boys) in this country,  All of that is NOT going to change my son.

He is MORE than a statistic. He is Andrew, and THAT is all I will ever ask him to be.

A little boy, who LOVE animals

A little boy who is beautiful.

A little boy who LOVES Thomas and sleeping in laundry baskets :)

A little boy who loves to swing

A little boy who loves to line toys up

But most importantly, He is a little boy who is LOVED 

All of this is what defines Andrew. Not Autism

How it all started...

I'm not sure how to start this, I've never had a blog before. I guess an introduction in to who we are and why we are here. I am Shauna, and this is going to be my family's story about our journey in Autism.

To get to where we are now, I guess you will need a little back story. Erik and I were high school sweet hearts <3 we started dating my senior year and quickly found our self's getting serious. We have been together since January of 2006  On 11/5/09 we welcomed our baby boy Andrew Marshall in to the world. He was 8lbs 5.6oz of beauty.  On May 19th 2012 Erik and I finally tied the knot, and most importantly, we all finally have the same last name! lol

My pregnancy, labor and delivery of Andrew were NOT easy, but I will talk about that more one day.

He was about 4 hours old in this picture <3

When Andrew was an baby he was advanced in everything. No, I'm not just saying that as his Mom either, I promise. He rolled over at 3 weeks, sat up at 4 months, crawled at 5 months and walked at 9 months. At 10 months he started identifying mama and daddy to Erik and my self, He would call out for my moms cat, Ginger. By the time he was 18 months he was talking in 3 and 4 word sentences and had about 20 signs! He knew his colors, all of his animal sounds and his ABC's.We were told buy our Dr's and by this program that we participated in called Parents as Teachers, to prepare for a gifted child and to NEVER compare any future child to him because this is NOT normal. Lol... Little did we know!

He pulled him self up in his crib at 6 months old.

At 7 months Andrew started having what looked like seizures. Our family Dr. referred us to a pediatric neurologist. Dr. Edgar ordered an EEG and then 2 weeks later we went in to the office for the results. I ended up having to go by me self because Erik got called in to work. It started out with good news. Andrew didn't have seizures, he was NOT epileptic. Dr. Edgar, upon viewing his EEG and a video that I had of Andrew during an episode. He diagnosed him with Benign Infantile Stereotipi Spasms. When a person has a seizure it scrambles their who brain, when a child with this disorder has a spasm it focal points on one part of his brain. LUCKILY for us Dr. Edgar was also an Autism specialist. He went on to tell me that out of the children who has these spasms about 60% go on to develop Autism and that with Erik's family history of it he was thinking that Andrew had about an 80% chance.

He ALWAYS has a smile on his face :)

This was his second EEG, I don't have pictures of his first.

One morning when Andrew was about 20 months old, he woke up and it was like he was a completely different child. (This was the morning after his shots, but I will get in to our beliefs on that in future pots as well) He would not talk or sign, at all. He would not make eye contact with us. It took all of our power and my knowledge as an Autism therapist to get him to engage, he was STUCK on lining things up and spinning wheels. I knew right away that something was wrong. Soon after he quit sleeping, He was going on day four with 20 minuet cat naps about three times a day when I finally gave in and called our Dr. Our normal Dr. was out of town so they had us see a nurse practitioner. When she came in Andrew was in a full melt down. He was screaming, banding his head on the door and stomping his feet. The NP asked me what was *I* though was wrong. I said " I think he is on the Autism spectrum" She told me that he was 2, There is NOTHING wrong with him.

See on the train table right behind him? See all of the various wheeled things in order by size? YES - he did that on his own.

We would find this all over our house

He is also obsessed with Thomas the Train :)

At this point I was crying; I was telling her all of the symptoms he was having. How he had regresses, was seeing visual stim and how he was seeking gross motor pressure. How he would throw tantrums for 45 minuets at a time. Finally, she started taking some notes and told me that she would give this information to Dr. Spencer. about 4 hours later we got a call from his office telling us that Dr. Spencer made us an apt at The Lily Center in Brookfield, WI. We went on September of 2011.

This is just the beginning of our crazy journey. I will post another post about what has take place for us since the Lily Center.