I don't spend too much time talking about how Buzzy behaves on a day-to-day basis. I am going to do that right now. Sometimes it is so painfully apparent that things aren't quite right with Buzzy. Sometimes I feel he is right where other kids his age are. And in some situations, I feel he is advanced. And I am grateful that there are any instances at all where I can feel he is advanced. Yay for progress!
Buzzy does well at night. He does sometimes make some noises in the middle of the night, but it's not too difficult to settle him back down. I just have to go in there, fix his covers and tell him it's time to go to sleep and he is good. Then I walk back out.
Buzzy wakes anywhere between 7:30 and 9:00. He is pretty patient. He will generally stay in his bed, chattering to himself - for a little while. If you let him go too long, though, he might get noisier and get cranky. Fortunately (knock on wood) he doesn't try to escape his room (we have a gate up). I change and dress his. He isn't potty trained. And he doesn't know how to dress himself, or even really help me get him dressed. He likes to play on my phone while I am taking care of this. I haven't pushed the whole "self-help" issue yet with him, because I feel we have bigger fish to fry at the moment.
Then we do breakfast, which is all his vitamins and supplements and everything else. Generally, he sits really well for breakfast in his chair. Then, some mornings he has ABA right away. If he doesn't, then he bumps around the living room, doing his own thing. And what does doing his own thing mean? Playing with items not appropriate for a 2 year old, of course! He likes to find cords and plug them into phones, or plug them into outlets. I have given up a long time ago trying to get him to NOT plug things in, so I have showed him how to do it properly. I don't like it, but it is what it is. He likes to drag one of the big vacuums around, as well. He likes to take the telescoping handle out and pretend to vacuum with that. He will (at times) run up to his sister and give her kisses. He also likes to take down the gate that gates off the stairs and lure his sister upstairs. I am not sure why that amuses him (getting his sister to come upstairs), but he really likes doing that. Probably because I really like him NOT doing that.
Lunch is a little harder to get him to sit down for. He also likes to constantly raid the cabinets and fridge (if I am dumb enough to leave them open and unlocked). He definitely likes to graze. I try to engage him to play with baby and me or do therapy with him, but that can be challenging. A perfect example of this was yesterday. We were all settled in watching the Super Bowl game, and Buzzy was off in the kitchen by himself playing with a little tube pretending it was a vacuum. It made me sad to see him there off by himself. He did later come to me and put his head in my lap and fall asleep, though.
During the day, he doesn't want to be read to. He sometimes will want to play with puzzles or play with trains, but it's hard to get something set up that will hold his interest - and that the baby won't come over and destroy.
While I've been typing this, he's been down in the basement with me, turning the air hockey table on and off, turning the fake fireplace on and off, and plugging cords into a surge protector. It's like he doesn't need me at all - for interaction.
But then, he has started to want me to do everything for him: put him in his car seat, he needs me right there when it's bath time (he won't go upstairs unless I am right behind him), I do his bedtime routine, and I also have to put his shoes on, even if one falls off in the middle of church. He also has to be loitering when I shower, and will tantrum if he's not in the same room. So, I shower while he hangs around in our bedroom. He doesn't bother me or anything - he just wants to be where I am, I suppose. Fortunately, he doesn't really get into anything. He just plays with the vacuum up there and looks for pacifiers to steal.
I've been reading this interesting book, called The Myth of Autism. I will have to talk about that next time, because it's getting late here and I need to help with the bedtime routine.
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