My Baby’s Starting School….

……….and I’m shit scared 😦

As you probably all know by now both my sons have Aspergers Syndrome (or aspie as we like to use in my house – sometimes even faspie (under my breath, honest) if they’re being particularly annoying!).  My oldest has had a totally brilliant first two years at school, excelling in all the areas we thought he would.  His ‘stressful’ times generally revolve around communication and social situations which is fairly normal for these kids.  My youngest on the other hand is a completely different story!!

We are expecting all sorts of problems there – inside the classroom AND in the playground.  People so often say “really? Both of them? But they are sooo different!”  Well durrrrr – they’re not the same person are they!!!  Even twins have differences!!

His list of ‘stressful’ times is a hell of a lot longer than his brothers, and he has the added bonus of a severe language disorder, along with bowel issues which all fuel the behaviour problems!!  The short of it is – they.are.not.going.to.know.what.hit.them!  Two hours of orientation last year was going really well until the last 10 minutes when a kid brushed past him to sit on the mat (soft pressure on his body hurts him) which ended with my little darlin kicking this kid in the head!  Would you want your child playing with mine??

His aide seems nice BUT old school.  I would love to have been able to have one of the young male aides BUT my baby needs really firm hugs to help him calm down and it’s not fair to put that expectation on a male when they have to be sooo careful with those sorts of things these days.  He won’t do number 2’s anywhere but home (quite a few of these kids are like that) which means his behaviour (kicking, screaming, hitting, punching etc with no preference for his target) will escalate throughout the day……………

So basically I’m playing a waiting game.  Waiting to see how things go.  Waiting to see if they’ll be able to cope with him.  Waiting to see if I can go to work once I’m qualified or will I need to spend time at the school.  Waiting, waiting, waiting……..

Thanks for letting me get this off my chest – I feel a teensy weensy bit better now 🙂

 

The English Language

I’m going to start by saying I know it’s a terrible language to grasp what with all the different spellings for the same word………..there, their, they’re, I know, it’s hard *sigh*

BUT

Use a damn dictionary!!!

If you are not sure, look it up!  They even show you how to pronounce a word properly, which helps people know what the hell you’re talking about!

Use a thesaurus to say the same thing twice without using the same word if you want to!

Get creative………….but not.too.creative…………..unless it’s funny

For example, ‘this one time, at band camp’………..sorry, only kidding 🙂

For example: the word Aspergers.  I have heard this word said in so many different ways.  The word is Aspergers people.  Not Asbergers or Asberjers or Asperjers!?!  It’s Aspergers spelt and As-per-gers pronounced!  Look it up people – you’ll see I’m right 🙂

Now – in saying this, I am not trying to piss people off (unless they choose to take it that way which I am by no means responsible for – because that is not my intention BUT we all have freedom of choice, so you choose which way you want to take it!).  I am merely educating society on this injustice and correcting the problem.  I know so many of us don’t like to ‘label’ people (especially children – even though it gets them the help they need and I’d be the first to throw a party if it gets taken away later), but if we are going to participate in a society that loves putting people in ‘little boxes’ (I can feel a song coming on), we need to pronounce and/or spell those labels correctly!

OK, I’m jumping down off my soapbox now and making room for someone else to have their say……… 🙂