Jack

It has taken me a while to write this post. Jack is very dear to my heart but finding words to describe him can be difficult. He is just so different from the rest of this mundane world that it isn't fair to use our standards to measure him. He has very profound autism without having his intelligence affected negatively (in fact we suspect he is smarter than average but it can't be measured in any standard way). In our case he never regressed, he has been 'weird' since birth and that is the way we like him. I will never forget the time I picked him up turned toward me and he leaned in for a hug willingly and patted my back – I cried. That was almost a year after we started seeking help. He received a diagnosis of autism at the age of 2 yrs old and at the time he was mute. This is a collage I made of him when he was three.

He has made incredible progress since then and never ceases to amaze me. Socially he has progressed from the equivalent of 0 to 3 months at diagnosis to about 2 years. That is just measuring his social interactions of course; the rest is literally beyond measuring!

This summer he worked with my mom in a one on one summer school type of program. They had a blast together and she taught Jack how to draw (he hates holding anything in his hands with enough pressure to write or draw so those things have been major stumbling blocks for him).
As wonderful as that is it reminds me of the time his occupational therapist taught him how to take off his shoes. She warned me that I was going to hate it but that someone his age should be able to remove their shoes. His shoes haven't stayed on his feet since. Now that Jack can draw he has been attacking the walls with a vengeance, after all he has years of catching up to do!

Also, the picture of Elmo and Big Bird hanging out in the Shower caddy is Jack's handywork. We think of them as random Jack-a-stacks, turn the corner and you are likely to find something arranged in an intriguing way!