Sunday, October 12, 2008

People...they're the worst

So I am on this autism listserv right? There are sometimes messages about walks and fairs where you can get information on therapies, etc., but mostly there are frantic posts about chelation and diets and Jenny Mc Carthy and it sort of freaks me out. Since Joseph has been diagnosed with autism, I have gone right to the internets to find ... help and comfort and people in like situations, like every other thing in my life. But I can't find anyone who just wants to talk about what their days are like. I start to think maybe it's me, maybe I don't want Joseph to get better? But the thing is, I do. He is in preschool five days a week and although it's not the most aggressive program in the world, he is only three years old and he seems to be thriving. He gets speech and occupational therapy there. Then two afternoons a week, we all three (and a half, I guess, or a quarter) drive to another place so he can get more occupational and physical therapy too. He has 'low muscle tone' in his core and when I heard that I was like "who doesn't?" Ha! ANYWAY.

I am trying to balance accepting and loving Joseph for who he is with trying to change him and make him better. I think a lot of things that make our lives crazy with Joseph are age, too. He is super noisy during Kathleen's naps, he sometimes sits at the bottom of the stairs and yells, which is super annoying as she is a light sleeper. But ... he's three. I don't expect him to do everything I say. I just try and distract him, to move him on to something else, preferably outside. I tell him the baby is sleeping and he sometimes says "baaaaaby...sleeping", very seriously, like he gets it, and then screams wildly and wakes her up. So...ugh, right? But also ... three.

So. My point, if I have one, is that the other night this woman posted this "very important breakthrough" news and it was about how mercury poisoning has been proven to cause autism. So I was looking at the study and it seemed weird, it seemed to talk in circles and the main thing was that you could get a urine test from some lab in France for 100 dollars. So I googled it and found an interesting post on this guy's blog - he's in England and his daughter has Asperger's - and he said a lot of stuff contradicting this study. So I posted the link to the blog and said thanks for the link and here was a differing point of view. Well. This woman, who seems very nice, posted in like TWO SECONDS asking me all these questions about WHOSE blog it was and WHO did he think he was and THAT wasn't the test she was talking about and on and on, saying the blog author was probably a PLANT from BIG PHARM and DOCTORS. So I posted back and linked to the about me section in the blog and said I didn't think he was and I was just, as I said, posting a different point of view and I thought that would be cool since SHE had posted one point of view. Ugh. Forget it.

I just wish I could have friends, like my regular friends that I have met since I had kids - and they could understand my situation a little bit. It feels very isolating, because Joseph can be kind of a pain at playgroups, etc., (really I don't think any more than any other kid, they all have good and bad days) and I'm afraid that out old friends are not inviting us over because of that. It might not even really be happening, but it's in my head. Also, I have to go and get him every day kind of late morning so once Kathleen is done with her morning nap, we usually just go and get Joseph and then we can't do anything after lunch because Kathleen is napping again. Hoo boy.

So. Whine whine whine, I know. But it just sometimes feels like I am banging my head against the wall and after a while I think boy this hurts! And my head is bleeding!

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