(originally written & published on February 9, 2014)
Sometimes progress isn’t measured from one week to the next. And sometimes it’s not even noticed or appreciated for years.
I find myself noticing progress and how far the king has come when I see a toy or an item from Kyle’s old days.
That’s what happened here…
A few weeks ago Kyle was playing in his playroom and wifey opened the closet in there to get something.
The king’s eyes
lit up when he saw a bunch of his old toys in there.
Wifey purposefully takes toys in & out of rotation so when he gets satiated with one there’s an oldie but goody ready to take its place.
So anyway she opened the closet and he noticed right away and his eyes lit up.
Even that is progress from years back. This might sound weird but years back he’d be obliviousness to even noticing the closet being open or noticing his fav toys in it.
So the fact that he took an interest and parked his butt right outside the open closet door and started grabbing toys is a bit of progress.
He noticed this one toy that he used to love.
He never ever played with it appropriately. He would just turn it on & off and touch all the buttons…for hours…
🙂
Anyway he gravitated towards it, but alas it was broken…probably from one to many throws across the room by his majesty over the years.
I changed the batteries and yep it was definitely broken.
But Kyle kept handing it to me & wifey as if to say “turn it on, dude. make it work!”
(which is something he never would have done years ago)
So wifey asked if I could find it online. I searched amazon and they don’t make it anymore but I found it used on eBay.
And for $20 including shipping it was at my house 4 days later.
I know what some of you are thinking. “$20 for a used toy that probably cost $20 when it was new 8 years ago?! Are you crazy…or rich?!”
And the answer is… No. I’m usually a cheapskate. And it hurt me to spend $20 on a used toy, but wifey’s always saying “family give him money for Christmas and his birthday cuz they don’t know what to get him…this toy is exactly what that money is for!”
And I hate it when she’s right…(which is more often than I like to admit)…but in this case she was right…
So 4 days later this toy arrives. I add new batteries and it works and the king was thrilled.
But as with many things with Kyle he gets overly obsessed with it…so we have to take it away…
And like the old days id take it away and put it up high on top of our “hutch”
But in the old days he wouldn’t notice where I “hid” things. It was literally out of sight, out of mind back in the old days.
But now he noted where I put it.
And now when he wants it. He’ll take our hand and bring us to the hutch to get it for him.
Or he’ll try to get it himself.
And he’s getting so tall that a few more inches and he can jump and reach it himself!
Progress & growth!
That’s about it folks. He still doesn’t play with it appropriately at all. He still throws it across the room. (I should’ve bought 2!). But he knows what he wants. He knows where we hide it. And he knows how to ask for it.
Progress & growth!
The only new problem that we didn’t have to worry about years ago?
Look at what this toy does…
Hope all those fast blinking & flashing lights don’t induce seizures in epilepsy boy. We didn’t have to worry about that years back.
Oh well. I guess like with most things related to autism one could say that the seizure worry is a case of 3 steps forward & 2 steps back…but by my calculations that means that he’s still 1 step ahead!
3-2=1
Progress & growth!
The end
———————————-
amzn_assoc_ad_type = “search_box”; amzn_assoc_tracking_id = “a050ef-20”; amzn_assoc_marketplace = “amazon”; amzn_assoc_region = “US”; amzn_assoc_width = “120”; amzn_assoc_height = “90”;
If you’re gonna shop Amazon anyway, can I ask that you enter Amazon by using the link above? This way I can make a little money. This blogging thing has been awesome & life changing for me… but I must admit that it’s taking up a lot more time than I ever thought… so if I can make a few bucks it’ll make it easier for me to justify….Love you all! Thanks!!
052014
080814
091914
View Comments
I belong to quite a few FB buy and sell groups that are catered to baby and childrens items only. It might be worth looking to see if your area has these type groups. Basically somebody posts an ISO (In Search Of) OFFER or item FOR SALE with a brief description of what they are looking for, selling or giving away for free with their location. Then people comment on the post saying they are interested. Pick up details with addresses etc are done VIA PM. You may be able to find many items such as the one you just purchased from Ebay quite a bit cheaper and you'll be able to pick it up faster. Its also a great way to sell or pass on items that are no longer needed to another family that may be looking. Just a thought...
I have a typical son and a severe ASD son. Our victories are so different for both. We use to hide things up high, he figured out you get a chair. Not cool he is climbing on the counter tops but the mom in me is proud he figured it out. My son does not play with toys. December I took him to toy isle to look at the toddler toys. He usually pushes a button here and there but he actually took interest in a leap frog toy similar to that one. So I bought it! Thanks for always sharing your stories. Most people would not be as open as you are.
My Autistic 4 year old loves his Rock & Roll Elmo. He wants us to squeeze the hand so he can hear it sing. He will keep that up for hours so like you, we hide it! Your post is so true, small progress.. I hid it in a cabinet in the laundry room once and I went to that cabinet to get something else, he was beside me and he saw it. He started jumping up and down to play with it so i was "forced" to let him play with it for a little while. I hid it somewhere else later and he grabbed my hand and walked me to the cabinet, when I opened it to show him it wasn't there he wouldn't leave and kept reaching for the cabinet.
Your post reminded me of that
I was in high school before I no longer played with toys. Smart, but immature's how I was as a kid. At 24, I'm teenish in some ways, but grown-up in others.
Our 10 year old loves that same toy! We have been lucky to find "replacements" at local thrift stores, where we can usually find "matches" for all his beloved toddler toys. At one point he had an all-time high of nine singing "doggies", some purchased for as low as $0.84! Gotta love Value World in these parts. As these toys go, this one is at least interesting enough to me. Each letter plays a song that begins with that letter! Some classic oldies, too! My challenge is to get my boy to try letters other than "M" and to let the song play for more than a nanosecond before he pushes it again....and again....and again....and again. But it is all still music to my ears. Thanks for the post!
Our kids love what they love. My son had a leap frog version of that same toy. He would obsess over it , press the same buttons over and over. laugh at the noises it made and of course throw it. It would eventually end up in a closet or on top of our china cabinet. We would also rotate his toys, so what is old becomes new again. So I can relate to the struggle that we face with making our kids happy, even if it drives us crazy. My son is 17 and still loves elmo. His was lost in a house fire. He talked about his melted elmo and everytime he saw one he appeared sad in his own way. Thanks to amazon we were able to replace his beloved elmo, much to the rest of my family's shagrin. Oh well our kids love what they love no matter how old they are and sometimes we have to replace out of date toys.
awesome
Same here AD....my son notices..grabs my hand and pulls me to toys etc I hide from him..I even hide chips and other food but he finds and looks for those by himself.....does 'kyle' ever get together with as kid just like him and if so what happens?
I drive my friends an family nuts sometimes when I get stuck on a stimmy toy back in the day had a taking calculator the school had to keep sound off cuse I stimming of a number sn driving them crazy an I think did stuff like that with my key board they had in the 80 I laughing it was funny
You could have been writing about my daughter on so many points in this :) Yes we have bought used toddler toys to replace the thrown old favorite ones no longer sold in stores, yes we have that same toy you wrote about and it is slowly not working today she brought it to me to make it work, and just this week she dragged a chair over to climb up on to get something I had "hidden" up high first time she has noticed and tried to get something like that. Nice to not feel alone in these accomplishments and growth of our sweethearts. Thanks for the post.