EP 27. All The Great Things Our Kid Can Do

Parenting Severe Autism podcast host and mom Shannon Chamberlin celebrates 1 year of podcasting with a full list of all the things her son is good at, along with short stories or descriptions illustrating these abilities. Shannon and her husband encourage all special needs parents to recognize the talents their children have, and to recognize that as special needs parents, everyone does their best but they're not going to be perfect or know everything. They are also encouraging parents to figure out a way to break up the monotony of this caregiving lifestyle.
Included in this episode is a brief description of some of the podcast merchandise available for listeners, and a call to action to SHARE THIS PODCAST wherever possible in order to help other struggling parents and caregivers find it and enjoy listening to stories from another parent going through it.

Transcript

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

minnows, vcr, kid, excellent, dad, podcast, lifeguards, understand, costumes, people, school, severe autism, logo, superhero, thinks, focus, cute, program, learned, amazing

0:18
Hello and welcome to The Parenting Severe Autism podcast. I am your host Shannon Chamberlin. I'm so happy that you're here with me today. 
0:25
This week marks one year that I have been podcasting about parenting severe autism. So I think it's really fitting that this episode is focused on recognizing and celebrating all the great stuff my kid can do. Most of the time, we as parents are focused on all of the things the child cannot do, because we have to do it for him, right? As I mentioned, in my last episode, I was feeling I guess, like a Negative Nelly, kind of down in the dumps about that. And I don't like to focus on the negative, even though that's pretty much where we live. This autism really goes against everything that I am. I - at my core, I'm an eternal optimist. Everything is for a reason, everything is good, and you know, I see the best in everything and everyone and I always give everyone the benefit of the doubt I seriously  - optimism is my thing. So it's completely foreign to me to live this lifestyle that we're in with the severe autism. And I think that might be why it gets me down so much. But I mean, who wouldn't get down about it? Right? 
1:33
I'd love to know what your kid can do. If you would like to share that send me an email or would it on my Facebook page where I post this episode emails contact dot parenting severe autism@gmail.com Facebook pages parenting severe autism podcast, if you check out my Buzzsprout website, we do have merch I've been asked a couple times if there's a logo, you know, my thunderstorm and rainbow and broken glass, broken brick wall logo and the parents trying to protect the child under the umbrella of autism. And yes, I do have that logo available without the white background. It looks really cool. And it's on all kinds of different stuff. And you're welcome to check it out. If you would like to be reminded that you're a superhero, it's over there. It's on the website, Teespring website. Sorry, I don't know what it is. It's just on there for merch. And I've got some really nice coffee cups. The message on my cups is Dear Mama or Dear caregiver or Dear Dad, dear grandma, whoever you are, it says that and then it says 'you didn't fail. It's part of severe autism.' And it's got my logo on the other side, I believe. And then I've got some travel mugs and water bottles that have my podcast logo. On the other side, it says Hang in there. You're a superhero. So I've got all that kind of stuff. I've got that stuff on pillows, and got some other angry-type things on some shirts, you know, like, oh, yeah, keep staring that'll help... things like that. So if you want to, go ahead and check that out, the link is there in my show notes, I believe on my psa.buzzsprout.com 
3:17
Let me know if there's anything you would like to know or share anything you spend supporting the show, whether it's through the buy me a coffee program, or merch or subscriptions or anything like that a portion of the proceeds still goes to a savings account to help other parents in our situation who are strapped and need things for their kid. It's a good cause. And I appreciate your support. 
3:41
So let's talk about some really great stuff. Hopefully, you have been thinking about all the great stuff your kid can do. While they may not be big things to many other people in the world for us in our world. These things are amazing. And they're huge. And they're worth celebrating as often as possible. I'm going to start as I can with the very first thing I noticed my son was good at and then just kind of go as he has grown up and aged and progressed through life. And I'm going to try to keep them in order. So I have a pretty long list. I'm pretty impressed with all the great stuff he can do. Number one, when I first met Jacob, I noticed that he was very adept at operating the VCR. And at that time, it wasn't even a DVD player yet, you know, those were kind of just coming into focus and also in the process of getting covered up by the blu ray players at that time. They had a VCR and he was amazing at it. He would stand there and just watch the TV and press the buttons and operate that thing because you probably have seen this with your own child. He only likes to watch certain parts over and over and over again. And he may not be concerned with the rest of the movie. So he got very good at that very fast. And as I recall, the family told me that that was the very first thing he ever figured out how to do on his own. And he has never forgotten it. That has since become obsolete, really. And now it's more operating the x box and operating the remote for the firestick. And the regular TV. 
5:16
I'm trying to teach him how to voice search, because I think that would be really cool. I think it's worked one time. I've been working on it with him for about two years now. And I think it kind of helps him to understand how not clear his speech is. And I don't really like to focus on the things that he can't do and show him Hey, you can't do this. But when he tries a voice search, and it doesn't work, and it doesn't work, and then I do it right in front of him and it works, I see a glimmer of understanding in his eyes like oh, okay... and some things I know he can't say so I won't have him try to voice search but other things I know he can if he tries, he can really get those words enunciated and pronounce well enough for Alexa to understand you know, so anyway, VCR operation was the very first thing he became good at. 
6:07
The next thing I noticed he was really good at came from out of nowhere is costume creation. Amazing, right? He had - and he still has - as he's gotten bigger, we've continued to try to find good costumes for him. They're just like body suits. So when he was young, about eight years old, he had a Batman body suit with a cape, he had a spider man one and a Superman one with a cape and he had full access to all of his clothes and costumes in his room at that time, because it wasn't a problem back then. And left to his own devices, he would sometimes not play his video games. And he would get into his closet and mix and match these costumes together and create his own superhero. And I thought that was awesome. And the one piece that always tied everything together. And maybe it was the whole motivating factor, I don't know it was my sunglasses. He always would steal my sunglasses. And that would just make the outfit. And he would come downstairs with all of his superhero costumes mixed and matched together and then slide on my shades. My shades were silver plastic at the time, and he apparently loved them. And they always went with whatever costume he would make. 
7:18
Another thing he's good at is coordinating his own outfits. We all go through that stage in life, I think when we're kids, where our parents decide to give us the freedom to dress ourselves. And some of us choose some really whacked out stuff. And they let us go to school like that, because that's us exercising our creativity and our autonomy. That's what a lot of parents do, right? So, he never had an awkward outfit. He is very good at coordinating his clothing. And he's never mismatched. No one has ever taught him this color goes with this color. He just has it, he will even pick other people's clothing if he can get to it and try to incorporate that if the colors look good, or whatever it - it's really cute. 
8:05
And he can get himself dressed. And he's been able to do that for quite some time, I think when he was about eight or nine is when he started really being able to dress himself. And we were very impressed with his clothing choices. 
8:18
The next thing he's good at is running. As you know, he's an excellent runner, he's super fast. And in the right situation, he probably could have done something with that athletically different schools that had the track coaches, and they would always say, Man, I'd love to have him run for us. But you know, that's where it stops, he can run. And he's excellent at jumping. He's like Tigger, he can jump and jump and jump and he never gets tired. 
8:44
Another thing he's good at is typing. I think that kind of ties in with the VCR because it's the electronics and he's using it to get what he wants. And so typing to communicate is something we did try to introduce didn't go over too well. But typing to search for stuff with either a keyboard or the remote control. He's very good at both of those things. And you know, with the remote control to do a search, like on YouTube, or even on a regular TV, it's letter by letter. It's old school text, right? And he can do it, he has no trouble. So what that means to me is that he's also very good at reading and spelling, which as you know, we worked on that all the time in the kitchen with the whiteboard, but he gets the stuff searched for so fast. It's amazing. And that's because he can spell and read what he's doing, right? So that's pretty cool. 
9:33
Another thing I noticed when he was about probably nine or 10 is that he's a bit of an empath. There was one time and forgive me if I've told this story before he was upstairs in our townhouse, and we were downstairs. He was on the opposite side of the townhouse. It's not like he could hear through the ceiling or the floor or anything like that. And we were watching Schindler's List and there was quite a long bit in that movie where it was just music And watching what was going on. And there was no talking right? No sound effects just music. And eventually he came downstairs. By the time he got to us in the living room, he had tears in his eyes. And he was so sad. And he indicated that this was a sad movie. And he could tell just by the music, and he could feel it all the way upstairs in his room, and so much so that it brought him downstairs to seek us out. So that's pretty neat. And he is he's very sensitive to other people, once he knows that, Oh, you look sad, or I feel that you are unhappy in some way. He's very tuned into that. And he can connect to that it's really strange to have that paired up with this maniac that comes out as well. But yes, he's very sensitive to other people's feelings, once he's figured it out that they are having feelings. 
10:51
Another thing that really floors me is his long term memory, particularly in the area of returning to an area of interest. I've mentioned in previous episodes that his dad and I would sometimes have to take him to our demonstration dinners with us while we're working. And it got to be really interesting because he would remember which houses had which toys and which movies and games that he was interested in. And he would sometimes get very upset with us as we were driving to a new appointment, he would say turn left. And then if we wouldn't turn left, he would get very mad, but a couple of times we let that play out. Why does he say turn left turn right? What is that? And then we realized he's directing us to a house that we've taken him to in the past because of something that they have. And a couple of times he indicated whether it was a movie or a game, and he would do his best to say the title at that time. He didn't talk very well. And he still doesn't. But you know, we can try our best to understand him. It was amazing. That's what he does. He remembers exactly where people live who have things that he wants, it goes back way back, like we moved away from here for 12 or 13 years. And we have come back now. And just about a year ago, we were driving around in a different town right near here looking at houses. And Jacob kept telling us to turn here and turn here and you know, do all these different things. Every once in a while we would turn on the street he wanted us to turn just because that's the direction we were going in anyway. And it turns out, he was directing us to his maternal grandmother's old house way back when he was a baby. He remembered where she lived while she had a pool, see. And who knows what else, and we ended up on that street and almost right in front of that house. And he said yay, grandma's house or something like that. And I had no idea that that was what he was talking about. But his dad explained it to me and how amazing is that? 
12:59
He also is a very talented sound effect artist, believe it or not, ever since he was little we have always thought if we could just get him to the Hollywood Studios. He has Hollywood quality, movie quality sound effects that he makes with just his voice. I mean, it's unbelievable. We've got screams and howls and growls and glass breaking - all those sounds he makes with just his mouth. Now that he's a little bit older, we think that he would also be very well suited as the frontman for a death metal band. He's got that death metal voice, I really think that he would be great in a death metal band. I mean, look, you can't understand what they're saying most of the time anyway. And it's just this demonic growling yelling voice right? And he's perfect for it. So that is a huge talent. I really wish we could have marketed that. And maybe we still can, I don't know. 
13:56
Also along those same lines, he has this really cute ability to imitate characters in video games. You know how in a superhero video game or even Sonic or Mario Brothers or something like that, the characters, when they stop moving, and they're just waiting for your next command to come through the controller that you're holding? They just kind of bounce a little bit and hover. I don't really know how to describe it, but they don't stand still. They just kind of hang there and move kind of I don't know, just like a hover bounce. He does that - he'll make some kind of sound or try to imitate what he hears in his head from the character in the video game. And then he'll just stand there. He kind of hangs his arms, puts his head a little bit down into the side and he'll let his hands just kind of hang in like this curved cup shape and he'll just hover and just move and looks like his whole body is breathing and he'll just do that with this half smile on his face. He'll do it for minutes at a time. It's the weirdest thing when you realize he's not going to come out of it until you jar him out of it. But I think that's a pretty cute little talent that he has.
15:06
 He's also become very good at cuddling. He's a little bit more careful than he used to be. He used to try to cuddle and he would headbutt me in the nose every single time. But over the years, he's learned that that's not the greatest way to do it. So now he still leads with his head, but he comes in real slow, so as not to bust me in the nose. And he is an excellent cuddler. He loves affection and attention, which I never expected for someone with autism. Like I said, I didn't know anything about autism before I met him. And all I knew was Rain Man, and Rain Man didn't want to be touched, right? That was something that surprised me. But he is a cuddler. 
15:45
And he's also a prankster. He's got a great sense of humor, and he's ornery. So he's always trying to prank people in different ways, you know, he'll try to pinch his dad's butt because he knows his dad doesn't like it. And he'll try to confuse you... even - it's confusing enough trying to talk to him. But sometimes he thinks that you know what he's talking about. And he'll try to confuse you and play tricks on you. And it's really cute to see that inner working thing going on. Like, you know, if he was a little bit more advanced, it might work, you can tell that he's just got this streak in him that he is just a prankster. 
15:48
And one of the things he's actually really good at along those lines is renaming people. Now, I don't know if that's something that is coming naturally for him, or if that's something that he has learned from me, because I also rename people, and I've done it for forever and ever, but I never really brought it to his attention. So I kind of think that it's all him, he will pick normal names. So I kind of don't think he got it from me. We took him to his sunshine camp when he first started a couple years ago. And he was just terrible at that time. And when he was in a good mood, he would just give them different names. There was a lady named Shawna, I think he decided that she should be named Paige, where would you get that? We've never had him in school with a girl named Paige. And he just did that for all the people, all of the counselors at camp, he just gave them new names. And they would say no, my name is this and he would shake his head and say no, and then he would give them their name that he decided for them. And I think that's cute. 
17:15
He is an excellent swimmer. There is a little waterpark near Camp and he gets to go there twice a week. Sometimes they have a special needs night. And I think it's once or twice a year we'll take him normally. And when he's with the kids from camp, it's one thing I guess because the lifeguards are doing their jobs. But also there's so many adults from camp there that it's not as emergent, I guess. But when we took him there, he went down the waterslide. And he decided to do a dead man's float at the end of the waterslide and scared the shit out of these lifeguards. It was so funny. We knew he was fine, because that was his thing at the time. He just liked to float, you know, face down and shoulders up. And I don't know, that was just his thing. And we know he can swim. We know he's fine. But the lifeguards were freaking out and his dad had to run in there and say he's fine. He's fine. He's fine, you know, but they were just so scared. And he does it all the time. No matter where you take him. He will try and I guess that falls in line with the prankster. He will try to scare those lifeguards into thinking that he's drowning. Sometimes he'll flap around, you know, and he'll say, Help me Help me. But most of the time, he'll do this dead man's float and just scares the crap out of people. But he's an excellent swimmer. He likes to swim underwater, he likes to jump in swimming on top of the water is really exciting. Very splash zone-y. But he's still he does a really good job getting from here to there and staying under and he is just not afraid of the water. He loves it. 
18:43
He's also really good at steering, believe it or not, we don't have him drive the car. But we lived out in the country for quite some time. And we had a couple of four wheelers and the big utility one, it was really safe for him. And it was an automatic, we would let him sit in front and drive it and eventually it got to where he could drive it by himself. And he's really good. He can fit stuff where you would never think he would think he could fit it. He's very confident he's just zeroed in and he the way that he sees things must be amazing. I wish I knew how he saw stuff. He can steer that thing and drive that thing like nobody's business. He's careful. He doesn't go too fast or anything. And he will remember - his grandfather would sometimes give him rides on that same four wheeler and he would remember his grandfather would always go to a certain point in the woods and I don't know what he was doing but I think he was getting himself stuck and he would stop in basically the same spot every time and we never knew until Jacob was on the quad on his own and we were all out in the woods together. He rode up to that spot and got off it - there's nothing nothing around at all just pine trees. It was just a clearing you know he got off it and starts pulling on the back cage of it and trying to rock it back and forth and then goes around to the front and starts pulling on it and trying to pick it up and we're like what are you doing? And it turns out he was using his memory and imitating what he has always seen his grandfather do. I don't know why, but we explained to him that yeah, you're doing fine. You don't need to do that. But yeah, he's excellent at steering the quad. And I know that's a weird thing, right? You wouldn't think that a kid like him would get a freedom like that. Right? But yeah, it worked out really well. 
20:29
Another thing that's really strange, I'm sure that you would never think parents like us would ever allow our child to do is shoot an air rifle. He is an excellent shot at shooting zombies. Excellent shot, zombies are seven up cans but he's very good at it when he's in the mood. And usually he is in the mood. He used to do a lot of gaming with the Splinter Cell and army stuff, you know, and there was always a lot of shooting and marksmanship and stuff and we have an air rifle pellet gun thing. His Dad showed him everything how to get in there and get aimed and pull the trigger and keep it in the right direction and all that stuff. And he never misses, he never misses. And it's really fun to watch him do it. He's amazing at that as well. 
21:13
Another thing he learned last year, it was so cute was how to get his minnows out of the bucket when we were fishing and that - I'm gonna post that video here pretty soon on my Facebook page for the podcast. And it's so cute because at first he was like, eehh you know, freaking out because the minnows are alive and they're swimming and they would wiggle in his hands and he would freak out, you know, and then his dad would play with him and prank him a little bit and he would freak out. But eventually he caught a minnow and ever since that first one, he can just reach in there and catch it, catch it, catch it on the first time, every time he doesn't even have to chase him around. He's just zoomed in on him. He's he's in the zone, you know, and he can just reach in that bucket and pick up a fish. And he did that for every single minnow because we set them free into the water when we were done fishing for the day. And he's the one that did it. He picked up each minnows individually out of that bucket of water and threw him in the water. So yeah, that's a new skill he has acquired. 
21:13
Another thing I think is really funny is his ability for using properly placed expletives. As I've mentioned before, he always uses them in context. And I think it's really funny because hardly anything he says is in context or appropriate or understandable. But expletives he's got them in he knows exactly where to put them. I call it cursing in context, he knows where to put them. And when to use them. There are things that he learns to say that I'm may not be fond of, but he knows the difference between we say those things at home. And we can say those things out in the world. I've always been very adamant about teaching him that making sure that he understands because Jeez, you know, the last thing I want is for a kid like him to be out in the world and say something inappropriate and rude and terrible, like that time with the guy in Walmart around people who don't understand him in the first place and don't realize his condition. You know, he's very good at understanding that which is amazing to me. He learned some off putting phrase from his papaw and he'll say it and it may be funny here and I will give him the laugh. If it's funny, I can't hold that back. But I'll also say now, we can only say that at home. We don't say that at camp and when he was in school, I would say we don't say that at school. We don't say that on the bus. We don't say that anywhere else, but at home. He's like, okay, you know, so that's cool that he comprehends what I'm trying to teach him with that and that he respects the boundary there. That's pretty neat.
23:44
 He's now very good at catching a ball. It's been a long time I started trying to teach him that in I think 2010. And he just learned how to catch a ball, oh, I don't know, maybe a year or two ago, he finally can do it. And and now he can catch them all the time. So that's a new skill that he has gained. And I'm proud of him for that. 
24:03
Here's one thing I forgot to mention earlier in the timeline of all the things he learned how to do touch math, he is excellent at doing touch math. This is what they were teaching when he was in school. And I don't know if you know it, but you have these numbers, and then each number gets dots on it. And I guess the dots represent the value of the number and then you do math with the dots, not the numbers. And he's excellent at it. We don't do it anymore, because I just don't have time to be the teacher and he really isn't interested in home school anymore. He kind of gets a little irritated about the idea. And I don't blame him. I'm tired of school too, but he was excellent at it and he was doing triple digit addition and subtraction. That's pretty impressive. He was only 12 When he was doing triple digit addition and subtraction using touch math, and I'm pretty sure he can still do touch math to this day. That's awesome. 
24:57
And we got him his prescriptions about two years ago, I believe. His first prescriptions ever in his life, were still using the same prescriptions. And he has somehow learned how to open the prescription bottles now that that's a good skill, because now we have to lock everything up, as you know, but it's a skill. He's good at it, he can get those open. And I don't even know if he does it the right way, but he figures it out. If you ever need some drugs opened up, call my kid. 
25:22
That's about it. The other thing, there's a couple other things I want to say here. He is very supportive of us, which I appreciate. For instance, last night, I ate all the food on my little plate for dinner. And he got up, and he said, Let me see. And I showed him my plate. And he's like, Oh, great job, Shannon doll. So that - he's very supportive. And I appreciate that very much. He's very proud of me for eating all of my food. And these are great skills, right? I don't think they're marketable. But you know, whatever. 
25:55
Now, I have mentioned some of these things to the so called professionals out there under many different circumstances, whether I'm fighting with them to get services for my child, or whether we're just having a meeting about the services that are offered for my child or whatever, for some reason or another. The things that he's good at will come up in conversation. And these so called professionals never let me down. They always say something brilliant, like, Wow, that's great. Yeah, you can and should get him into a job placement program because he can do those things. What? Seriously? Okay, he can operate a VCR he can make costumes out of what he's got in his closet. He can dress himself and match his colors. He can run and jump, he can type. He has good memory, he can cuddle. He likes to pull pranks. He likes to give people new names. Oh, he also likes to taste test in the kitchen. So he's an excellent taste tester. He's a good swimmer. He can steer quads, he can shoot zombies. He can catch minnows, he can curse in context, he can catch a ball. He's an empath. He does touch math very well. And I am supposed to take these skills and market them to get him into a job placement program? Well, I tried it, okay? They didn't want him. You know why? Because none of those things were of interest to them. You know what they wanted before. They said 'he's too autistic and too needy for our program', even though their program had grown people in there laying on mattresses shitting themselves and drooling. But my kid's too needy, they don't want him to do the things that he can do. They want Him to do the things that make them money. They have a cleaning crew, they want him to use chemicals. They want him to go around and spray stuff and wipe it down and follow directions and be disciplined and do what he's supposed to do!
27:46
Good luck! No one even gives him a chance. But I mean, I know he's not going to be able to do that. And we don't want him around chemicals. And as soon as we said I don't want him around caustic chemicals, I don't want him around any chemicals because he doesn't understand the dangers and he will absolutely not pay attention and spray himself in the mouth or the face or the eyes or the ears. I don't want him handling chemicals. Oh, well guess what? He's too autistic for our program. 
28:10
But when these so called professionals tell me things like that I immediately start experiencing feelings of failure. You know, that is not my area of study. I, I've studied, I have - Okay, I have my certificate in interior design. I have my certificate in permaculture. I'm a Business Management Professional. I'm a sales professional. I'm not suited for grooming him for jobs. I don't know how to help him flourish. I don't understand why they keep putting it in my hands. It can't be my responsibility. It's not what I went to school for. Where are all the people that go to school for things like helping kids like my kid and your kid? Where are they? Why is it all falling on us? How am I supposed to help him succeed in a job placement? I don't have those skills. I cannot do it. I just can't do it. I can't work with him. on that level. I don't have it. I don't have it in me. You know, I'm doing the best I can by him. But I've reached my limit. I'm maxed out. I don't have what it takes to cultivate his abilities to make him a marketable person to get paid for doing something. It doesn't work like that. And I need people who can help him and nurture that and I don't know, we're just... here we are. We're just at home. He's in the bathtub. And that's - he's also very good at taking baths. Maybe I can get him a gig bathing somewhere for money, I don't know. 
29:36
He doesn't get any community involvement. He doesn't get any give back to the community feeling and they always say Oh, well, it's so important to let your child feel that they're giving back. I don't think he gives a shit to be honest. Okay, he he's five. 
29:50
Anyway, don't forget to check the Buzzsprout website for the show notes and the products that we recommend for our stress management and to help him stay happyand all that jazz. And please remember to try to share these episodes, share my Facebook page, the parenting severe autism podcast Facebook page, just to get this out to others. 
30:11
I've heard from many parents who listen to this podcast that it's nice to hear that someone else is going through it. And someone who does crazy stuff like me, you know? I look at it a crazy way, I guess. And I just, I just want you to share this if you can help some other mother or father out there. And, you know, my husband believes that the things we talk about on this podcast will actually help save a marriage and save a relationship. It's pretty important. You know, it's hard to get through this life, the way that we have to do these things. And when you're constantly butting heads, and you know, Dad thinks it's this, and mom thinks it's this, and we just can't come to an agreement. We can't agree to disagree, because the kid won't leave us alone about it, and we can't figure it out. It's very stressful. And the one thing that I am very grateful for through all of this is that we don't expect each other to be perfect. And we know that each of us is not an expert. We know we know that. 
31:09
Realigning text with audio
We're just people who happen to be in this parenting life. And we didn't ask for it. The kid didn't ask for it. We're just doing the best we can. And we're not perfect. And we're not experts. And we're entitled to our opinions. And we're going to be wrong. But it's important to appreciate each other, try to switch burdens once in a while and try to do some kind of balancing and juggling act to give the other one a break and try to recognize all the good that our child can do. I don't want to focus on anything past that because it starts to go downhill. But if I just focus on Well, he's really good at this. And it's fun to watch him do it because he's good at it. And he knows he's good at it and he enjoys it. It's just that moment. Don't worry about marketing it don't worry about job placement. Don't worry about selling that to some home or some program. Just appreciate that he can do it and let him know that he should appreciate it. You know, let him know that it's nice. It's good. It's great. Keep doing it. We appreciate it. We love it. Yes, yes. Yes. Go Go. Go. You can do it. You know, it's exhausting, but it's necessary. 
32:12
Realigning text with audio
In my next episode. My next two episodes here, I'm going to focus first on our experiences with doctors for all this time that I've known him. After that I'm going to focus on starting the story about when we think the decline began for our son. 
32:29
Realigning text with audio
Try to find some happy stuff about your kid this week, if you can. We're celebrating one year of successfully podcasting about parenting severe autism. Thank you for listening. You hang in there. You're a superhero.