Lock down, Autism and Dogs


Sometimes I go into 'lock down' when encountered with this huge thing called autism. 

One friend of mine who's son is in the same class as Joels said she goes into 'shut down' mode when her son displays so many autism behaviours that your body somehow protects itself from this destruction that happens right in front of you and you just have to close up shop and let it happen.  Examples are when Joel has got creams out and smeared them everywhere, emptied food from kitchen cupboards, peeing on the floors around the house. 

That last behaviour of Joel's though has really got to me as I can't seem to control that one and I am supposed to re-direct him to the loo and not say anything but my instinct is saying the opposite. 

Joel can pee in the toilet but for some reason he's got other ideas at home at the moment.  The good news is he's not doing this at school as he has one on one support there but at home it's a different story.  With Holly (7) and Max (3) around too I can't supervise Joel all the time so he'll just get on with these behaviours which with a kid of 2-3 you'd expect maybe, but not one who's nearly 10.  Yikes.

I have been to see Karen incontinence nurse of West Sussex this week to discuss strategies.  Pictures, signs, rewards (we decided non sugar polos could be an option and Karen suggested haribos).  Please Karen can you just come to my house and be on his case and not leave it all up to me?  That is just not going to happen.  Like most of these services I'm left with paperwork but not results.

This is why so many things in life which would have worried me before are so not important now so that's a good thing I guess.  

In my pilates class this week I saw a fellow autism mother who has a child Joel's age who goes in a push chair when she's out as she can't control her child if she was walking so I felt grateful we can walk with Joel when we're out.  Her child also has seizures so it's a constant strain for her and I could see a haunted look on her face this week.  Do you offer sympathy?  Yes but not pity.  Anything but that I've had enough dished out to me for a lifetime so not giving it to her.  Though I do talk to her when I can about what's going on with Joel so that she can maybe chat to me.  We don't really know each other so it's not like just because you both have something in common you have to automatically set up a support group.  



Holly, Blue, Joel and cousin Bea at Granny and Grandpa's in Cornwall

Holly wants a dog for her imminent birthday coming up in a week.  I said we'd get one if it was trained and looked up dogs for the disabled as you can get dogs for autistic kids now.  But they are based in Oxfordshire so will only give dogs to autistic kids in the area.  They offer something called PAWS http://paws.dogsforthedisabled.org/ so am looking into going to a workshop to find out about how to train a dog for a child with autism.  I think I must be mad to be thinking about this but Joel, Holly and Max love dogs and love their Grandparent's dog Blue and I do think a dog could help Joel with communication and maybe these behaviours he gets into.  Having a dog may break the cycle of these behaviours and bring so much to the family life maybe disentangling the many parts of autism.  Then again it may be like toilet training not one, two but three members of a family and not so into that part.