Dietary Concerns

This past week we had some “fun” with behavioral issues. Saturday evening we went to the grocery store, and of course took Aidan with us (normally Jeremy goes after work so that Aidan isn't with us – it cuts down on cost some and allows us to more closely examine labels because there isn't a 7 year old needing our immediate attention). He wanted some cheese puffs so without really considering whether they might adversely affect his behavior, we said sure, it would be a nice treat since he really was acting great at the store and had been great at dinner. The next couple of days were a wonderful mess of aggression, hyperactivity, attitude, and inattention. We removed the cheese puffs from the equation and last night and today Aidan has been great. We've seen this kind of thing happen before. In Rockford, on our trip to visit family, Aidan had ice cream twice in one day. It could have been the sugar, but much more likely was the milk since he has sugar in other things without adverse affects. Aidan was impossible for the next 24 hours. At school last year we didn't realize they were letting him have strawberry milk at lunch and for two weeks he was having major behavioral issues at school. Ms. Annie found out and we removed the milk and again, withing approximately 24 hours, his behavior was much more normal for Aidan. Similar situations have happened with both milk as well as artificial sweeteners. How many other issues that we didn't attribute to anything in particular have been caused by similar sources or by artificial colors or flavors or who knows what else?

Milk also causes tummy issues for Aidan – a couple of years ago we took him to the ER for what we thought was appendicitis and turned out to be an impacted bowel. We soon switched him to soy milk and started giving him Activia yogurt (I know, it's dairy and I think we'll look for a pro-biotic soy yogurt) to help with the tummy. I don't know if the milk directly causes the behavioral issues, or if it's actually the discomfort it causes in his tummy that maybe he can't communicate to us, but it seems like a pretty easy solution to remove it.

Should we try just a casein, artificial free diet? Should we do gluten free too? What does the research say? What other diet options are there – Feingold, Paleo?

We know dairy affects Aidan's tummy and his behavior – that's number one to remove. That means all casein/lactose products.

Casein has a wide variety of uses, from being a major component of cheese, to use as a food additive, to a binder for safety matches, paint, glue, plastics and fiber, medical and dental. (wikipedia)

Bad Ingredients:

• milk solids ("curds")
• whey
• casein (sodium caseinate, most commonly)
• lactose (sodium lactylate, frequently)
• lactalbumin and other names that begin with lact
• galactose (a lactose by-product) Most people with milk allergies will have no trouble with galactose, but you should be aware that it may cause problems in some people.
• protein (often "high protein" or "protein enriched" version of another ingredient, such as wheat) The added protein in foods (particularly "high energy" foods) is often milk protein.
• caramel coloring. Many kinds of caramel coloring use lactose, a milk sugar, to help get that rich color. When in doubt, do without.
• Recaldent. This ingredient, found in some Trident brand chewing gums, is milk-derived.
• Fruit flavored Tums contain undisclosed dairy. The original, white Tums are fine.
• "natural ingredients". Some of these may contain dairy products or byproducts. Call the manufacturer (an 800 number is usually listed on the packaging) for further information.
• and the obvious:
• milk,
• butter,
• cheese,
• yogurt...
• canned tunafish. Many brands contain "hydrolized caseinate". However, the low sodium ones in spring water (such as Star Kist), and all of Trader Joe brand tunafish, appear to be milk free.
• chicken broth: Any form, including canned and bouillion. Many brands contain milk solids.
• sour mix, such as what is used to make margaritas, or other artifically "sour" items such as some candies.
• Coconut milk powder (dried; not to be confused with canned coconut milk in liquid form). Every brand I've found to date contains casein, milk or cream.

Gluten (from Latin gluten "glue") is a protein composite found in foods processed from wheat and related species, including barley and rye. 

It is used as a food additive in the form of a flavoring, stabilizing or thickening agent, often as "dextrin". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gluten-free_diet Several grains and starch sources are considered acceptable for a gluten-free diet. The most frequently used are corn, potatoes, rice, and tapioca (derived from cassava). Gluten is also used in foods in some unexpected ways, for example as a stabilizing agent or thickener in products like ice-cream and ketchup. The standard gluten-free diet does not meet the recommended intake for fiber, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, folate, iron, or calcium

http://www.urmc.rochester.edu/news/story/index.cfm?id=2860 The GF-CF (gluten free, casein free) Diet is a popular autism diet not shown to demonstrate behavioral improvement. (wikipedia)

The Feingold diet is a food elimination program developed by Ben F. Feingold, MD to treat hyperactivity. It eliminates a number of artificial colors and artificial flavors, aspartame, three petroleum-based preservatives, and (at least initially) certain salicylates. 

• synthetic colors (FD&C and D&C colors) (made with petroleum)
• synthetic flavors (several thousand different chemicals)
• synthetic preservatives (BHA, BHT, and TBHQ)
• artificial sweeteners (Aspartame, Neotame, and Alitame)
  

During the initial weeks of the program, certain foods containing salicylates are removed and may later be reintroduced and tested for tolerance, one at a time. Most of the problematic salicylate-rich foods are common temperate-zone fruits, as well as a few vegetables, spices, and one tree nut. During this early period, foods like pears, cashews and bananas are used instead of foods like apples, almonds and grapes. (wikipedia)

Do I need to really be aware of all of these? How much casein/milk product or relative is too much? Obviously Aidan isn't ALLERGIC to milk or any of the things listed. He doesn't get hives or have difficulty breathing or any major symptoms. But if it affects his behavior it still seems like a good idea to remove it from his diet if it can help him to function better at home and school.

Things Aidan loves that would have to be removed or altered with the casein free diet and the removal of artificial colors and whatnot:

• Pizza,
• ketchup
• ranch dressing
• yogurt
• pop tarts
• certain cereals
• macaroni and cheese/shells and cheese

If we did gluten free it would become even more complicated so I think that would be a last resort. In fact, mom pointed out that some studies show that a gluten free diet could be harmful to someone without celiac disease or a wheat allergy.

Summer Vacation Trip

We went to Rockford this past week and Aidan had a blast! He got to:

• Ride a trolley
• Blow the trolley whistle and ring its bell
• Climb on and around trains at the Illinois Railway Museum
• Visit his Great Grandparents
• Drive Great Grandma's scooter
• Ride an airplane
• FLY an airplane
• Ride on a boat
• Jump off a boat and swim in the middle of the lake
• Drive a boat
• Ride a four wheeler
• Ride in a canoe
• Paddle a canoe
• Light fireworks
• Roast marshmallows

Wow! What a week! It was a wonderful visit with Poppa, Grandma Holly, Auntie Arian, Auntie Mimi, Uncle Chris, and his many cousins (Autumn, Cody, Dani & Addy). He was super great for the 11 hour ride up and the 11 hour ride back, plus all the in between trips here and there.

We did have a couple of close calls as far as his autism. At the train museum he got super hungry and overstimulated and tired, and almost had a meltdown before we were able to get him food. Also, he had ice cream twice in one day and the dairy affected his behavior quite a bit – have to plan better next time! The only other really close call was the last day, visiting Great Grandma and Great Grandpa at their apartment. Aidan was at the end of his rope, tired and overstimulated and homesick. He started pushing and pulling and spinning Poppa's chair and after many times of being asked to stop, I asked him to come with me to the hall so we could talk. Aidan ran away and went in Great Grandpa's office where he proceeded to have a mini-meltdown (aggressive, stiff, arching his back, growling, nonverbal). We got him calmed down, gave hugs and left. Otherwise, it was an all in all awesome trip! Hopefully we can do it again soon. I know Aidan had a blast!

Bullying Act 2

I'm so sick of bullies. So very, very sick of bullies. And having been bullied, I have this irrational fear that if I go talk to the parents of the bullies, then I'll have to deal with bullies of my own. That's a whole other problem though. Anyways, it looks like we have a street gang: 4 boys, ages 10-12, on bikes who roam the neighborhood as “police” (according to the girls who blew the whistle on them earlier today) bullying other kids.

Earlier today, Aidan had gone outside to play. I guess the boys down the street ran across him and started playing with him. He plays with one of the boys, Brant, fairly frequently and Brant seems pretty nice. He's ten. About 20 minutes after he'd gone outside to play (he'd been playing on his scooter out front and then came in about 10 minutes before to ask if he could knock on the neighbor's door to see if they could play) the dogs started barking so I went to go see what was going on. A little girl probably 10 years old was coming up to the door so I opened it and she told me that Aidan was being picked on next door (between the house next door and the next house down). Jeremy was just getting home so he parked his car and came down there with me. Of course as soon as we walked up, before we could see what was going on, they boys stopped everything. I asked them what was going on and at first they all started talking. Then, Brant stopped them and said that it was just him and that he had been play fighting with Aidan. It seemed apparent from the other boys' faces that he wasn't the only one and that some information was being left out, but we just fussed at all of them and asked them whether they enjoyed picking on younger kids and what would their parents say. The other boys were kind of smirking, but Brant looked like he was about to cry.



At that point we were working on dinner and so we came inside and worked on it some more, but Jeremy saw the girls riding around again while he was working out in the garage so I joined him when I noticed him talking to them. They told us that two of the boys are brothers to the girl who beat Aidan up last time, one of which I think might have been taking pics that day. Interesting. They said that Brant's older brother beats him up and when Aidan was getting picked on, that Brant was actually trying to stop them from hurting him and they were pushing him down. I have the feeling that the reason Brant said he was to blame was because he was afraid he would be bullied later if he didn't lie about it. The girls also seemed worried that the boys might bully them because they told on them (which was very much the right thing to do!) Aidan said that one of the boys had him up in the air and was about to body slam him (the girl who alerted me to the bullying said this too).



I'm so frustrated. I think Aidan has a hard time understanding the difference between activities that are just playing and activities that are bullying or are leading to bullying. The only time he knows for sure is when he's already been hurt. The girls said these kids are home alone in the afternoons (at least Brant and his brother are for sure) so it makes it a challenge to talk to their parents. I'm really super tired of this happening. Where do kids learn this crap and why do they think it's okay?

A Second Job?

We all know that Aidan wants to be a storm chaser when he grows up. This has been his dream job for the last 2 years at least. He keeps up with the weather, and wants to go out driving every time he hears thunder. I'm cool with this - it's dangerous but a good goal to have and he gets to have lots of education and interesting experiences and a chance to make a difference. He hasn't changed his mind since the tornado outbreak on April 27th - if anything he wants to even more.

The other day though, Aidan told me he wanted to be... wait for it.... a lunch lady when he grows up. What?! Yeah he said he wants to serve food in the cafeteria at school. I told him I thought he wanted to be a storm chaser and he said, "Yeah - I'm going to have 2 jobs." Then later, "Spiderman has two jobs..."

Wow. Okay, whatever works for him I guess.

April 27th, 2011

For those of us in Alabama, April 27th was a day we will never ever forget.

I woke up to the sound of tornado sirens around 4am and didn't go back to sleep. Aidan went into school late because of tornadoes in the morning, and then was released from school early. Around 11:30am, Ms. Annie from the autism unit called me and asked if I wanted to go ahead and come get Aidan because it was hectic at school and he was very overstimulated. I told her that I would rather wait, and it's a good thing I did. Less than 5 minutes later I was camped out in the hall as an EF-1 tornado passed over us. I finally went to get Aidan around 12:15, about 20 minutes before we were once again hit with a tornado warning. When I got there, power was out at school, it was pouring rain and lightning like crazy so I shoved Aidan in the car and we headed home.  We'd already had hail once in the day and I didn't really want to be caught in it, so it was good that we got home when we did.

We spent most of the afternoon in and out of the hallway. Aidan was hyper, excited and probably a little confused by all the tornado warnings. I'm sure he could sense my anxiety over the outbreak of severe weather. The meteorologists had been warning us all week of the weather we would face on the 27th - there wasn't just the possibility of tornadoes, but it was very probable that we would have several strong, long tracking tornadoes.

Around 4pm I called Aidan's daddy and told him to come home right away. A huge tornado had just ripped through a town an hour or two to our southeast and was barreling our direction so I wanted him to make it home before the tornado hit. Tanner, a town where a friend of mine grew up, and only a few miles down the road from my college got slammed into by the large tornado. Jeremy got home and we looked at the sky outside which was the most eerie shade of pea-green before hurrying into the hall in the center of the house with blankets and pillows and puppies. As the tornado passed, we had no idea that just a mile away houses were being torn into pieces and high tension power lines (the big metal ones) were being crumpled like they were made of aluminum foil. Aidan was visibly frightened as we listened to the TV turned up loud and telling us how serious the situation was. 

We had to run errands Thursday, the day after the storms, which was gorgeous. We had to pass through affected areas in order to get to a store that had power so we could purchase the things we needed (we miraculously never lost power at our home and became a place for those without power to take hot showers and eat hot meals and do laundry and charge their electronic devices). I was stunned to see the wreckage and just how close it was to my home. Even now, I have a hard time wrapping my head around just how blessed we really are, and when I think of my friend who lost his father and step-mother, I wonder what I would have done had I lost my parents or worse Aidan? What would have happened if I had lost my life protecting Aidan from the tornado as Roger's parents lost their lives protecting their grandchildren?

I showed Aidan pictures of the wreckage after we came home from running errands, and he kept exclaiming how "cool" it was. I knew this wouldn't do so we ended up taking him to see in person just how bad things were. Although he's only seven, I felt that since he wants to be a storm chaser, he needs to understand just how serious a tornado is. We explained that these people lost EVERYTHING, and that some of them died or were hurt very badly. Aidan got very quiet and seems now to really understand. I think he still wants to be a storm chaser.

We are very blessed to have survived this ordeal and our hearts and prayers are with those who lost everything.  I encourage you to donate to the recovery efforts - here is a link to the Salvation Army's donation website where you can specify that you want your donation to go to the Limestone and Madison County communities affected by the April 27th tornado outbreak.

Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.

I'm Doing the Best I Know How - Aidan's story

I posted this on my Facebook page back a couple years ago, but I don't think I ever posted it here. Here's the story of Aidan's autism:

In August 2008, my son Aidan was diagnosed with a disability known as autism. Officially he has what is called PDD-NOS or Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, which means he has atypical autism. He hadn't even turned five years old yet. In some ways it was a relief - it was good to finally know why my beautiful, smart, smiley, talkative, almost potty trained little boy had suddenly stopped talking, potty training, and began having regular meltdowns with little or no warning or reason. I faced a lot of that horror by myself - my husband at the time was away with the military, and then we moved to Texas and he was busy otherwise. I had no idea what I had lost my baby to - they said he had good hearing so it wasn't that, but no good reason could be given for his regression. Finally, a year after leaving my husband and moving back to Alabama, Aidan's pediatrician referred him to the TRIAD clinic at Vanderbilt University, which specializes in diagnosing, researching, and assisting with helping to recover from autism. Dr. Warren spent 4 hours with Aidan, playing with him and talking to him, all part of a battery of tests that helped him finally determine what we had feared - Aidan was autistic.

When someone gives you news like that, even when you have your family there with you, it's completely overwhelming. Like getting caught in an undertow. And there is so much information they give you about what autism is and why it might have happened and how you can maybe reverse some of the symptoms. You start trying to get in touch with all these people to get help for your child, and in so many cases they don't help or can't help or won't help. I struggled with the schools and got turned down by the Social Security Administration and wondered why speech therapy and occupational therapy and behavioral therapy weren't covered by insurance. I began investigating whether I should start refusing to allow my son to be vaccinated, whether I should change his diet to one without gluten or casein or sugar or strawberries or blueberries...

And no matter how much you explain to people that your child is autistic, and what that means, they really don't seem to get it. When he has a meltdown in the middle of the floor because you told him no, people just assume you have spoiled your child and are letting him manipulate you. What they don't realize is that the reason your child is so out of control is because on top of being in an environment where every sound, every light, every touch is more than he can handle, you've just changed something on him without properly setting an expectation and his brain, the way it works (or doesn't work) can't handle it. He literally can't maintain control of his own behavior. And it isn't always easy to know what will trigger him, because even though he's five years old, he doesn't talk well enough to tell me what's going through his little head or that he's feeling completely overwhelmed.

When you choose to quit your job to stay home with your little boy because you feel that's the best way for him to continue making progress, it's a bit of a slap in the face when people look askance at your choice. I'm doing what I know is best for my son. I can't afford to pay a professional to give him speech and behavioral therapy, and once a week or an hour every other night before bedtime won't do him a bit of good. I don't know what I'm doing of course, so I have to research and learn to be a speech therapist and teach my child how to read faces and non-verbal social cues. I have no idea if changing what he eats will help him, or if it's a good idea to possibly make him vulnerable to deadly diseases in order to prevent him any further regression from a vaccination.

It's SOOO frustrating to try to help your child when even DOCTORS haven't a clue what causes autism, what triggers it, how to treat it or whether a child can ever totally recover from it. I'm trying to be brave and take it one day at a time. And I literally have people who will tell me that I am a bad mother because my child sometimes talks back or throws fits or doesn't eat the healthiest food. They don't understand that an autistic child doesn't always understand that when he echoes a phrase he's heard another child use or when he uses the tone he's heard an adult take with another adult that it is socially unacceptable. They don't get that I don't LET my child throw fits, I just can't always stop one once it's in motion. They don't see that there are days when if I want my child to eat anything, I let him eat whatever he's willing to put into his body and hope that I can balance it out with something else later in the day or week.

And yes, sometimes I need a break from Aidan. And yes, sometimes I am angry that my child is autistic. And yes, some days I question my decision to have a child (which wasn't planned, but every woman has alternatives when she finds herself pregnant). But know this and NEVER question it: I love my little boy with ALL my heart. I would not give him away. He is an amazing little boy who has worked VERY hard to recover from his disability and has made such great progress. He is so smart and wants so bad to make those around him happy. He has bad days, but he also has very good days which more and more often outnumber the bad days.

Thanks to all of you who have supported me as I raise Aidan and we defeat autism together. Especially Jeremy and my mom who have provided so much help and love that I am forever in their debt.

For more information about autism go to www.autism-society.org

I selected this post to be featured on my blog’s page at Autism Blogs.

Meltdowns 101

A lot of people outside the autism community seem to be confused or misinformed or uninformed about meltdowns in autistic children (and adults for that matter). I know that when Aidan has a meltdown, I make myself stop and say “Okay, is this a meltdown or just a tantrum?” It's usually pretty easy to tell the difference. Sometimes a meltdown will start as a tantrum but devolve into a meltdown, usually because Aidan's communication skills aren't enough and he gets frustrated, or because whatever caused the tantrum was just a trigger for a meltdown (like the straw that broke the camel's back – more about this later). A meltdown can happen for any number of reasons, and it's often difficult to tell what that reason is – I try to go back after an unexpected meltdown (it's not possible to do so DURING) and figure out what triggered it. If and when possible I'll try to defuse the situation before the meltdown happens, but this isn't always possible. Just like the bombs on television always have digital clocks on them, all autistic kids have bright, easy to see, obvious warning signs, right? Wrong. Sometimes I can see it coming, but unfortunately it's usually too late by the time I do.

What does a meltdown look like?

For Aidan, a meltdown may start with a very aggravated look on his face, widened eyes, clenched teeth, and balled up fists. He'll often growl at me or grunt, and usually at this point is beyond speaking to me, especially not to tell me what's wrong. This then progresses beyond aggression into violence – at this point if I look at his eyes, it's almost like Aidan's not in there at all, he's been taken over by this crazy little rabid animal for the time being. He begins screaming at me and then attacks me. I can try to walk away or place him in his room to do his thing by himself, but inevitably Aidan will pursue me. He will punch me, scratch or claw me, kick me, throw whatever is available at me, headbutt me, and attempt to bite me. His whole body is completely tensed up, his back frequently arched. He's chipped my teeth, broken Jeremy's glasses, damaged his own toys, thrown furniture, and always leaves claw marks and bruises all over me. It can last anywhere from 5 minutes up to an hour (we've never seen one longer than that, thank goodness, although he has had multiple meltdowns in one day). A meltdown doesn't stop as suddenly as it starts. Eventually Aidan slowly calms down, stops hitting me or trying to hurt me, moves from screaming and growling into crying and sobbing, and his body relaxes. He'll hide his eyes at this point, a lot of times he'll cover his ears, and sometimes he'll let me rub his back but usually he doesn't want anyone to touch him. If I try to talk to him about it, it's going to either make him cry harder or ramp the meltdown back up. He's usually very very tired after a meltdown and doesn't talk much at all.

What causes a meltdown?

Often a meltdown seems like a mystery. There are any number of triggers for a meltdown, and what may seem to be the cause of a meltdown this time, might not so much as phase Aidan next time. Or something that never bothered Aidan before suddenly sets him off unexpectedly. This is a pretty good sign that what set him off was a trigger but not the cause. Think of it like the old metaphor of the straw that broke the camel's back; a combination of sensory overload, physical discomfort, frustrations, disappointments, or surprises comes together to confuse Aidan's brain and he doesn't have the vocabulary or self-control to handle it calmly or at least ask for help to fix the situation. Sensory overload for Aidan is usually sound related, although it can be lights or any number of other sensory input – think of it kind of like how a strobe light can cause a seizure. Physical discomfort we've discovered after the fact has been from toothaches, tummy aches, sore throats, and even from being given milk at school (his tummy is very sensitive to milk products). Frustrations could be caused by a game not working for him or a friend not doing what he wanted or expected. Also, Aidan has a very strong sense of “justice” which isn't always logical, but if you punish him for something that he feels was not wrong or that he wasn't told there was a rule against, he will go into a tail spin.

Can't this just be “disciplined” out of him?

If Aidan is just throwing a tantrum, or if he's winding up toward a meltdown but still has some control over his behavior, then yes, discipline or even distractions can help the situation. But if Aidan loses control over and unmet need or discomfort, and I punish him instead of figuring out what his problem is, then I'm only going to make Aidan even more out of control. Basically I'm punishing him for trying to communicate that something is wrong in the only way he knows how at the moment. Some days his verbal skills are worse than others. Especially if Aidan is fighting off being sick, his ability to tell me something wrong can be diminished by various factors, and if I try to punish him into acting the way I want him to, I'm just going to make things worse.

So what do I do now that I know?

For a long time I had no idea whether Aidan was having a tantrum or a meltdown. I would try to punish him and only make things worse. Without the experience I have now with Aidan, I wouldn't know what to do in the event of a meltdown. Now, if I judge that Aidan isn't throwing a tantrum but has completely left the building when it comes to his ability to control his behaviors, then my only option is to make sure he's in a safe place (out of reach of things that can get broken or could hurt him), and try to restrain him enough to keep him from hurting himself or me. It's exhausting for everyone involved, and god forbid it happens in public. I think the hardest thing to explain to people without experience in the world of autism, is that aggression and meltdowns and the behaviors associated with them, are not signs of a spoiled or bratty child, or of bad parenting – they are simply symptoms of a disorder.

I invite your questions, comments, and suggestions (so long as they are constructive and in the spirit of learning and cooperation).

Visiting the Principal

Today I had to go talk to Dr. Lewis (the principal) is because Aidan punched and hit a little girl, and apparently this is the 3rd time he's done it this school year, so for liability reasons, they had to talk to me about it. Aidan won't say a lot about what happened or why, and he had a meltdown from the door of the school until about 5 minutes after we got home. If this doesn't get settled, we'll have to do a new IEP to try to deal with this aggression and occasional violence.

This has been going on (this go round) for about 5 days now. I'm not entirely sure when it started (I'd have to go back through my facebook and tweets to determine the first meltdown of this cycle), but I know Sunday he had a major meltdown out of the blue, and then got beat up by a little girl while two little boys looked on and one took pictures.  He's had meltdowns and been very aggressive and easily upset since then.

One thing I noticed today is that the yogurt we got him (he always has Dannon Activia because of past problems with his tummy) was actually Light, which means it has artificial sweeteners in it. I wonder if this has anything to do with the problems he's having. I'll definitely be cutting that out and throwing the rest away.

But the problem with hitting the little girl isn't a recent problem apparently. I'm not sure when it started, but it apparently didn't just start this week, so I don't know what to think about that. They didn't give me a whole lot of information.  Ms. Annie wasn't there to see what happened, Ms. Simmons probably wasn't either since it happened in P.E., and the Coach didn't come to the meeting with Dr. Lewis to tell me what he saw. So we're depending on Aidan to tell us what happens, and he always gets very agitated and frequently melts down when you try to extract information from him about what happened in a situation like this.

I literally have NO IDEA WHAT TO DO in this situation. Back in September-November he had problems like this too, although they weren't manifesting at school, only at home. I wish I had some more resources with what to do. Insurance, even Medicaid, doesn't frequently pay for autism therapy, but I'm going to try to go soon to the mental health center and try to get him an appointment to maybe talk to a counselor or something. Any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Another encounter with Bullies.

Earlier today Aidan had an encounter with Bullies. I wrote about it on Facebook and some on Twitter, so I'll just compile it all here for everyone, and for the general record.

Around 3:30pm -

"OMG WTF! SOME KID DOWN THE STREET JUST BEAT AIDAN UP!!! She punched him several times, and he has an abrasion on his face and ear. He says he doesn't know why, that he didn't hit her or say anything mean to her.

He said she pushed him down and punched him in the face and the head and legs, and pulled his ear. He couldn't tell me what words she said. I'm so upset right now, angry and sad that this could happen to my child. I don't know what to do.

He says that there were three kids - the little girl was the one hitting him and one of the other kids, an older boy, was taking pictures. He said he's never played with them before, but that once they tried to break his scooter."

A couple of people made suggestions:  

"Well I suggest you talk to her parents, prob better after you calm down. If that doesn't get anywhere, contact the police."

"ugh I hate bullies. I'm so sorry! maybe take pictures of the injuries..?"

I responded:

"I don't know where the kids live - and I am sure that if their parents are anything like the other parents in the neighborhood then it will just come down to a case of he said-she said. It's happened before, although never before has a kid punched him."

And then about half an hour later:

"Are you freaking KIDDING ME?! The kids just came back down here and asked if he could come back out and play. I asked them what happened...It didn't match up to Aidan's story at all, except that they were playing with lightsabers. I told them he couldn't play anymore with them.Why would he say she punched him with her hands if they were just "playing at hitting each other with lightsabers"?"

To which I received several responses from friends:

"If the kids are still out there, go ask them where they live. For Aiden's sake, the least you should do is talk with the parents."

"I don't think your child is a liar. I DO think you need to take pics of his injuries & set up time to talk w/ other kids' parents. Aidan doesn't make stuff like this up. Sounds like the 3 kids were tormenting him & if there are pics on their cameras it's proof."

 I said:

"We don't know what house they live in, and the kids are gone now. I wish Jeremy were here, so we could find out. I don't do well in situations like this. I'm not sure all the kids are even related."

"I don't know - they acted like they didn't know what I was talking about when I asked about that. I'm sure they deleted them."

 

 I'm not entirely sure of the whole situation. I don't know the whole story - Aidan told me what he could, and it's entirely possible he was playing rough and left something out, but I still think it was inexcusable for her to punch him and for other kids to take pictures. It's not just Aidan - he gets along fine with Jacob and Jonas and Briley and her brothers, as well as the kids at school. The only problems I've really seen are with the kids today and the next door neighbor kids who are very verbally abusive.  I'm still very upset over it, but Aidan seems to be okay for now. He definitely will not be playing with those children again. 

DIBELS (What the heck is that?!)

DIBELS is an acronym for Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills. According to their website,

"The Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) are a set of procedures and measures for assessing the acquisition of early literacy skills from kindergarten through sixth grade. They are designed to be short (one minute) fluency measures used to regularly monitor the development of early literacy and early reading skills.

DIBELS are comprised of seven measures to function as indicators of phonemic awareness, alphabetic principle, accuracy and fluency with connected text, reading comprehension, and vocabulary. DIBELS were designed for use in identifying children experiencing difficulty in acquisition of basic early literacy skills in order to provide support early and prevent the occurrence of later reading difficulties."

We got Aidan's DIBELs results back today from the testing in January (they also tested in August, and I imagine they'll test again sometime between Spring Break and the end of the year.  If you'll remember (or maybe you don't), last year when they did DIBELs at Creekside it threw Aidan's schedule off so bad he never did recover. This year he seems to have handled it much better.

The first area they scored him on was "Initial Sound Fluency" 

("The examiner presents four pictures to the child, names each picture, and then asks the child to identify (i.e., point to or say) the picture that begins with the sound produced orally by the examiner. For example,"This is sink, cat, gloves, and hat. Which picture begins with /s/?" and the student points to the correct picture. The child is also asked to orally produce the beginning sound for an orally presented word that matches one of the given pictures..."). 

In August he scored above the target goal which was 10-15 correct letter sounds, by identifying approximately 25 initial letter sounds. As of January 14th Aidan did so well he scored above graph bounds!!! That's right! Target goal was to identify 25-35 initial sounds, and he identified 74 (top of the chart was 70).

The next portion of the test was "Phoneme Segmentation Fluency" 

("assesses a student's ability to segment three- and four-phoneme words into their individual phonemes fluently... has been found to be a good predictor of later reading achievement... administered by the examiner orally presenting words of three to four phonemes. It requires the student to produce verbally the individual phonemes for each word. For example, the examiner says "sat," and the student says "/s/ /a/ /t/" to receive three possible points for the word...").

January was the first time he had been tested for this, and the goal was to identify 20-25 correct phonemes. Aidan scored well above this target by identifying 60 phonemes.

The third and last thing they tested him on was "Nonsense Word Fluency" 

 ("The student is presented a... sheet of paper with randomly ordered... nonsense words (e.g., sig, rav, ov) and asked to produce verbally the individual letter sound of each letter or verbally produce, or read, the whole nonsense word. For example, if the stimulus word is "vaj" the student could say /v/ /a/ /j/ or say the word /vaj/ to obtain a total of three letter-sounds correct. The student is allowed 1 minute to produce as many letter-sounds as he/she can, and the final score is the number of letter-sounds produced correctly in one minute.... students should receive a higher score if they are phonologically recoding the word, as they will be more efficiently producing the letter sounds, and receive a lower score if they are providing letter sounds in isolation. The intent of this measure is that students are able to read unfamiliar words as whole words, not just name letter sounds as fast as they can.") 

This had also not been tested before January, and the goal was to produce 20 correct letter sounds. Aidan achieved just above the targeted goal by correctly producing 33 letter sounds.

I'm so excited that Aidan has done so well on the DIBELS test this year. Obviously his reading skills have vastly improved. Ms. Simmons says he does very well reading in her class, and he seems much more interested in books and reading at home now that he's got a better understanding of how words work.  I can't wait to see him continue to learn and improve.