Our Autism Story Part I

I’ve been meaning to write our story for a very long time but just haven’t gotten around to it.  So, finally, I give you part one of Silas’ story.  My purpose is to write down all of him symptoms from day one, hopefully to help you with your own child.  Silas didn’t have the symptoms we all hear about like no eye contact and no snuggling.  He didn’t regress at 18 months, he didn’t have major sleep issues.  It’s a totally different story and it needs to be heard.

Silas’ entry in to this world wasn’t easy.  He had an incredibly traumatic birth experience that ended with him being ripped from my loins with forceps.  He cried the whole night through.

The word “autism” first came to my head at a very very early time.  I remember my sister Jill chasing his eyes with her face when he was only a few days old.  “SILAS!! Make eye contact with me” she said.  I was already a bit worried.

Silas was seemingly a normal baby.  A few things were funny though, like the moment he could focus on things that were farther away than two feet he’d stare at fans.  All fans and any fans…stare stare stare.  He was also really hard to get calm and to get asleep.  He liked to be swaddled REEEAAALLLLYYYY tightly and liked rough rough rough pats and rocks to get to sleep.  I think people thought we were abusing the poor fellow.

The biggest thing to help Silas calm down was singing.  I sang to that boy all….day…..LONG.

His smile came at the right time but it was soooooo hard to get him to smile.  We’d chase his eyes around with our faces.  Finally he’d focus on us and a little smile would appear.  It was no easy task.  Laughing was even more a strange event.  It would come out as forced air.  His whole body would tighten and it was mostly a cough more than a laugh.  Gosh, looking back it was all so obvious.

Silas’ first motor skill came right on time.  He sat in his exersaucer and spun this barrel thing that was full of beads.  he’d spin it and spin it and spin it and spit in.  Over and over and over, round and round and round it would go.  I’d laugh and jokingly say “that’s my little autistic boy”.  Silly me.

Silas thrived on snuggles and he still does.  We’d snuggle and snuggle and snuggle and snuggle.  He just loved it with all his heart and so did I!

Before Silas was even crawling he began to look at books.  He’d roll around the house to get where he wanted to go and he would end up at is basket of books and proceed to lay there for HOURS and look at books.  He knew how to hold them right side up and turn all the pages properly.  He didn’t just lay there for a bit and get distracted, he was consumed with it.  It was all he wanted to do, aside from rolling around, spinning things and snuggling.  This was Silas before he was mobile.  More to come.