With each day at The BWF Sam is improving. I am literally beaming with pride for him every session. On November 15th Sam imitated by patting the table, he matched with nesting bowls, he put blocks in a bucket and not only that he went home that afternoon and helped me put-away his toys. He learned this skill after one session. I began to understand that phrase that many parents of typically developing children use: "It's crazy how fast he is learning, he's like a sponge!"...this phrase use to almost hurt me inside, it's hard to describe unless you have experienced it yourself. For me it was very much a feeling coupled with guilt because I had failed to teach my child, because I had failed to find the best way to help him learn. It was NEVER a feeling towards Sam of "why can't you be like this child" NEVER. So finding Sam's window of learning has been amazing it makes me feel like I am doing my job as his Mother. If you are a parent with a child that has developmental delays or that has autism then you truly understand how important this day was for us as parents.
Each day to follow Sam has improved. He is following one-step commands such as "give me five" and "throw this away". The day after Thanksgiving I sat down with my son and we had our very first Mommy & Sam ABA session. It was such a moment of empowerment for me to have the knowledge, thanks to the BWF parent-training program, to teach my precious child. I was at my Dad's for Thanksgiving weekend and Sam's Gigi helped with one of his programs. They were working in the kitchen and watching, rest assured watching proudly, as Sam worked through the steps of his program. We got to the program to work on Sam's "Imitation" skill, which he has struggled with and I asked him to "do this" and I patted the table and he looked at me and he imitated for them all to see. Everyone clapped and yelled for him and I continued, as I have, to beam with pride.
For myself and my husband Sam's progress is like Christmas & Thanksgiving all wrapped into one. Would "proud" even be an appropriate word for how we feel about Sam's progress? As many words as I always seem to have to express my feelings...this has made me feel speechless at times...and left me in a constant state of Thanksgiving. A state of Thanksgiving to God, to my child for showing me Holland and a family that sees past the Autism and always sees our Sam.
My letter to MCFS
For myself and my husband Sam's progress is like Christmas & Thanksgiving all wrapped into one. Would "proud" even be an appropriate word for how we feel about Sam's progress? As many words as I always seem to have to express my feelings...this has made me feel speechless at times...and left me in a constant state of Thanksgiving. A state of Thanksgiving to God, to my child for showing me Holland and a family that sees past the Autism and always sees our Sam.
My letter to MCFS
October 11, 2010
Dear Masonic Children & Family Services;
My name is Tiffany Carter, I am Sam’s Mom. I know that a personal letter isn’t part of this process, but I wanted all of you to get to know Sam and our family and to know what you helping us would mean to us all, but mostly our precious little boy Sam.
The best day of our lives began the moment we knew we were having our little baby, that God had given us the gift of a precious little soul. Sam was born on 3-4-2008, completely perfect, and we felt like the luckiest 2 people on the planet. As we watched Sam grow we learned so much about our child. As a baby we learned that he was hot- natured, a heavy sleeper, a constant smiler and irresistibly cute. As Sam grew into a toddler and began walking at 15 months, we noticed that he loved Sesame St. , peanut butter sandwiches, to hear us sing, being tickled, giving the best hugs and kisses and everything to do with being outside. We also began to notice that he did not seem to know his name, didn’t show any interest in other children, never pretend played or brought things to show us and often seemed to be in his own world. While this was happening we couldn’t help but see that while other children Sam’s age were talking, Sam was barely babbling.
On November 12, 2009 all of our lives changed. Sam was diagnosed with Autism, specifically PDD-NOS (pervasive developmental disorder-Not otherwise specified). Our Sam was only 20-months old at the time and initially we were shocked. Sam was so little for such a big diagnosis. I asked God,“why Sam?”,“why does his life have to be harder when this world is already hard enough?” I questioned myself as a Mother and wondered if I had done something to cause Sam’s autism. We were devastated. I ask you to please understand though that we have never for a moment looked at our little boy’s face and felt any less than lucky and blessed to have him. We know that God gave Sam to us because he knew we were the right parents for him and that Sam was the right child for us.
Over the past 11 months we have experienced grief, denial, anger and finally acceptance. Acceptance that Sam has autism but never acceptance that the autism will define Sam and never accepting that he cannot be helped. We know that God has given us the great honor of raising such a special little boy and that we must find a way to give him the help that he deserves. During these past 11 months we have been fighting for our child. Searching for the right therapies, reading everything we can on how best to teach him, calling everyone we can for information. And also feeling helpless and heartbroken when all the best care and therapy that our child needs seems to be just out of our reach.On October 6, 2010 we brought Sam in for an assessment with the Brent Woodall Foundation for Exceptional children. Over a 3-hour period, while using Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA) methods the therapists were able to guide Sam from a tantrum and trying to bite them to getting him to point, give them high-fives, nest bowls and put shapes in a bucket. We have had Sam in speech and occupational therapy using sensory integration methods for 11 months and have not seen the progress that we did that day. I cannot describe the wonderful feeling that we had. Perhaps hope, relief even, that we had found Sam’s window, that we had found a place that knew how to help our Sam.
At the end of the assessment however came the feeling of helplessness...and for me the feeling that I was letting down my child, that I was not doing the job God had tasked me with. That I was not helping him all because we could not afford it. That my child wasn’t getting the help he deserved because we as parents had fallen short in offering the right financial support for our son.
Sam deserves and needs this therapy and we pray that we have found a way to help him and that God will show us the work we must do to make that possible for our child. We wholeheartedly thank you for considering Sam and for taking the time to read this letter.
Sincerely The Carter Family
Jonathan,Tiffany & Sam
