Latest / DA CREW Podcast / EXTRA SCOOP hosted by DWAYNE & SISSY | DA CREW PODCAST

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EXTRA SCOOP hosted by DWAYNE & SISSY | DA CREW PODCAST · DA CREW Podcast

0:15
Speaker 1: Now I know why all the trees change in the fall.
0:22
Speaker 1: I knew you were on my side even when I
0:27
Speaker 1: was wrong, and I love you for giving.
0:31
Speaker 2: Me your eyes, staying back and watching me shining.
0:37
Speaker 1: I didn't know where you know, So taking.
0:41
Speaker 3: This jo, gentlemen, I have your attention. Please. The show
0:57
Speaker 3: stops in Nay seven six, hire.
1:12
Speaker 4: Shoot one go, good evening, good evening, good evening. Welcome in,
1:22
Speaker 4: Welcome into Extra Scoop podcasts where we're anything but bite sides.
1:27
Speaker 4: And I want to welcome everybody in today. I'm one
1:30
Speaker 4: of your hosts, Dwayne. You can reach me at Dwayne
1:33
Speaker 4: turnrself at all of my socials, and I want to
1:36
Speaker 4: welcome in my co host today, Cissy. How are you
1:39
Speaker 4: doing today, Sissy?
1:47
Speaker 5: Mike Tag is at Cissy one one, two five one
1:50
Speaker 5: on all socials, and I wanted to give a quick
1:53
Speaker 5: shout out to the Queen herself, miss Angela with the Cruz,
1:57
Speaker 5: so thank you, and we've got to believe that will
2:00
Speaker 5: be joining us today. Is anybody hearing it? A wizards me?
2:08
Speaker 4: I think it's just you on your on your hand echo.
2:11
Speaker 5: Just wanted to make sure, okay, So we have Selene
2:18
Speaker 5: and I'm gonna let you introduce yourself, tell a little
2:22
Speaker 5: bit about bash.
2:32
Speaker 4: I think she's muted again.
2:36
Speaker 1: Can you guys hear me? Can you guys see me?
2:37
Speaker 5: Yeah?
2:38
Speaker 3: There care we go.
2:40
Speaker 1: Hi again. My name is Selene. Uh either it is
2:45
Speaker 1: Selena S E L E and E E underscore eighty
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Speaker 1: nine across all platforms. I am an autism mommy. My
2:53
Speaker 1: son is eight years old and he has autism or
2:58
Speaker 1: he's autistic, and so am I.
3:01
Speaker 5: And then and then we also have Allison joining us. Alison, Hi,
3:14
Speaker 5: if you could introduce yourself, tell us a little bit
3:16
Speaker 5: about your son.
3:20
Speaker 2: He's a level two autistic non verbal. He's four, getting
3:25
Speaker 2: ready to turn five next week.
3:28
Speaker 5: Okay, And I just I just want to to really
3:33
Speaker 5: point out, guys that when you think of autism, it's
3:37
Speaker 5: not one month or one voice. It is a spectrum.
3:40
Speaker 5: And so as you see, we've been talking about this
3:44
Speaker 5: for several weeks prior kind of veering up for Autism
3:48
Speaker 5: Awareness Month next month, you can't lump it into a
3:51
Speaker 5: one nice little box. It is a spectrum for a reason,
3:54
Speaker 5: and so we're going to be covering that spectrum. So
3:58
Speaker 5: I wanted to kind of jump in two we were
4:03
Speaker 5: talking about meltdowns previously when you guys have meltdowns, because
4:08
Speaker 5: I want to kind of start there and go forward
4:10
Speaker 5: with that with Maverick being almost five now, but he's nonverbal,
4:17
Speaker 5: how communicative is he with you? Can you tell when
4:22
Speaker 5: he's having the meltdowns prior?
4:27
Speaker 2: Sometimes I can. Sometimes there are some signs where he's
4:30
Speaker 2: getting over stimulated and frustrated and I can kind of
4:34
Speaker 2: intervene before a meultdown starts. And there's other times because
4:39
Speaker 2: of the nonverbal that he may just set off very
4:44
Speaker 2: quickly and go into a meltdown. So yes and no, okay?
4:49
Speaker 5: And how does he communicate with you? Because he's nonverbal,
4:52
Speaker 5: does he have any words specifically that he says? Is
4:56
Speaker 5: it more?
4:58
Speaker 2: It's mostly him gestures. There's a lot of his body language,
5:03
Speaker 2: facial expressions. You know, he might get frustrated and throw something.
5:10
Speaker 4: I think we lost her signal, I see her, Oh
5:17
Speaker 4: there she goes, she's been now.
5:21
Speaker 2: Like I was saying, it's a lot of body language,
5:24
Speaker 2: hand gestures, facial expressions, different things of that nature. If
5:30
Speaker 2: it's a toy that's frustrating him, he may throw the toy.
5:34
Speaker 2: If it's an iPad, you know, he may put the
5:36
Speaker 2: iPad down and go do something else. If I called
5:39
Speaker 2: it early enough. If not, it's uh, it's more of
5:44
Speaker 2: a heavier meltdown when I don't catch them.
5:49
Speaker 5: I gotcha and one a with bath. He's eight.
5:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I would say with my son the I
5:59
Speaker 1: called him now, they're just more micro. They're not as
6:02
Speaker 1: bad as they used to be. You know, they used
6:04
Speaker 1: to be a lot worse when he was a lot younger.
6:06
Speaker 1: I would say toddler was a big age. We had
6:10
Speaker 1: the stage where he would he did a lot of
6:13
Speaker 1: kicking and scratching and punching and this if something wasn't
6:18
Speaker 1: going his way. But you know, it was all it
6:20
Speaker 1: was kind of like a level that would build up,
6:23
Speaker 1: kind of like you know, it built up, like I
6:25
Speaker 1: could tell he was overstimulated, and then once he started
6:27
Speaker 1: getting over stimulated, it would just start. It was like
6:29
Speaker 1: the sensory thing, it would just start. It was like
6:31
Speaker 1: a build up, you know, stack sack sack. So if
6:34
Speaker 1: I saw that, he was like already like, oh my god, okay, okay,
6:37
Speaker 1: I gotta go. I gotta go because it's not gonna
6:39
Speaker 1: be good. And like, you know, fifty to twenty minutes
6:41
Speaker 1: now because he is older, obviously, it's it's actually frightful
6:46
Speaker 1: that he would get violent because he's older, so he's stronger,
6:51
Speaker 1: you know, he's he would be able to like it
6:53
Speaker 1: hurt me more. But I think we've coped a lot,
6:56
Speaker 1: and we've done a lot of like it was a
6:58
Speaker 1: lot of the micro stuff now so I would say,
7:00
Speaker 1: a lot of the backlasher things like they're small and
7:04
Speaker 1: it's like a quick thing and then it's it's like gone,
7:07
Speaker 1: because I think we've we've worked ourselves up from it already.
7:10
Speaker 1: But a lot of training, a lot of talking, you know,
7:14
Speaker 1: they it's it's funny like people think because it's a kid, Yes,
7:17
Speaker 1: but they understand more than you than you think, So
7:20
Speaker 1: speak to them. A lot of talking, a lot of soothing.
7:25
Speaker 1: My son is big time with like soothing, a lot
7:28
Speaker 1: of breathing, you know, because it's all mental health at
7:30
Speaker 1: the end of the day, you know, it's just your
7:32
Speaker 1: your your brain is just wired a little different. So
7:34
Speaker 1: we breathe a lot. We do a lot of breathing exercises,
7:36
Speaker 1: you know, we calm down distraction when they were when
7:41
Speaker 1: he was little, I think distraction helped a lot. So
7:44
Speaker 1: like say that he was like upset about a toy
7:46
Speaker 1: or something. Then I would distract them with something that
7:49
Speaker 1: he really liked, like oh look, oh my god, look
7:52
Speaker 1: at what happened, or you know, something like that to
7:54
Speaker 1: kind of literally like just make that part of his
7:56
Speaker 1: brain just kind of switch completely to something else, and
8:01
Speaker 1: it would help a lot. Now, I think as he's older, again,
8:05
Speaker 1: it takes time. Sebastian is also level two. But my
8:09
Speaker 1: son is verbal, but he's also level two.
8:11
Speaker 5: And so for those viewers who are just tuning in,
8:14
Speaker 5: we have two lovely ladies here. They are autism moms,
8:17
Speaker 5: so they're speaking of their children. We have Slena who
8:20
Speaker 5: has a son named Bath. He's eight years old. And
8:24
Speaker 5: then we have Alison who has a son named Maverick
8:27
Speaker 5: and he'll be five next week. So thank you guys
8:32
Speaker 5: for talking about that. Another thing is I noticed you
8:35
Speaker 5: had said learning. Are there special devices that either one
8:40
Speaker 5: of you use? They have the special iPads. I can't
8:44
Speaker 5: remember the AC.
8:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, Maverick actually does have an AAC device. We're working
8:54
Speaker 2: up to using that right now. I sat down with
8:57
Speaker 2: his speech therapist and she valued him because he needed
9:01
Speaker 2: a reevaluation, and we decided that we're going to work
9:05
Speaker 2: on a picture exchange and using some buttons to help
9:10
Speaker 2: him communicate. That way, we can give him the foundational
9:13
Speaker 2: blocks to get up to that AAC device. And because
9:20
Speaker 2: those have so many different buttons and things that he
9:24
Speaker 2: can use, it can be overwhelming. So she wants to
9:27
Speaker 2: make sure he has good solid foundation to be able
9:30
Speaker 2: to use that.
9:33
Speaker 5: Does does he understand when you tell him things in
9:36
Speaker 5: sequenced or do you have to wait till he completes
9:41
Speaker 5: the first thing and then leave him to second.
9:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's very simple instructions Like if I say let's
9:48
Speaker 2: go get changed, because he's not Ponty trained, st if
9:52
Speaker 2: I tell him let's go get changed, he knows we
9:55
Speaker 2: change him in my in my bedroom, so he'll go
9:58
Speaker 2: to our room. Or let's go get in bed, so
10:01
Speaker 2: go get in his bed. It's very simple commands and
10:04
Speaker 2: instructions that you know he gets right now.
10:07
Speaker 1: Seriously, I made that phase because potty training was the
10:10
Speaker 1: hardest thing, and I feel like we don't speak about
10:14
Speaker 1: it enough. As autism potty training are normal. Well I
10:18
Speaker 1: wouldn't say normal, right, but uh, potty training a neurodivergent
10:24
Speaker 1: kid is the hardest thing ever. And I help my mom,
10:27
Speaker 1: potty train my my my brother who actually does have
10:30
Speaker 1: a little bit of ADHD, but it has nothing on
10:33
Speaker 1: having a kid with autism. And then you're like trying
10:36
Speaker 1: because again the step directions, like you're saying the task,
10:40
Speaker 1: you know, the one too. A lot of them have
10:42
Speaker 1: the sensory issues again with the potty training, and the
10:46
Speaker 1: sensory issues are like they don't want to feel wet,
10:49
Speaker 1: they don't want to feel this, they don't want to
10:51
Speaker 1: feel that. So I think it's yeah, it's.
10:57
Speaker 5: All about the feel of toilet paper. It's so.
11:02
Speaker 1: We had a hard time with the wipes because the wet,
11:08
Speaker 1: the sensory with the wipes, that was hard. But I
11:11
Speaker 1: think we got so used to it that at the
11:14
Speaker 1: end it was like we're good, you know, like but yeah,
11:18
Speaker 1: like what you said with the toilet paper, but now
11:21
Speaker 1: he doesn't want to feel wet. So we have a
11:23
Speaker 1: two step baby wipes and then toilet paper to make
11:27
Speaker 1: sure it's dry. Because it's like a whole thing. Seriously,
11:32
Speaker 1: it's a lot more complicated than people think.
11:35
Speaker 2: Oh, absolutely no, and even finding when, even finding when
11:41
Speaker 2: they're ready, because we're in that step where we're trying
11:44
Speaker 2: to figure out do we start introducing it now because
11:48
Speaker 2: I have talked with other moms and you know, uh,
11:51
Speaker 2: there's another little boy that goes to the therapy place
11:54
Speaker 2: and they started too early, and now he's terrified to
11:58
Speaker 2: go to the bathroom and won't even do any bathroom.
12:01
Speaker 2: So it's like, say, now do we wait that they.
12:04
Speaker 1: Get scared or say they had a bad experience, like
12:08
Speaker 1: how she's saved. They had a bad experience. You know,
12:12
Speaker 1: they were like a little constipated because like, for example,
12:14
Speaker 1: my son carps. That's all he would eat for like
12:17
Speaker 1: a really long time. So it gives it goes for
12:19
Speaker 1: a hard stool. So sometimes what I would like, you know,
12:22
Speaker 1: obviously you do the orange juices, but he wouldn't do
12:24
Speaker 1: the vegetables, the greens, none of that stuff. He didn't
12:27
Speaker 1: want to eat it. Again, sensory issues. So then now
12:31
Speaker 1: he has hard stools. So then having a hard time
12:34
Speaker 1: and a bad experience once in the toilet everything is
12:37
Speaker 1: associated with that. So when you go to train them,
12:40
Speaker 1: their their their brain is wired that that's all you
12:43
Speaker 1: associate that with. Obviously, sometimes you can't think of it
12:46
Speaker 1: or you can't like see certain things, so then their
12:49
Speaker 1: association it's like it's a bad thing. So then they
12:51
Speaker 1: don't want to do it. And that was Sebastian. He
12:53
Speaker 1: didn't want to go, he didn't want to go, He
12:55
Speaker 1: didn't want to go, Nope, Nope. I would go three days,
12:57
Speaker 1: say he didn't want to go, So then I would
12:59
Speaker 1: have to like, we're gonna do jews, We're gonna do
13:01
Speaker 1: try to get you know, whatever to get him to go.
13:03
Speaker 1: So that was really really hard.
13:07
Speaker 5: What about when they get used to being in a
13:11
Speaker 5: specific area, your back or a hall or whatever, and
13:16
Speaker 5: then you're at a friend's house using a completely different bath.
13:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what they don't like change. No, Yeah, that's
13:27
Speaker 2: a whole new Uh. I guess, I guess problem if
13:31
Speaker 2: you want to call it that, you know, because you
13:33
Speaker 2: can't take them out and let them use every party,
13:36
Speaker 2: you know, that would be you would be out trying
13:38
Speaker 2: to find the potties all day, you know. But yeah,
13:42
Speaker 2: we we have not started that process yet with potty
13:45
Speaker 2: training him. We have a ba coming in home and
13:51
Speaker 2: they're gonna help us with that, and I hope it's
13:54
Speaker 2: a successful, uh transition.
13:59
Speaker 5: Well, and I thank you very much for being here too.
14:03
Speaker 5: So viewers, Allison is under the weather today and Lena
14:07
Speaker 5: had a little bit of a fall down there, so
14:10
Speaker 5: we thank you so much for joining us. We are
14:12
Speaker 5: talking to two lovely lady who are moms of a
14:16
Speaker 5: child with autism, and so I want to talk about
14:22
Speaker 5: sequential So for those who have children that do have autism,
14:27
Speaker 5: one of the hardest things is to keep that sequential process.
14:33
Speaker 5: So what, Alison, what are you doing right now to
14:37
Speaker 5: begin that? Since Mavericks before.
14:41
Speaker 2: We're doing a lot of first and you know, first
14:45
Speaker 2: we and I'll just give you a simple example. First
14:48
Speaker 2: we get dressed, then we play, or first we put
14:52
Speaker 2: on our shorts, then we do our shirt, kind of
14:55
Speaker 2: trying to start that sequential order of how we do
14:58
Speaker 2: things and and moving on to you know, steps three
15:02
Speaker 2: and four. But just getting one to two steps right
15:07
Speaker 2: now is where we're at.
15:09
Speaker 5: And then Helene, what about that he's eight, So.
15:14
Speaker 1: I would say we struggled a lot. I think the
15:18
Speaker 1: speech therapist helped a lot because she kind of like
15:22
Speaker 1: put a lot in perspective. I did not do aba
15:25
Speaker 1: with Sebastian. We've only done like counseling and stuff like that.
15:29
Speaker 1: I worked with him by myself since he was very
15:31
Speaker 1: very young. Again, I've said it. It wasn't because of anything.
15:34
Speaker 1: It's just that when I took him to get evaluated,
15:38
Speaker 1: it was really really young, and I had already been
15:42
Speaker 1: working with him so much that honestly, they said, you
15:47
Speaker 1: don't necessarily need it because of where you are, if
15:50
Speaker 1: that makes sense. They're like, because, honestly, like you could
15:53
Speaker 1: do a little bit of like food and things like
15:55
Speaker 1: that if you want to. But because I was already,
15:59
Speaker 1: it was just the time that I didn't have the
16:01
Speaker 1: time and a lot of things, and I made time
16:03
Speaker 1: to do so many things. So I kind of just
16:05
Speaker 1: pushed my son and I did it with him because
16:07
Speaker 1: I wanted to be present for it. So I just
16:10
Speaker 1: try to do everything myself, and it might be bad,
16:13
Speaker 1: you know that I didn't involve other people, but I
16:15
Speaker 1: just thought that, like, who's to know better than me
16:17
Speaker 1: that I'm with him twenty four seven, right, And so
16:20
Speaker 1: I don't.
16:22
Speaker 5: Could you explain that?
16:26
Speaker 1: She would and I would.
16:28
Speaker 2: So it's supplied behavioral analysis. Ours is really focusing on
16:35
Speaker 2: getting him ready to go to school. So we're working
16:37
Speaker 2: on daily routines, and we're working on sitting and attending,
16:43
Speaker 2: you know, even just minor things. We're also working on
16:49
Speaker 2: we're going to be working on the potty training after
16:52
Speaker 2: they get established with him, you know, And she said
16:55
Speaker 2: that would probably be about a six week window where
16:58
Speaker 2: they come in and they just to get to know
17:01
Speaker 2: him and get to know his thing, and then we'll
17:03
Speaker 2: work on, you know, the potty training. We're also implementing
17:08
Speaker 2: a behavior plan because he does have some self harming
17:12
Speaker 2: behaviors that I don't want to get out of hand.
17:20
Speaker 2: When he has his mountdowns like we were speaking about earlier,
17:24
Speaker 2: he does hit himself with his hand and his objects
17:28
Speaker 2: and things like that, and he has uh, he has
17:32
Speaker 2: hit me, and he has hit my husband Ryan. So
17:36
Speaker 2: I don't want for him to go to school, uh
17:40
Speaker 2: and to you know, get upset and hurt somebody that's
17:44
Speaker 2: small would have been him or and like Selene said,
17:48
Speaker 2: as they get bigger, they get stronger.
17:51
Speaker 5: Yeah. So, Dwayne, I know you have a family that
17:56
Speaker 5: you're very close to that has fun with autism. When
18:02
Speaker 5: you discussed yeah, how was how was that? Have they
18:07
Speaker 5: introduced to Aba into his life?
18:13
Speaker 4: I think his mom did a lot of the same
18:16
Speaker 4: similar things. She made sure she had a lot of
18:20
Speaker 4: firsts for him and the steps that he had to
18:22
Speaker 4: take and they did a lot of creative things. He
18:26
Speaker 4: actually wrote a book as a little kid, and that
18:30
Speaker 4: book was actually of his daily daily activities, daily life,
18:34
Speaker 4: daily things, and it was from his perspective, so he
18:37
Speaker 4: had to always go back and rework that book, and
18:39
Speaker 4: rewrite that book, and react that book. And it helped
18:42
Speaker 4: him get from almost none verbal to now being able
18:46
Speaker 4: to give speeches in front of crowds. And actually I
18:50
Speaker 4: think he started a couple of commercials and different things
18:52
Speaker 4: of that nature. So the progression of him from a
18:56
Speaker 4: three four year old to now a I believe eighteen
19:00
Speaker 4: u ro uh is huge because they did take the
19:04
Speaker 4: steps to have the headache, because I'm not going to
19:07
Speaker 4: say it wasn't hard or a headache for the family,
19:10
Speaker 4: but they took out the time and made sure that
19:13
Speaker 4: he was able to build on everything that he needed
19:16
Speaker 4: to in every step at his pace, not at anyone
19:19
Speaker 4: else's pace. And they built that with a lot of
19:22
Speaker 4: creative ways, with blocks, with with I heard her say,
19:26
Speaker 4: with buttons. They had him writing and drawing and and
19:30
Speaker 4: just doing all kinds of different things that actually led
19:33
Speaker 4: up to him being where he had now to really
19:36
Speaker 4: get a real perspective of what it was that he needed.
19:40
Speaker 4: So that was their experience with with with that part
19:44
Speaker 4: of his journey.
19:47
Speaker 1: And then what about what I was going to say,
19:51
Speaker 1: go ahead, I'm sorry. Well, so like for example, I
19:54
Speaker 1: didn't do the AB eight, but I do. And this
19:57
Speaker 1: is something for like the viewers at home. If you got,
20:00
Speaker 1: you know, need a little extra something, I did buy it,
20:03
Speaker 1: like what you call a daily routine on Amazon. Right,
20:07
Speaker 1: So we did a reward system. And basically it's like
20:11
Speaker 1: because I started him on a schedule since he was
20:13
Speaker 1: really really young. I mean I started working four weeks
20:17
Speaker 1: after I had him, I went back to work, so
20:19
Speaker 1: it was like he was a baby. We were always
20:21
Speaker 1: in a routine and still till this day, we're in
20:23
Speaker 1: a routine. We have stuff in cubbies. Everything is like
20:26
Speaker 1: super organized because it's better for our minds. Right. So
20:30
Speaker 1: this is and I think it's a plus that I
20:32
Speaker 1: myself have autism because I work this way. He works
20:36
Speaker 1: this way, and it's a little bit easier to keep
20:38
Speaker 1: everything organized for our brains and for the overstimulation. Right,
20:42
Speaker 1: So we did we had a reward system on the
20:45
Speaker 1: on the and this is all ABA stuff that they do.
20:48
Speaker 1: But if you don't like again if you think that,
20:50
Speaker 1: you know, for whatever reason, you can't do it, can't
20:53
Speaker 1: afford it, can't it's not covered. There's no help anything.
20:56
Speaker 1: There is other stuff that you can do yourself. You know,
20:59
Speaker 1: you can even make the cards. You don't have to
21:01
Speaker 1: buy them. We bought like it was like a little board.
21:03
Speaker 1: You put it on the on the fridge, right and
21:07
Speaker 1: we sign off. You know, I had it's a calendar
21:11
Speaker 1: Monday to day, you know, whatever everything we did. I
21:14
Speaker 1: had a swim because obviously we went swimming. He had
21:17
Speaker 1: swimming lessons, you know, so swimming lessons Tuesday, Wednesday, you know,
21:21
Speaker 1: all these things. And then when we got this, we
21:23
Speaker 1: got this reward, like he liked going to dairy queen, right,
21:27
Speaker 1: so you know Fridays that was the reward. We get
21:30
Speaker 1: everything done Friday, we get this or you know, you
21:33
Speaker 1: get to choose. These are the rewards. You get to choose.
21:36
Speaker 1: What do you want to do? So little things like them,
21:40
Speaker 1: like you give them an like encourage them for something,
21:43
Speaker 1: for something. And even now like that he's older, we
21:46
Speaker 1: do the same thing too, but just a little bit different.
21:49
Speaker 1: Right like for example, spring break, you know we're gonna
21:53
Speaker 1: go he loves going Florida to the hotel. You know,
21:57
Speaker 1: do all stuff that's what he wants. And then you
21:59
Speaker 1: do this, really, God, you do. March is the reading month.
22:02
Speaker 1: We get all the books done and then you get
22:04
Speaker 1: the reward at the end of the month. So you know,
22:07
Speaker 1: it's kind of but it's a little bit bigger because
22:09
Speaker 1: obviously he's a little bit older.
22:11
Speaker 5: Now you touched on something, which is ice cream. What
22:15
Speaker 5: kid doesn't like ice cream? Because we know that Bash does.
22:19
Speaker 5: But when you were teaching him about different foods, what
22:23
Speaker 5: did you have to introduce and how hard was that?
22:26
Speaker 1: Honestly, I think that we were so good right up
22:31
Speaker 1: until eighteen nineteen months because you know, I used to
22:36
Speaker 1: buy a build, so I was like meal prepped and
22:38
Speaker 1: trained a lot. So all my meals I literally would
22:41
Speaker 1: when I would prep my meals, I would just give
22:43
Speaker 1: him the same thing I ate steam rice. I would
22:46
Speaker 1: actually make like little balls of rice, so I'd be like, look,
22:48
Speaker 1: it's a little ball or a planet, because he was
22:50
Speaker 1: upseessed with planets, look right, So I would make little
22:53
Speaker 1: balls of white rice. Broccoli. He loved broccoli and chicken.
22:57
Speaker 1: Now he will never eat that. He could God forbid
23:00
Speaker 1: I'd give him that right now, but at the time
23:03
Speaker 1: he did, but he regressed right like, so he stopped
23:06
Speaker 1: eating that stuff. Everything was like smell, you know, it
23:10
Speaker 1: was it was really weird everything. It was almost like
23:14
Speaker 1: something changed inside him. And if something just didn't smell
23:20
Speaker 1: or didn't sit right with him, or the texture or anything,
23:23
Speaker 1: it was just a no. I would still serve him.
23:26
Speaker 1: I still intrudis them in the plate. Even though I
23:28
Speaker 1: put the stuff that he liked, everything was still there
23:31
Speaker 1: just in case because sometimes curiosity, like you know, or
23:34
Speaker 1: I served it first and then one site, you know,
23:37
Speaker 1: that I saw that he didn't like it that, you know,
23:40
Speaker 1: little by little. I think I'm gonna tell you what
23:42
Speaker 1: I think helped the most. Because we didn't go out
23:46
Speaker 1: to eat for a long time. I didn't want to
23:49
Speaker 1: have him, you know, and it's it's not that exposed,
23:52
Speaker 1: but it's just like I don't want to interrupt other
23:54
Speaker 1: people's meals, right, So I was being considerate because I
23:56
Speaker 1: was that single person once without kids, that you know,
24:00
Speaker 1: wanted to just have her own like alone time or whatnot.
24:04
Speaker 1: But I think that when we started going to different
24:07
Speaker 1: places and taking him here, he started seeing different stuff
24:10
Speaker 1: and then I think one a big thing was my
24:14
Speaker 1: niece and nephew for example, Like they like to eat everything,
24:18
Speaker 1: so he would see them and he's like, oh, like okay,
24:22
Speaker 1: or even school, you know, like, oh, my friend tells
24:25
Speaker 1: me he likes those Dino chicken nuggets and I was like,
24:28
Speaker 1: you want to try them? Sure? And you know, things
24:33
Speaker 1: like that. So it was always like little things like that.
24:36
Speaker 1: But I'll tell you what, that ice cream he's always
24:38
Speaker 1: loved him. Does that change his mind with that at all?
24:41
Speaker 5: Well, how's Maverick Allison? Does he like ice cream?
24:46
Speaker 2: No? No, we are on the very different side of
24:50
Speaker 2: the feeding So, Maverick, our journey's been a little different.
24:56
Speaker 2: Maverick got COVID around I want to say it was
25:03
Speaker 2: twelve months we were in that window and at the
25:07
Speaker 2: time they Maverick is a COVID baby, so he was
25:11
Speaker 2: born during the height of COVID. He did not get
25:13
Speaker 2: COVID till it was he was a year old, and
25:17
Speaker 2: I think at the time they were not testing, so
25:21
Speaker 2: I am assuming it was COVID. We were just treating
25:24
Speaker 2: the fever and the body aches and other symptoms that
25:28
Speaker 2: you know he had, so because they weren't testing. He
25:33
Speaker 2: had a lot of congestion after having that sickness, and
25:39
Speaker 2: that's what led me to go to the doctor because
25:41
Speaker 2: he was transitioning from like period of soft foods, and
25:47
Speaker 2: when we were almost completely onto soft foods, he regressed
25:52
Speaker 2: back and went completely back to the bottle, and I
25:54
Speaker 2: brought it up to the doctor and they actually referred
25:57
Speaker 2: us to feeding therapy, and that is where our journey started.
26:01
Speaker 2: So Maverick has never for a very brief period of time,
26:06
Speaker 2: he ate salt foods like moshi, french fries, mushi, green beans,
26:10
Speaker 2: things like that that you would normally transition a baby
26:13
Speaker 2: to to where he went completely back to the bottle
26:17
Speaker 2: and he has not since then eaten anything but a
26:23
Speaker 2: pure ad diet and it's purid. The Gerber baby food
26:27
Speaker 2: is what we still eat now. In the last six months,
26:30
Speaker 2: he has progressed to where he eats apple sauce. He
26:34
Speaker 2: has tried yogurt pouches, he has tried some pudding, and
26:40
Speaker 2: he also has tried we've done polhip. Not a fan,
26:47
Speaker 2: not a fan, but he's trying, you know, no, right now,
26:56
Speaker 2: apple sauce is a big thing for him and he's
26:58
Speaker 2: eating that as snacks. And I'm careful in the varieties,
27:02
Speaker 2: like we do regular and then we can do cinnamon,
27:05
Speaker 2: and I kind of have to do like one regular
27:07
Speaker 2: one cinnamon to kind offset pill eat. Those we're working
27:12
Speaker 2: on like the Go Go Squeeze yogurt pouches also, we're
27:18
Speaker 2: still working on those.
27:21
Speaker 5: So how's his sleep?
27:24
Speaker 6: So yes, yeah, makes another problem as far as having
27:34
Speaker 6: to put locks up.
27:35
Speaker 1: In your house.
27:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, So we actually just got Maverick and I would
27:41
Speaker 2: show you, but he's in bed. We actually just got
27:44
Speaker 2: Maverick a safety bed. So everybody you've seen the cobby
27:47
Speaker 2: beds that have the they look like a tent and
27:49
Speaker 2: they have the cool little video. When I was originally
27:54
Speaker 2: pursuing a coby bed, his therapist told us that it's
27:58
Speaker 2: very hard to get insurance approval right now for cubbies.
28:01
Speaker 2: So we have what's called a haven bed. It's very
28:06
Speaker 2: similar to a cubby The only difference is where the
28:09
Speaker 2: cubbies are metal, this is a wooden frame. So it's
28:13
Speaker 2: got the wood on the outside, it's essentially got the
28:17
Speaker 2: door that zips, it's all mesh around, and then it
28:23
Speaker 2: has the steel frame to keep him safe. So we
28:29
Speaker 2: were approved and he's been in his haven bed for gosh,
28:34
Speaker 2: I wanted to say about five or six months now,
28:38
Speaker 2: and that's working well, yes, yeah, oh yeah. He's very
28:42
Speaker 2: proud of his bed. Like if we have somebody come
28:44
Speaker 2: over or something like that, he wants to go throw
28:47
Speaker 2: off his bed. He automatically like pulls you in the door,
28:51
Speaker 2: drives you by the hand, and it's like come look,
28:53
Speaker 2: you know, walks him in there to get in his
28:55
Speaker 2: bed with him. Oh, you know, and and Dad and
28:58
Speaker 2: I are in there all the time. He he loves
29:00
Speaker 2: his little bed and that's his safety area.
29:03
Speaker 5: You know.
29:03
Speaker 2: We leave it open during the day and he plays
29:05
Speaker 2: and runs and he'll put his toys in there, and
29:08
Speaker 2: we'll go in there and live with him. The first
29:12
Speaker 2: night he was actually in there, that's what I did.
29:15
Speaker 2: I laid in there with him for a little while
29:17
Speaker 2: to get him used to being zipped in, you know,
29:20
Speaker 2: because that's a big change to go from. We went
29:23
Speaker 2: from a crib to the safety bed, so that's a
29:25
Speaker 2: big change. Yeah, but he did fabulous. He did fabulous
29:29
Speaker 2: with it.
29:31
Speaker 5: And what about that.
29:33
Speaker 1: Honestly, I've had a really really really hard time with sleeping.
29:40
Speaker 1: We stop napping after like eighteen months and then after
29:46
Speaker 1: the nap stopped, we only did quiet time, and then
29:50
Speaker 1: he was in a crib. He jumped to a regular
29:53
Speaker 1: because I just put a twin sized bed and I
29:55
Speaker 1: just got like a really small, uh just like a
29:59
Speaker 1: like a one. And then what I did is I
30:02
Speaker 1: bought this thing. It's like a I don't know, it's
30:05
Speaker 1: like a guard, I would say, like a guard. It's
30:08
Speaker 1: like a bed guard. And that's what he had for
30:11
Speaker 1: a little bit. And then about two and a half
30:16
Speaker 1: almost three, he started having these things called night terrors,
30:21
Speaker 1: which were the worst thing that I've never heard of
30:23
Speaker 1: him before in my life. And I'll tell you what,
30:26
Speaker 1: it was the worst thing that ever happened because I
30:29
Speaker 1: was not sleeping and I was working, and it was
30:32
Speaker 1: really really hard for me. He would wake up in
30:35
Speaker 1: the middle of the night screaming, wanting to like hurt
30:39
Speaker 1: me because wouldn't recognize me. He thought I was someone
30:42
Speaker 1: else and that I was gonna hurt them. And you know,
30:45
Speaker 1: I tried everything. I would turn on the TV, like
30:47
Speaker 1: I was just distractions, you know, everything I could do
30:50
Speaker 1: but to try to get him to react, you know,
30:53
Speaker 1: like wake up, like it wasn't a sleepwalking necessarily but
30:57
Speaker 1: it was more of a I get out, and it's
31:00
Speaker 1: fight or flight, like I gotta leave, I gotta go,
31:02
Speaker 1: I gotta go. So he would like I was so
31:05
Speaker 1: afraid again falling down from the stairs for example, you know,
31:08
Speaker 1: going into the bathroom and opening up the faucet for
31:12
Speaker 1: the for the tough because they love water. So you know,
31:16
Speaker 1: I was just he was. It was just like this
31:18
Speaker 1: like freak out, you know, at the middle in the
31:20
Speaker 1: middle of the night. So it's hard me trying to
31:22
Speaker 1: stop him. He would hurt me, not on purpose, because
31:26
Speaker 1: once he would like, you know, come back into it,
31:29
Speaker 1: you know, but it was then it was this crime
31:31
Speaker 1: and it was like that. So it was always in
31:33
Speaker 1: the middle of the night. I want to say that
31:36
Speaker 1: happened for like six months straight, like you never knew
31:39
Speaker 1: what night or not. But I was so afraid that
31:45
Speaker 1: I was so afraid that he would leave or that
31:46
Speaker 1: something would happen and me be sleeping because I was
31:49
Speaker 1: so tired and so exhausted, like twenty four to seven,
31:53
Speaker 1: that maybe I should have looked at better resources or
31:56
Speaker 1: better things or whatnot. But then I co slept, so
32:00
Speaker 1: I put him in my bed, and he's still in
32:02
Speaker 1: my bed didn't.
32:05
Speaker 5: When he does have, Is there any regression on anything?
32:10
Speaker 1: Honestly, you don't know. It's just honestly no, I just
32:14
Speaker 1: feel like it's just you know, you get these triggers
32:18
Speaker 1: kind of like myself, right, I don't sleep good, then
32:22
Speaker 1: my anxiety levels are higher. So same thing with him.
32:25
Speaker 1: If he didn't get a good night's sleep, then his
32:27
Speaker 1: anxiety was higher. You know, all those little things, so
32:30
Speaker 1: then you're quicker to get triggered, quicker to get over stimulated,
32:34
Speaker 1: and then just everything just kind of builds up. The irritability,
32:37
Speaker 1: just all these little things that you don't want kind
32:40
Speaker 1: of just build up because of it. So I wouldn't
32:43
Speaker 1: say that it would regress, but it just made life
32:46
Speaker 1: a lot harder. Again, he's older now that that was
32:50
Speaker 1: just like a I always said, I'm like six months
32:54
Speaker 1: of fotty training. Okay, Well first it was like the
32:57
Speaker 1: six months of the of the sleep progression with all
33:01
Speaker 1: that craziness, all the terrors, and then all of a sudden,
33:04
Speaker 1: it was like six months of the potty training. Oh
33:07
Speaker 1: my god. So it's like everything came in like six months,
33:10
Speaker 1: Like it was like so hard, and then I went exhausted,
33:14
Speaker 1: like just barely woke, like woken up and barely like
33:18
Speaker 1: breathing in at work and just tired and overwhelmed myself.
33:22
Speaker 1: And then the next six months and I'm like, oh,
33:24
Speaker 1: we're good. Now he's not he's not having the night terrors.
33:27
Speaker 1: We got like three good nights. Oh guess what all
33:29
Speaker 1: of a sudden bam again or you know, somebody's like trimelatonin. Yep,
33:34
Speaker 1: it made it worse.
33:36
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, sometimes not always answer.
33:41
Speaker 1: No no, and and you know I was, I honestly,
33:45
Speaker 1: I was just you know, for me, I'm a big
33:48
Speaker 1: tea person, so I would be like, oh, this is
33:50
Speaker 1: some camel mill or you know, but make him try
33:52
Speaker 1: to drink that camel mill. Yeah, uh huh, that's not
33:56
Speaker 1: gonna work. Yeah, So, you know, just like little thing
34:01
Speaker 1: sleep aggression was really really hard with the night tears
34:05
Speaker 1: for me. Anyways, in my experience, that was like one
34:07
Speaker 1: of the craziest things with that. Yeah, I have locks,
34:11
Speaker 1: like you know, those those extra locks that you put
34:13
Speaker 1: on your doors, because he was so easy to learn
34:15
Speaker 1: to open all the locks. So I put the chain
34:19
Speaker 1: lock too, on top of my door, like just the
34:21
Speaker 1: case you never know, because he can't reach that one.
34:23
Speaker 1: It's even if you put a chair, he wouldn't be Yeah,
34:26
Speaker 1: but they're so smart that they figure everything out.
34:29
Speaker 2: The hm. Oh yeah, we've We've had to put locks
34:33
Speaker 2: on toilets. We've had to put locks on the doors.
34:37
Speaker 2: We make sure his windows are locked.
34:39
Speaker 1: And the water so the toilet. Very quick to put
34:44
Speaker 1: their hands in water. They love water.
34:46
Speaker 2: We had we had an iPad get a swim and
34:50
Speaker 2: a toilet a few times. Oh yeah not d oh, yes,
34:58
Speaker 2: we had that iPad. Yeah, and thankfully his his device
35:02
Speaker 2: does come with the five your quarantine. We've used it.
35:07
Speaker 5: Does Mavericks still use the iPad for different things, even
35:14
Speaker 5: even small little video games for his level.
35:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, we we do. There is some free apps that
35:25
Speaker 2: I have on there for him, like different ones that
35:27
Speaker 2: speech is recommended or ot is recommended. Starfall Academy has
35:33
Speaker 2: a free one that's got some games and songs and
35:36
Speaker 2: things and you can pick grade levels and things like that.
35:40
Speaker 2: There's a few other ones, like a bubble game that
35:42
Speaker 2: he likes. He'll go in Disney and watch like short
35:48
Speaker 2: little videos or movies.
35:52
Speaker 5: He likes Paul.
35:53
Speaker 2: Patrol, so anything Pall Patrol if he can get into that,
35:56
Speaker 2: he'll watch he'll watch Paul Patrol for hours. Yeah, it's
36:02
Speaker 2: what about movies. He'll do some movies too, Like he
36:08
Speaker 2: has a we have a profile on the Disney app
36:10
Speaker 2: and we put it in guide in Access, so he
36:13
Speaker 2: can't get out of it and just roam the internet
36:17
Speaker 2: because you know, you don't want that either.
36:21
Speaker 1: So that's the thing that is a little hard right
36:24
Speaker 1: to like know sometimes because it's like a toddler thing too.
36:29
Speaker 1: It's like a little kid thing that they watch the
36:31
Speaker 1: same movie over and over and over again. So it's
36:34
Speaker 1: it's just it's just I feel like it's a normal thing.
36:37
Speaker 1: So sometimes it's hard to like differentiate between whether it's
36:42
Speaker 1: because he's on the spectrum or because he's just a
36:45
Speaker 1: toddler or he's just a kid.
36:47
Speaker 2: But yeah, he's always gravitated towards like if he goes
36:52
Speaker 2: on to Disney, he'll gravitate for certain movies and certain
36:55
Speaker 2: shows versus like he might not watch Dinah ranch is
37:01
Speaker 2: a big favorite of his on Disney, but he won't
37:04
Speaker 2: watch like Wally or you know, he prefers Ratituty over Cars.
37:13
Speaker 2: So and he'll even change the language on it. And
37:16
Speaker 2: he's watched it so much that I have learned the
37:19
Speaker 2: music of what he's watching in that different language.
37:23
Speaker 5: Oh wow, honestly, yea, what is Sebastian using.
37:31
Speaker 1: Sebastian never used an iPad? He never used I mean
37:34
Speaker 1: he uses an iPad, but he never used it. Like,
37:38
Speaker 1: how do I say it? We had one, he wasn't interested.
37:41
Speaker 1: I bought him a smaller one, but nothing to communicate
37:44
Speaker 1: because he's always you know, Thank god, he communicated a
37:49
Speaker 1: little different. I would say, like he would again like
37:53
Speaker 1: how the toilet? You know you associated with that? So
37:56
Speaker 1: like say that, I would ask him, are you hungry?
38:00
Speaker 1: Or are you thirsty? So that's what his command was
38:04
Speaker 1: to me, Like if he was hungry, he would say
38:06
Speaker 1: are you hungry?
38:07
Speaker 2: Mom?
38:08
Speaker 1: Or like are you hungry? Are you thirsty? Or are
38:11
Speaker 1: you thirsty, Sebastian? Are you hungry Sebastian? The things I
38:13
Speaker 1: would say it was like the same sentence I would
38:18
Speaker 1: use when he was hungry. He would say it back
38:21
Speaker 1: to me, repeated back to me, because that's what was associated.
38:24
Speaker 1: But he didn't know how to tell me I'm hungry
38:27
Speaker 1: or you know this or that? And then he spoke
38:31
Speaker 1: of himself like Sebastian's hungry Sebastians needs water. Sebastian, Yeah,
38:37
Speaker 1: like a third person. Yeah, but it was like it
38:39
Speaker 1: was because he knew he was Sebastian, but you know,
38:44
Speaker 1: just to make it clear. And he still does that actually,
38:46
Speaker 1: Like for example, he'll be like, your mom, your mom
38:49
Speaker 1: said you can't do this, you know, and I'm like,
38:51
Speaker 1: that's your grandma. He's like whoop. He's like, I know,
38:54
Speaker 1: but it's your mom. So like it's still like the same,
38:57
Speaker 1: you know. He still uses like that with everything. So yeah,
39:03
Speaker 1: that's one of the things for him. We never used
39:06
Speaker 1: an iPad. We did a lot of videos because he
39:09
Speaker 1: likes the learning stuff, right. He likes all the and
39:12
Speaker 1: they like the sounds. They're very good in like the
39:14
Speaker 1: the the they you know, they recognize patterns, so they're
39:18
Speaker 1: very observant. They recognize all the patterns the sounds we use.
39:22
Speaker 1: There's a really really cool videos they're called Kids Picture
39:27
Speaker 1: Show and the guy that created it his kids also
39:30
Speaker 1: have autism and he has books to come along with it,
39:34
Speaker 1: so he'll do like vehicles and then it goes tractor trailer.
39:40
Speaker 1: So it's like it gets your attention because it switches
39:43
Speaker 1: that part of your brain and especially us as so
39:46
Speaker 1: you're just like that, And to me, it was better
39:48
Speaker 1: than having all the like annoying little like songs or whatever.
39:51
Speaker 1: So he learned a lot of things there, and I
39:54
Speaker 1: noticed a lot because vegetables, fruits, I mean everything, right,
39:57
Speaker 1: So that's like a really cool thing if your kid interested.
40:00
Speaker 1: My son was super interested. He saw a video on
40:02
Speaker 1: planets there and that's when his interest in planets went crazy. Yeah,
40:07
Speaker 1: And it was like after that, it just took off
40:08
Speaker 1: and he just wanted everything planets, everything planets, like everything
40:11
Speaker 1: everything he ever did in his life. And I mean
40:14
Speaker 1: until now, we're still super super obsessed with planets. But
40:19
Speaker 1: he's a pro at the iPad. I'm not gonna lie.
40:21
Speaker 1: I got him an iPad really young. And yet I
40:23
Speaker 1: know they say screen time, screen this, but like I'm
40:26
Speaker 1: gonna tell you honestly, and I guess you might think differently.
40:32
Speaker 1: Doctors might think differently, anybody might think differently. But you
40:36
Speaker 1: are the parent. You're the one that has to accommodate them.
40:39
Speaker 1: You're the one that has to take care of them.
40:41
Speaker 1: No one is dealing with your consequences. No one is
40:44
Speaker 1: dealing with your sleep, your job, the way you have
40:46
Speaker 1: to work, your schedule to be able to like afford
40:50
Speaker 1: to take care of them or to do anything. So you,
40:53
Speaker 1: as a parent, you have the judgment they're there with
40:56
Speaker 1: you twenty four to seven.
40:57
Speaker 5: You that I hear that.
40:59
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, like you know what. That's why I said,
41:02
Speaker 1: you know, I'm losing more sleep if he's like in
41:05
Speaker 1: another bed than he's with me. Oh co sleeping, Like
41:08
Speaker 1: you know what, You're not going to take care of
41:10
Speaker 1: him so I could go to work, so I could
41:11
Speaker 1: buy his food or his expensive protein shakes that I
41:15
Speaker 1: had to get him for a long time, you know,
41:17
Speaker 1: So things like that. It's like, you can't tell me
41:19
Speaker 1: how to race or how to do this because you're
41:21
Speaker 1: not living it with me. You're not living the consequences. So, yes,
41:24
Speaker 1: it is good to take a lot of advice for professionals.
41:27
Speaker 1: But also a lot of these professionals are just in theory.
41:30
Speaker 1: They're not putting their hands on they don't have the children.
41:33
Speaker 1: It's just studies that they do. And yes, a lot
41:35
Speaker 1: of these studies work. But you, as a mom, you
41:38
Speaker 1: know what works for you. You know what works for
41:40
Speaker 1: your child.
41:42
Speaker 5: Viewers, we are talking with two lovely ladies. They are
41:45
Speaker 5: off as a mom we have who has a son,
41:48
Speaker 5: Sebastian age eight, and Elson with the Sontag, who will
41:54
Speaker 5: be five next week.
41:56
Speaker 1: Next week, I know his first day.
42:01
Speaker 5: I'd like to close by talking about your fears as
42:06
Speaker 5: moms and so if there's any viewers just coming now,
42:10
Speaker 5: perfect timing because this is the heartfelt part. I know
42:17
Speaker 5: as a parent you try not compare and as they
42:23
Speaker 5: move forward, learning where am I as a parent going
42:28
Speaker 5: to be? What if something happened to me? Am I
42:33
Speaker 5: doing too much? Am I doing too little? So that's
42:38
Speaker 5: kind of what i want to ind with on a
42:41
Speaker 5: takeaway I'm start with you.
42:48
Speaker 2: One of my biggest fears is where he's going to
42:51
Speaker 2: end up when I'm no longer here. Will he be
42:54
Speaker 2: able to provide for himself, provide, you know, have a
42:57
Speaker 2: stable home to live in, have someone that will care
43:01
Speaker 2: for him. Because Selena said, we're moms, that's our job,
43:06
Speaker 2: you know, and dad too. So that's one of mine
43:10
Speaker 2: and my husband's biggest fears is who's going to be
43:13
Speaker 2: there for him to support him like we have as
43:18
Speaker 2: far as final planning goes, if you want to get
43:21
Speaker 2: into that, you know, we're making sure that and I'm
43:26
Speaker 2: doing this now because I've recently learned and come into
43:29
Speaker 2: the knowledge about it about you know, financial accounts for
43:33
Speaker 2: kids that have disabilities and having the proper will planning
43:38
Speaker 2: and having you know, life insurance and things like that.
43:42
Speaker 2: And you know, I'm coming a little late because it's like,
43:45
Speaker 2: you know, the younger you start, the better it is.
43:47
Speaker 2: But you know, we're starting to go on to that
43:52
Speaker 2: avenue as well as keeping in the back of my
43:55
Speaker 2: mind in the state that we're in, when he turns eighteen,
43:58
Speaker 2: we will have to go for guardianship of him. So
44:02
Speaker 2: that is also that something that we need to keep
44:05
Speaker 2: in the back of our mind is that we need
44:08
Speaker 2: to be financially able to get that as well to
44:10
Speaker 2: in order to keep taking.
44:15
Speaker 5: Okay that cut out, can you hear me?
44:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh, that's cut it on. Okay, all right. So
44:27
Speaker 1: I would say my biggest fear again, it's it's it
44:31
Speaker 1: goes right hand in hand with her, like what's gonna
44:34
Speaker 1: happen to him? You know, like honestly, yes, my kid
44:38
Speaker 1: is verbal. Yes, my kid has and you know what
44:42
Speaker 1: another thing too, Sometimes because they're verbal, we are dismissed
44:46
Speaker 1: too because we're not as bad as the one that
44:49
Speaker 1: is non verbal, so you you have these little things.
44:54
Speaker 1: But it's like if you were in my brain. I'm
44:56
Speaker 1: not saying one is worse than the other. It's just
45:00
Speaker 1: a very different it's very different. But we're still all
45:03
Speaker 1: like in this together, you know. And it's just like
45:06
Speaker 1: where where where is he gonna be? Like, you know
45:10
Speaker 1: what's gonna happen?
45:11
Speaker 2: You know?
45:11
Speaker 1: Sometimes it could be a lack of understanding, like he
45:14
Speaker 1: could have if I'm not here one day, he could
45:16
Speaker 1: have issues with please you know, how do I know this?
45:20
Speaker 1: I don't know what's gonna happen.
45:21
Speaker 2: You know.
45:22
Speaker 1: I want my son to have all the opportunities. I
45:24
Speaker 1: want him to be able to go to college and
45:26
Speaker 1: you know, understand things. And I want him to have
45:29
Speaker 1: a family, you know, raise his own kids if he
45:31
Speaker 1: would want to, you know, obviously. But it's like it's
45:36
Speaker 1: hard because you think, like and you see it all
45:38
Speaker 1: the time and it's not like it's a known thing
45:40
Speaker 1: like they stay living. I mean, I have autism on
45:43
Speaker 1: level one.
45:45
Speaker 5: You know.
45:45
Speaker 1: I have a hard time with relationships, Like I have
45:48
Speaker 1: a really hard time with relationships because I I am
45:53
Speaker 1: very very like pressure and patterns and this and that.
45:57
Speaker 1: So anything that goes out of patterns, and it, you know,
46:01
Speaker 1: triggers this little radar and I start feeling a certain
46:04
Speaker 1: way and anxiety and and you know, it just creates
46:07
Speaker 1: a lot of issues as an adult. So I would
46:10
Speaker 1: say I'm worried about the same thing for him. You know,
46:13
Speaker 1: I wouldn't want him to have a hard time with that.
46:16
Speaker 1: I would want him to have a good life. I
46:18
Speaker 1: would want him to meet a good woman. And you know,
46:21
Speaker 1: but obviously that makes it harder too. A lot of
46:23
Speaker 1: times people don't want to date them when they find out,
46:27
Speaker 1: you know, oh yeah, maybe not because then the possibilities
46:30
Speaker 1: of your kids. Tell me, know, autism are like you know,
46:32
Speaker 1: so it's just a lot a lot of things that
46:35
Speaker 1: it's it's so complex and so complicated, so many different
46:39
Speaker 1: things and so many different feelings. And I would say
46:42
Speaker 1: that don't help and add don't you know, they take
46:46
Speaker 1: away and they don't add. They add to my anxieties,
46:48
Speaker 1: you know, my everyday anxieties.
46:51
Speaker 5: Are you trying too much and not enough compare me?
46:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, or if I'm if I'm not doing enough, you know,
47:00
Speaker 1: or what else should I do? Or what did I miss?
47:02
Speaker 1: Or what didn't you know? Just things like that that, Yeah,
47:08
Speaker 1: that are so hard in so many ways.
47:09
Speaker 5: Yeah, as all parents, but now you have a child
47:13
Speaker 5: who has some challenges, and so if something to happen,
47:17
Speaker 5: you know, it's having the family support.
47:21
Speaker 1: And you know, no one's gonna take care of him
47:23
Speaker 1: like we do. No one because I'll tell you what.
47:27
Speaker 1: Everybody's quick to say, Oh, we're gonna be there for
47:30
Speaker 1: you this, this and that, or like you know, the village,
47:32
Speaker 1: this and that. But when I mean, honestly, like when
47:37
Speaker 1: stuff gets real, like you don't see it a lot,
47:40
Speaker 1: you know, or people back down or you know, I
47:44
Speaker 1: am very blessed. His dad is an amazing dad, and
47:48
Speaker 1: he works really hard and he takes good care of
47:50
Speaker 1: him and you know he caters, and you know it's
47:56
Speaker 1: in that sense, I'm very blessed. My mom is amazing.
47:59
Speaker 1: She helped all these things. Right. I have a good
48:03
Speaker 1: a good group of people that are willing to help
48:05
Speaker 1: and that are there for me if I if I
48:07
Speaker 1: was to need I'm blessed again. But I you know,
48:11
Speaker 1: I can only imagine the people that don't have that.
48:15
Speaker 5: She's said, Ellison, could you finish where you Leftnock?
48:20
Speaker 7: Welcome back, h And how is your family circle as
49:02
Speaker 7: far as here you do you have the support of
49:05
Speaker 7: your family.
49:08
Speaker 2: I actually don't. I right now, it's just my village
49:15
Speaker 2: is myself and my husband. We do have some adopted
49:20
Speaker 2: family members if you would say that, that you know,
49:24
Speaker 2: are kind of their shoulders to lean on, but they
49:26
Speaker 2: don't watch Maverick. As far as care goes, it's just
49:29
Speaker 2: me and my husband. My my step mother and father
49:35
Speaker 2: live in New Jersey. Most of my family is not
49:39
Speaker 2: in the state that we're in North Carolina, So it's
49:43
Speaker 2: just my husband and myself.
49:46
Speaker 5: Okay, and Dwayne. Is there anything that you'd like to.
49:54
Speaker 4: Uh, not really, you know. The gist of it is
49:57
Speaker 4: that there's a lot of challenges in raising kids normally.
50:02
Speaker 4: There's a lot of things that you have to deal with,
50:05
Speaker 4: and I think that people have to really understand that
50:08
Speaker 4: with our families that have kids that are on the spectrum,
50:13
Speaker 4: that we need to be more aware of the challenges
50:16
Speaker 4: that those families have and be more supportive, be more supportive,
50:20
Speaker 4: more understanding, more helpful to those moments, and get educate
50:25
Speaker 4: ourselves so we can learn what we can do to help. Because,
50:29
Speaker 4: as she just said, her family, her biological family is
50:32
Speaker 4: not around, but she can find strength from other people
50:35
Speaker 4: that may be strangers that she may become friends with
50:38
Speaker 4: just because she passed one day and they were like, oh,
50:41
Speaker 4: that's a cute outfit that baby got on, and they
50:43
Speaker 4: start having conversations, and then that person is able to
50:46
Speaker 4: give her help along the way and help her with
50:49
Speaker 4: her mental with her with her times that she's anxious,
50:52
Speaker 4: when she's having a breakdown because it's just too much.
50:56
Speaker 4: And I think people forget that sometimes that the mental
50:59
Speaker 4: health inspect of all of it. It's very detrimental to
51:03
Speaker 4: the entire family and sometimes to the extended family as
51:06
Speaker 4: well because they're there in the life as well. So
51:09
Speaker 4: we have to pay attention to the mental, the physical,
51:12
Speaker 4: the spiritual, and also the medical part of this thing,
51:16
Speaker 4: so we all can make sure that everyone has an opportunity,
51:20
Speaker 4: because it's about the kids at the end of the day,
51:22
Speaker 4: making sure that they have every tool necessary to live
51:26
Speaker 4: a healthy, normal life as possible.
51:30
Speaker 5: Yeah, thank you. I do want to say a couple
51:33
Speaker 5: of things. Parents, there's so much to teach kids, you know,
51:38
Speaker 5: we think through things day. I get one of the
51:40
Speaker 5: things to add to that large list, Please teach your
51:44
Speaker 5: children to have great and if they take something little
51:48
Speaker 5: filter or unique that they're not just the same. Teach
51:52
Speaker 5: them to the point not to stare and just to
51:57
Speaker 5: go about their own business as if they didn't see
52:01
Speaker 5: anything off. The parents who have children, whether they're simmy
52:09
Speaker 5: or whether they're going into a meltdown for doing the
52:12
Speaker 5: best that they can. And so the worst is having
52:17
Speaker 5: to deal with the public right along with that. So
52:20
Speaker 5: I would say that that would be a huge thing.
52:22
Speaker 5: Please please guys, grace, have grace. That being said, you
52:28
Speaker 5: can reach me at City at one. If you need
52:33
Speaker 5: to contact Lena on all, you can contact at the
52:37
Speaker 5: Lena which is spelt s E l E n ee
52:42
Speaker 5: Underspore eighty nine, or you can reach Allison as it's
52:47
Speaker 5: underscore wifey w I E y zero four and Dwayne
52:54
Speaker 5: turns silk on all. I'm going to give you ladies
52:58
Speaker 5: a chance to real quick give a take away and
53:01
Speaker 5: then the way and I'm gonna take it away.
53:03
Speaker 1: So let it go ahead, Okay, So I would say
53:07
Speaker 1: I wanna take away. I I I always usually say,
53:11
Speaker 1: you know, have a little bit of grace because we're
53:14
Speaker 1: running low on battery, you know, for the for the moms.
53:17
Speaker 1: But I guess today I want to do a message
53:19
Speaker 1: like for the moms, for the moms out there that
53:22
Speaker 1: are struggling with acceptance, that are struggling, you know, with
53:27
Speaker 1: with everything. Just know that you're not alone. There is help,
53:32
Speaker 1: There is people out there. There is a lot of
53:35
Speaker 1: people like we're not you know, you're not alone, and
53:37
Speaker 1: there's there's a lot of us that that are dealing
53:39
Speaker 1: with this more than you think, more than you think.
53:41
Speaker 1: There is so many of us, and you know it
53:44
Speaker 1: might not be the same, but there's things that are similar,
53:47
Speaker 1: and the help is the same. You know we could
53:49
Speaker 1: help you. You know you're not racing a child. You're
53:53
Speaker 1: learning a whole new language. Patience, love, understanding, and strength.
54:01
Speaker 1: You know we're strong. We are one of the strongest.
54:05
Speaker 1: You know that there is so you know, I would
54:11
Speaker 1: hate to see you guys feel alone. You're not alone
54:14
Speaker 1: in this. You know you could always reach out to me.
54:18
Speaker 1: My platforms, the same thing on across all platforms. But yeah,
54:22
Speaker 1: you know, just just remember you're not alone and that
54:26
Speaker 1: it's okay. And it does get better. I promise it
54:29
Speaker 1: gets better. Just how your son gets better, your daughter
54:33
Speaker 1: gets better, Just how like the practice and this and
54:37
Speaker 1: this and the repetitiveness and the you know everything. Yes,
54:41
Speaker 1: there is small challenges, yes, and big ones too, but
54:45
Speaker 1: I promise it gets better. I promise it gets better,
54:48
Speaker 1: you know, because how do I say it? We learn,
54:53
Speaker 1: we learn more, and we're learning as we're going, and
54:55
Speaker 1: but we're all learning together. So you know, be strong,
54:59
Speaker 1: because you are strong and you can do this. You
55:03
Speaker 1: can do this, and you know I'm here.
55:06
Speaker 5: There are many ways to have a support besides your friends.
55:11
Speaker 5: If you talk to your pediatricians, they can actually give
55:14
Speaker 5: you referral and also a A n e dot Org
55:20
Speaker 5: is a complete site with so many so much meat
55:23
Speaker 5: potatoes there. I could even go on for we could
55:26
Speaker 5: have a whole podcast that, but definitely they could direct
55:30
Speaker 5: you to support groups within your area. Ellison for short, I.
55:37
Speaker 2: Would just say it two things. Really, when you're first
55:42
Speaker 2: starting out on this journey of getting a diagnosis, give
55:45
Speaker 2: yourself grace, not only your child, but give your self
55:48
Speaker 2: grace because this is a brand new, big chapter and
55:53
Speaker 2: you are allowed to feel all of those emotions that
55:57
Speaker 2: you are feeling. It is completely normal. I can promise
56:01
Speaker 2: you I've been through it. I'm sure Selene's been through it,
56:05
Speaker 2: you know, Processing, accepting, that diagnosis. And the other thing
56:11
Speaker 2: is don't be afraid to ask for help. I was
56:15
Speaker 2: afraid for a very long time to lean on friends
56:18
Speaker 2: and lean on acquaintances, even for therapists, and they have
56:23
Speaker 2: been his my son, Maverage therapist have been some of
56:27
Speaker 2: the greatest what I would call now friends, you know,
56:32
Speaker 2: because I go into his therapies and that's the first
56:34
Speaker 2: thing I asked, how are you doing? Mom? You know,
56:37
Speaker 2: how would you read him? But how are you doing?
56:40
Speaker 2: And that just asking that can make the day of
56:43
Speaker 2: difference because they understand the challenges and they're also a
56:47
Speaker 2: resource for you to lean on and ask questions. And
56:53
Speaker 2: I mean they have helped me tremendously with devices, his bed,
56:59
Speaker 2: referrals for things like that. So lean on your resources
57:03
Speaker 2: and don't be afraid to utilize them because you think
57:07
Speaker 2: there's a stigma against the help.
57:11
Speaker 1: And you're helping your kid, you know, at the end
57:14
Speaker 1: of the day, the sooner you start the you know,
57:18
Speaker 1: you're just setting them up to win. That's it. You're
57:20
Speaker 1: helping your kids. You're doing this like I know that
57:23
Speaker 1: you're in it for them. So we're doing this for them,
57:25
Speaker 1: you know, accepting and I understand it. Is very hard.
57:29
Speaker 1: It is very hard, is very hard.
57:30
Speaker 2: You mourn.
57:31
Speaker 1: There's a lot of things, a lot of big process
57:33
Speaker 1: that we have to go through. But the faster we
57:37
Speaker 1: get it done, the faster we start helping our kids.
57:40
Speaker 1: That's it most, the faster we can get them talking.
57:45
Speaker 4: Yeah, you're definitely right. We want to thank everyone for
57:48
Speaker 4: coming in and tuning in today. I want to thank
57:50
Speaker 4: these beautiful ladies for participating the day and sharing their
57:54
Speaker 4: hearts and their spirits. And we just want to say
57:57
Speaker 4: the word is grace. Let's continue give each other grace
58:01
Speaker 4: and stand up for each other. We want to thank
58:03
Speaker 4: our beautiful Queen Angela and the Crew podcast for hosting
58:08
Speaker 4: this and again this is extra scoop podcasts where anything
58:13
Speaker 4: but by size. We want to thank everybody. Y'all have
58:15
Speaker 4: a good evening, and we want to say until next time,
58:18
Speaker 4: God bless you, talk to you later everyone.
58:21
Speaker 2: Hey, it's the next time.