Sensory – Page 5 – The Autism Dad

A quick little update

The kids start back to school in the morning and we had a quiet last day of Christmas break. There wasn't a great deal of anything going on today and I'm totally okay with that. As the kids settle back into their school routine or as close to a routine as possible, I'll get back into my work schedule. Interviews start on the 14th and I need to get some things done before I launch season 4. I'm excited to get started though. Anyway, I wanted to share a couple of things from today. Neither are huge deals but it will round out this little update and close things out on a positive note. I didn't sleep well last night so I was up really early this morning. When I…

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January 4, 2021

My thoughts

The ups and downs of 2020

We're going to have a quiet evening tonight as we ring in the new year. We have no plans for anything other than maybe watching some movies and spending time together. I ordered dinner for us and it should be dropped off shortly. It's one of those days that I'm really struggling to keep my head above water. I'm frustrated. I'm overwhelmed. I'm spent. I feel like this is quite possibly the loneliest I've ever been in my life. I've mentioned before that I'm a sentimental person and this is one of those times where I feel the loss of my marriage. It's just one of those things and I struggle a bit on these days. As time passes these moments won't be so impactful and I'll make new memories.…

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January 1, 2021

How I’m choosing to handle parenting during and after my divorce

If you're new to this blog, you should know that I use this a sort of a personal journal. Many times, I'm writing about things that I'm experiencing in real time and you go through that process with me. This is one of those times. I woke up this morning and I'm finding myself very easily annoyed. Gavin is definitely pushing my buttons, whether he means to or not. For the record, I don't think he does. His brothers aren't too far behind either. I've been on edge and irritated today and I wasn't sure why until I started writing about this. I remember why and since the kids are already aware, I feel comfortable talking about it. This week, I meet with Lizze and my attorney. We will be…

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December 28, 2020

My thoughts

Can you guess why it’s so hard for me to sleep?

I've been talking about how tough it's been to sleep at night when Emmett is dealing with separation anxiety. The last few days he's been doing really well in regards to sleeping in his own bed. Last night was a bit of a struggle. He ultimately made it into his own bed but he had to fall asleep in my room first. If you ask him why he needs to sleep in my room, he'll say something along the lines of he feels more comfortable. Sometimes it's because he has a string of nightmares that really upset him. Yet on other occasions, he's said that he's afraid that if he's not glued to me at night, he's going to wake up in the morning and I'll have left in the…

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December 27, 2020

My thoughts

Avoiding conflict by encouraging my kids to communicate with each other

I spent a large part of today breaking up fights between the kids. They seem to be at each other's throats. I was just recording a speech for an upcoming summit yesterday and I mentioned something about this. I was pointing out that not everything I'm dealing with in my house is related to autism, at least not directly. There's a large portion of the daily challenge that's autism related but there's other portions that are simply typical kid behavior. The boys fighting is something that brothers do. That's pretty normal for brothers to fight and I totally get that having 3 brothers of my own. Autism tends to make things a bit more intense because of triggers and a difficulty reading body language. This is especially true when it…

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December 16, 2020

My thoughts

Just one of the unique challenges that #specialneeds parents face

Gavin had a little mini emergency tonight. He had us worried for a little while but seems to be fine now. In the middle of dinner, he got a really bad migraine, I gave him Motrin and told him to go lay down. It's really hard to tell what's going on with him because he is unable to answer any questions that could help me know how to better help him. I asked him if light or sound makes his pain worse and couldn't answer that. I asked him to be more specific about where the pain is and he couldn't really do that either. This was taken pre-covid Lizze was brought in via phone to help because she lives with migraines on the daily and she might have more…

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December 14, 2020

My thoughts

I totally got this

I want to recognize that I accomplished one of my goals for 2020. I set out to record 40 episodes for season 3 of my podcast and improve upon season 2. Today I dropped episode 40 and I'm done until next year. It feels so good to have accomplished this, especially considering l the obstacles. I've already got interviews booked for January and that's awesome. It took a little longer to get this last one out cause it's been a rough weekend but I was only about 48 hours late. ☺ The kids have been on edge today. We're getting closer to Christmas and the anxiety is building, as is the anticipation. This is historically a challenging time in our house, even when everything else is going well. Everyone's sleep…

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December 14, 2020

My thoughts

My kids are learning to cook

Okay. I'm really trying to get back into writing more about our daily lives. There's a ton of things I don't talk about because I just lack the energy to put those experiences into words. I'm seeking to change that and as season 3 of the podcast comes to a close, I have more time to write. The podcast is so time consuming but I'm finishing up episode 40 for release today or tomorrow and I'm done for the year. With that said, here's some cool shit I want to share with you folks. ☺ It's no secret that the pandemic has been a nightmare for all of us this year. We now have a vaccine but it won't be widely available for many months. That's still a hugely positive…

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December 12, 2020