RE: Kids w/ Classic Autism, PDD-NOS & Speech Delays

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Percy was a gift from his uncle the previous year. The red thing on the table was a gift from my aunt. It played music and had lights and a train that ran around inside. He was absolutely fascinated by it. He's full of smiles, sometimes he uses them to manipulate though.

Thanks! This board isn't perfect but it's still miles above other ones I've seen. He is a doll, until you go to pick him up, then BAM! - he transforms into a bag of feral cats. Your little guy has a great smile too, a smile like that can be a real day brightener.

I found this board when i was searching for astronomy web sites.

Eric is really delightful. My mum used to bring home some of the special kids she worked with and I met many kids with Downs at my home.

Yes there is nothing like having a special needs child to put your own life in perspective. I am relishing dropping out of the rat race to look after my daughter outside of school time. Little things are in order of magnitude more important to me now.

My favorite part of the day is getting him up in the morning and seeing his little face just beaming at me, and my second favorite part of the day is putting him to bed at night, because that boy can run you ragged.

Yeah I can easily relate

Mine rarely wakes in a pleasant mood, and can be very difficult to get him sleep. 3-4-5AM are not uncommon times for him to finally go down at night. I relate to the ragged bit though!

It's currently close to winter down under and the cold weather means my daughter gets a little bit of a cough in the mornings which means disrupted sleep. Happended this morning but luckily she survived in school.

Have to convince to go for a sports carnival in the school bus tomorrow - she hates buses, find's them claustrophobic - wish me luck!

OMG Washi, my head would explode! You must be exhausted!! I understand a lot of kids with autism have sleep disturbances/insomnia, and I'm really glad Eric didn't pull this symptom from the hat. He's a wakeful sleeper, he'll wake up in the wee hours of the morning, but he just vocalizes and plays for about an hour and then dozes off again.

Have you talked to his Ped. about trying Melatonin? I've seen quite a few parents here recommend it for their children, even the little ones.

It's approaching summer here in the southern states and for us it's seasonal allergies. I need to invest in Kleenex stock.

I can't blame your daughter for her judgement of buses, they do seem claustrophobic, especially with a full load of noisy kids. I think it's the lack of air movement and the smell. Buses always reminded me of a dirty gas station.

Yes, I feel like the undead. Sometimes the sun is rising when I go to bed and it's so late all the stores are closing when I want to go out. I bought the melatonin and tried it on myself first, it didn't do anything so I never tried it on Ethan. It's most definitely allergy season here, it's the worst one I can remember too. Ethan has been to the ER twice for waking up at night once with a croup cough gasping for air and once with the conjunctiva of his eyes swelling up over his irises such to the point that it was forcing his eye to look up. (Why do these things always happen when the pediatrician is closed?) He got steroids for the breathing and they said I could double the dose of antihistamine he was on (he was already on an antihistamine when his eyes swelled). And I'm coughing, it's so bad I'm thinking of buying a face mask to wear all the time to filter out the pollen.

Good luck with the bus trip! I used to get physically ill before class trips, especially if it was someplace I really wanted to go. Sometimes I got so sick with anxiety I had to stay home.

Sometimes we have trouble getting James off to sleep, like last night he was giggling and running about his room till 9:30 (What was he doing? He had a little green set square and a green nut and was holding them up next to each other and looking at them, yeah kid knows how to have fun ). But normally hes down at 7:30pm, asleep by 8, then sleeps like the dead until 7am. We can go in and pick him up and move him and he won't wake. Sometimes we need to change his nappy and usually he won't even wake and if he does he just looks about a bit bleary and annoyed and then once back in bed closes his eyes and snuggles down.

Yes we are so grateful for this!

Eric has the same schedule as James. A few nights a week, he has what I call his giggle session, somewhere around 6;30-7:00 Eric paces a little circle in the living room giggling and stimming with some random object. I have no idea what's so funny, but apparently it's hilarious to him. I wonder if it isn't a way for them to decompress or release any unspent energy from the day.

Washi, maybe try the Melatonin out on your son? Like maybe just half the dose. If it works for him, maybe you won't need it for yourself.. I know I don't sleep well if my son is awake, even if he's just in there playing in his crib. I tend to stay in the shallow end of sleep until he gets quiet again. It's like my subconscious won't allow me to doze off if he's still awake.

A popular thing here seems to be tart cherry juice which I think contains melotonin, some friends just started it last week on their two little midnight marauders, after four days they are sleeping through. Also on our first ASD parenting course there was a couple with a boy with severe sleep issues, the peadiatrician put him on something that made him a bit psychotic and didn't help, then a higher dose which didn't help either, they changed doctors and got prescribed melotonin, and problem solved. Doesn't work on all kids but seems to work on most I've heard of I think its well worth a try.

Well she negotiated a day of in the morning. Looks like it was a good decision, it poured with rain today! her poor classmates had to run in the rain and wind.! !

Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) may have lower than normal levels of melatonin. A 2008 study found that unaffected parents of individuals with ASD also have lower melatonin levels, and that the deficits were associated with low activity of the ASMT gene, which encodes the last enzyme of melatonin synthesis.[58]
Multiple small studies have demonstrated that 2 to 10 mg of melatonin may benefit children with ASD who have trouble falling asleep and/or maintaining sleep. A small 2011 randomized crossover trial found that the administration of melatonin, when compared to placebo, decreased sleep latency and increased total sleep time, but had no effect on the number of night time awakenings.[59] At this time, no guidelines exist for the use of melatonin in children with ASD.

Interesting! I'll look into this, thanks