A Heartfelt, Sincere Thank You

WOW! Seriously, wow. We are so truly amazed, comforted, encouraged and blessed to have received the responses from everyone that we got. Literally moments after sending out the email that shared Zachary's story with everyone we received many sincere and uplifting messages and phone calls that really confirmed for us that we did the right thing by telling everyone. Believe me, it was a hard decision to make. But we feel that it was the right one. It was sort of a second grieving, and a much needed final step towards acceptance. You all amazed us with your responses. Seriously. We expected to receive simple "sorry to hear about Zach, let us know if we can do anything" type responses, but what we got was so, so much more. Poems, true shared first hand experiences of Autistic children that have made an amazing life for themselves, encouragement, and wonderful compliments regarding our parenting and individual strengths that brought many tears of warmth. We feel very loved to have all of you on our side now through this.

One of our biggest struggles right now is getting Zachary potty trained. If you've ever potty trained a child, you know what a challenge it can be. Add to that struggle a child that isn't fully able to communicate and doesn't completely understand what is expected of him with this potty stuff and you have a day in our life right now. So many of your were gracious enough to offer to help if there was anything you could ever do... so now is your chance! Come on over and potty train our boy :-) You're welcome anytime! HA! But seriously, he is getting there. Slowly but surely. We began with the naked from the waist down while at home step. He did great! After about a week or two of that he was completely trained and would initiate going to the potty on his own. So it was time for step two - big boy underwear, or rather his favorite "scooby dooby underwear". This has been a challenge. I think he has grown so tired of hearing "do you need to go pee pee in the potty" and "remember, we only go pee pee in the potty, not in your big boy underwear" that he now gives a resounding "NO" every time he's asked. But he has to be asked often or there are accidents - and those are lots of fun! So we'll see. Unfortunately there is a timer running, as he has to be trained to go to the "typical" preschool class he's enrolled for which starts in 2 1/2 weeks. YIKES!

On the school note, he actually begins his Special Education class next week. I know that he will be so excited to go back, as he will have the same teachers that he had this past year. He just loves school and his been asking about it all summer long. We can really see a difference in him on days that he had school/therapy vs. days that are lighter. It's like he really thrives in a busy, but fun and challenging atmosphere. The more demands that are put on him by therapists and teachers, the better he does. So for that reason, the insanely busy days that will come soon with the addition of the two school classes are so very worth it.

Okay, that's the update for now. I am going to try and update this at least weekly. Thank you to those of you with an interest in reading this and following along with us!