Stephen is ten

Today, Stephen is ten years old.

We have "officially" known about his autism for just under 8 years now. I've mentioned here before that in some ways, he's doing better than I expected he would: sight-reading, doing pretend play (which is supposed to be "impossible" for kids with autism), and he's quite social and playful most of the time. In other ways, though, the chronic sorrow deepens as the years go by - his total lack of comprehension of using the potty; his inexplicable (but rare) outbursts; his inability to understand most abstract concepts...

We had his birthday party yesterday, and as soon as he saw that I had hung up a sign with his picture on it that said, "Happy Birthday Stephen!" he looked at me and said, "Open?" This concept he DID understand. :-) He has no understanding of age or the passage of this decade of his life, but he had a good time opening his dozen or so new DVDs, surrounded by a loving extended family, and last night while I was grocery shopping, he and his dad put together the Lego Buzz Lightyear figure that David found. This is a new and exciting bit of territory that we hope to explore. David said that Stephen was very interested in the process, and that he consistently matched up pieces to the diagrams in the instruction book, but his lack of fine motor skills made it hard to snap tiny Legos together. Still - it's an encouraging sign and a possible new area of interest, which is always good.

In the life in general category, we've had a pretty good stretch over the last few months, which is probably evidenced by the lack of new blog entries. I do always try to mark the anniversary of Stephen's birth though - it's a good time to reflect.

Stephen has instinctively been calmer since we moved into our house in August - of course, going back to school always helps, but in general he's been happier in our new digs. It's well-documented (don't ask me for sources, I just KNOW) that peaceful, calm surroundings have a positive psychological effect. Stephen can vouch for that, as can the rest of us.

Having recently watched the excellent HBO movie "Temple Grandin," David and I have been talking about how Stephen seems to have something more going on than just autism. Yes, he displays many classic "signs" of autism, but he lacks some significant ones: he seems to have few if any real sensory issues - he loves human contact for the most part. He also started pretending a few years ago, which is very unusual in the hyper-logical mind of many autistics. We know that he has mental retardation - and it hasn't gotten any easier for me to type that. He's ten and is still very enamoured with preschool themes. My dad said something yesterday about how Stephen might be very intelligent but can't communicate it...I had to gently disagree. No super-intelligent child, however limited in communication skills, still adores Blue's Clues, Dora, et al. It's just something we accept as part of who Stephen is.

One thing that I've learned from watching the Temple Grandin movie, and from David's sharing of some things he's been reading in TG's book Thinking in Pictures, is that Stephen's echolalia is his way of double-checking on something he's heard. I find that quite a revelation in and of itself. Also, in the movie, Temple zeroed in on a bit of dialogue from a TV show ("The Man from U.N.C.L.E.") and repeated it over and over, laughing uproariously. The words weren't funny, per se: "Would you like for me to open the gate?" delivered in a lilting tone. But Temple found them very funny. Stephen does that kind of thing ALL the time. It's one of the more charming aspects of his autism, those belly-laughs that don't really make sense, but hey - when is laughter bad?

So, happy tenth birthday to my little man. He showed up in our lives in a moment of surprise and in a hurry - and he keeps us on our toes to this day. He is a precious piece of humanity, given into our hands for safekeeping, and he depends on us utterly. It is a large burden to carry, but we are determined to keep him safe and happy and growing in his own way.