4.28.2004

Typos and Turnabouts

I managed to place a massive typo in every post, comment, or email I wrote today. Yeah!

Things are finally turning around, finally going well with Leelo.

We got all fifty or so blood test results back, and the verdicts are all cheery. No celiac. No Fragile X, in fact no chromosomal abnormalities of any kind. No anemia from his funky diet. No funkiness or deficiencies of any measurable kind. He had elevated potassium, and one elevated liver function. I will ask his pediatrician about these items, but they don't really seem worrisome.

His language is beautiful. Thanks to herculean efforts from his therapists, he totally gets answering "yes" or "no" to the question "Do you want XX?" To those of you who don't hang with autistic kids, this may seem like a basic, something your kid learns before they start to walk. For an autistic child, though, this sort of abstract conceptualizing can be a quantum leap. A thrilling one. I am going to try to record him answering "yes!" to a question, because his voice is so damn cute.

Yesterday, he made Therapist T bring him downstairs to me by announcing "I want to go see Mommy!" He's identifying objects not just by label only, but by saying "It is a/n XX!" (And, yes, he does pronounce all sentences exclamatorily.)

Adding soy back in his diet hasn't resulted in any behavioral problems--if anything, he's seemed much more calm and focused. Although now he can't get enough of those fricking veggie puffs. If we tell him they're "all done," he'll ask for them by their alias, "cheesy puffs." Sneaky boy.

Also, two days ago we took him off Nystattin, his antifungal medication. He'd been on it since August. I think as long as we're vigilant about probiotics, dietary enzymes, and keeping his sugar intake low, he won't need it. No noticeable nuttiness so far.

He was an angel at his accupressure appointment today. Perfectly behaved, responsive to my requests.

All good. But I am still immeasurably down for some reason. With that shaky insomniac feeling I had right after Leelo got diagnosed last year, and a lot of crying when I'm by myself in the car. Isn't it just too easy to blame hormones?

That traitor who is moving to the East Coast, JM, spent a bit of time yesterday pointedly telling me about a friend whose child was recently diagnosed with Tourettte's, and how this friend has been finding a lot of solace in therapy (although in the friend's case, she is 6 months pregnant with twins, and has just found out that the likelihood of their having Tourettte's is 50%). I've always found therapy totally fucking useless, but then again I never really had anything worth going to therapy about before. It's a thought.

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