Grab the kleenex

I know this is making the rounds on the internet, but it really is powerful to watch.

There's so many of us out there.

Keep fighting, sisters.

Mood: Exhausted Cynicism

I know I started this blog to keep track of Monster's behavior, but it seems to be more a therapy tool for me than for him. Ahh, Steel being self-centered as usual ;)

***Warning: Extreme self-pity ahead, read at own risk. Likely side-effects: one way ticket to downer's ville***

Today was a very tough and mentally grueling day. Monster's ear infection seems to be going ok, he fell asleep fairly easily last night and slept fairly well. He woke up a wee bit early (6 am), but he also fell asleep a wee bit earlier (around 9).

The day started out well enough; I was exhausted but I don't actually remember the last time I didn't feel that way. Exhaustion seems to be norm, not the exception. Poor me. I went to bed at a decent time, but spent way too much time imagining the perfect post, the perfect blog entry, the entry that would change the world. In a way, I went to sleep on a note of exhausted optimism. I woke with the same feeling. It's sad, when that's the best you feel all day.

Mr. called me on my way to a meeting (for which I thought I was prepared but for the wrong thing) to tell me about the upcoming CA court decision about Gay marriage and a happy-happy story involving a horse named Autism Awareness (http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/horse/triplecrown08/news/story?id=3284238). Both made me smile. The last real smile of the day.

By the time I sat down to see what my great state had done about the fate of Prop 8, it was later in the day. My state again let me down. The court pulled some fucked up mixed message decision, legalizing discrimination doesn't rise to the level of "major revision" to our State Constitution, but it's ok to have a few thousand couples live against that same constitution. This leaves what many view as the most liberal state lagging the likes of Iowa in the realm of equality. Gay marraige doesn't really touch my life in but the most cursory way. My in-laws have no use for a judge to tell them they are a family. My marraige, though not religous in anyway, is deemed acceptable, even if we live our life throwing the "tradition" of marraige on its head with Mr. giving up his career to stay home and raise Monster and me going out to earn the capital needed to do so. For me, as a woman, it makes me wonder what's next. How far does "traditional" go in the hearts and minds of my fellow Californians? As the mother of a disabled child, it is almost a physical blow. If Californians find that a loving home is harmful to children because the parents share a gender, what are they going to think of a man who may lash out when his senses overcome his reason? It sounds disjointed, I'm sure, but very real to me. Both situations draw a line in the sand as to how accepting people will be to differences. And my family is anything but typical.

The horse story is nice though.

The day was rounded out with a meeting with the school district. I know the District feels like they are making good progress. But to me, it seems like we are saying the same things over and over again. Perhaps we need to in order for the message to get out, but the glacial pace of change, when juxtoposed with the lightening speed of childhood, is frustrating and terrifying. I realize that this is the case with all pioneers; our struggles do not benefit us but those who come down the trail we have blazed. I know I've benefited from the brave women who came before me and I shouldn't chafe at giving back by blazing the next trail. But I'm a selfish bitch. I resent the time I spend on things that won't benefit me or mine. Tonight I do, anyway.

On the Monster front, things took a bad turn today. We aren't sure of exactly what happened, but when Mr. picked him up from school, Monster was red cheeked with a nasty rash. He still had it by the time I came home from work, which means it must have been something awful. Things are consistent with him getting into dairy/casein. He slipped away from us today, back to that world in which only he lives. Logically, I know two steps forward, one step back. Emotionally, it's like watching him slip into a coma. He left me. He left all of us, today. His speech therapist said it was a 180 from where he usually is. It's a sickening reminder that the clock is ticking for him. We are running out of time to pull him through the window (as Jenny McCarthy would say); the window got smaller.

Sure, I know, logically, that he has an ear infection; he's been pumped up with dyes the past few days. Whatever he ate or came in contact with at school was just enough to send him over. That's how delicate the balance is. A painful reminder that things are more precarious than I want to admit. That I can't control his environment to the extent I want and he can't assist us or even tell us when those who are suppose to protect him fail in their duty. I want to blame the teacher, the aides, but I know they do the best they can and these things happen. Truly, I know that. Moving forward (that's for Joyce), all we can do is close the loophole and do our best to prevent it from happening again.

Still, it's a punch in the gut to see him this way. When I get past this funk, when I can close off the emotions, I'll be able to objectively use this as a measure of how far he's come. All I have to do is push the panic into that dark closet in my head and bar the door.

But the horse story was nice.

ChARM and Ear Infections

Those are actually two separate topics, but it looks interesting put together, doesn't it?

So, Monster has an ear infection. Doc had a very tough time finding anything, but he did see some puss in Monster's ear (ewwwww). Last night Monster had a major, screaming-meamy fit (Sorry you had to listen to that, Jim). I guess the little dude's ear was really hurting. By the time we got some tylenol down his throat, he litteraly fell asleep mid-wail. Luckily, he slept very soundly all night. He was very protective about his ear and didn't want the doctor to come near him. I don't know if the fill in pediatrician was just really cool or if he was trained to deal with autistic children, but he pretty much did everything right, which isn't that common for mainstream practices. Perhaps it is the incidence rate in the bay area, perhaps it was because he was a young doctor (heck, I didn't think he was old enough to be out of high school-when did I get so freaking old?), but he asked if he could touch Monster's head, was fast and got away from Monster as soon as possible in a nice way.

Something else intereting was he actually gave us the option to use anti-biotics or not. we have the Rx for it, but he said anti-biotics would only reduce the illness by about 1 day and suggested that since Monster wasn't presenting a fever or other symptoms (just the pain in the ear) that we waig until Wed/Thursday before trying anti-biotics. Since we've been working on the bio-med treatment stuff for Monster's autism, I was very pleased with how he explained the whole matter to us and let us make the final decision. We have chosen to wait to see how things go; regardless if one believes/doesn't believe in the effect of candida overgrowth on people with autism, anti-biotics can mess with one's stomach and I don't relish dealing with a puking/runny monster who also has pain in his ear. We aren't going to torture the poor baby, but if he can kick this without it severely impacting his life (meaning it doesn't really get that much worse) without anti-biotics, we feel it is worth a try. Trick is gettting Monster to take the tylenol/ibuprofin enough to keep the pain under control. So far, so good. Dyes are going to take their usual toll on his behavior, but in our experience, that's easier to deal with than the tummy problems that result for anti-biotics (not to mention Mr. is allergric and as the person who will be giving Monster the meds, the one most likely to be spit up on if Monster is being onery).

Now onto the ChARM portion of the title. Someone posted about an online tool to track bio-med treatments on one of the yahoo groups to which I belong. I have the paper products (composition book, spiral notebook, etc) to keep track of stuff, but I admit, I'm more comfortable having things stored online somewhere where I can't lose it. I've registered there (http://www.charmtracker.com) but haven't started using it. It seems to me, from their website, that someone will be looking at the data the families put in. That's cool with me. Maybe someone can actually get a good handle on this aspect of autism.

I realize that some people think that this aspect of autism is nothing more than schmarmy con-persons taking advantage of desperate people. I'm sure there are those out there. However, to me, I know enough people (in real life, not just on the internet) who have seen some success. Our children are still autistic, but the autism seems to ease off a bit, or perhaps it's more appropriate to say the symptoms are lessoned. As a scientist (or at least a former one in that galaxy far, far, away) I want to do controled experimentation where I can test my hypotheses from different perspectives and compare them to a control group. That's not going to happen. So we do the best we can.

And this leads me to one of my biggest dilemnas and pet peeves. "Curing" autism. You see, to me, autism isn't like cancer, a disease that needs to be erradicated. To me, autism is a description of symptoms/behaviors. When one reads about autism and what it means, you can read about "concrete thinkers", "single minded focus", "near perfect memory (in preferred areas)" in addition to missed social cues and difficulty speaking. So what does "curing" autism really mean? I, personally, don't want to "cure" Monster's autism, I want to eliminate those aspects that separate him from the world-the sensory integration issues that make this world a continual assault on his senses, to reduce his anxiety in delaing with a place that moves too fast, is too bright/loud, to help him communicate his feelings/needs/thoughts. I don't want to change those thoughts. Maybe I would feel differently if my child was higher functioning or had asperger's syndrome.

So what is a "cure"? To me, a "cure" is something that is going allow his physical system to function appropriately-his mouth can form the words it needs to speak, his hands should be able to touch slimy things, his ears should be able to hear the words of others through the static, his eyes are not distracted by background. I don't want to change his sense of humor, his charming smile, his joy while swinging and flipping upside.

It is heartening that so many people are getting on board with autism-meaning they are researching, talking and asking about it. But as with any "Cause celeb" the picture being painted is fairly 1-dimensional. Autism is an epidemic and we need to find a cure. The reality of autism is actually 5 or more dimensions (if that is possible). Yes, these kids have serious challenges (sensory integration, communication, attention) but they have incredible talents. It seems like their biggest "symptom" is not being able to fit into a pre-determined, one-size-fits-all social-education system. They don't color within the lines. so to speak. I wonder if that's their biggest problems, that they don't fit in.

I am curious, for those who read this blog (if any), what do you see as a "cure" for autism? All opinions are welcome. It takes a whole hell of a lot to piss me off and even more to actually offend me. I may be an arrogant, conceited bitch sometimes, but I do admit that my opinons are not the final say in anything (just don't tell Mr, ok?).

What is a "cure"?

Monster at gymnastics

Additions to the current Treatment plan

I started this blog almost a week ago with the purpose of discussing Monster's treatment. This week has been both exciting and costly. Mr. went to a nutrition talk and came back with a renewed interest in addressing Monster's diet. So in addition to what we had been doing-Casein free, dye free, mag/calcium supplements, digestive enzymes, we also removed all artificial colors/preservatives/flavors (or "anything we couldn't pronounce or recognize") and added fish oil and a multivitamin to the mix.

Is it working? who knows. His language continues to be good. He is singing often now and talking to himself if not us. He rode some rides at 6 flags and got over his cold pretty quickly these week.

We are also going to start keeping a food journal. A big problem with Monster's eating is he doesn't eat a meal, per se, but rather eats almost continually. I attribute it to his perpetual motion and lack of any complex proteins in his diet (he's a vegetarian by his choice, not mine).

Of course now Mr. wants to try to cut out corn (yikes!) and soy (double yikes!). That leaves us with Rice or Coconut Milk yogurt which is twice as expensive than the soy stuff he currently eats and makes me concerned that he will stop eating again (what he did when we went casein/gluten free).

Oh the joys! We are also working on getting an appointment with a DAN! doctor, but how we are going to afford that, I don't know. It's $300/hr for either the doctor or nutritionist (at least initially) and I don't even want to think about the tests we would have to pay out of pocket (and these pockets are lighter and lighter with the looming job loss).

We'll figure something out. We have no choice. How can we let a silly little 'ole thing like money get in the way of helping Monster? Long term, if we can get things under control, is Monster can be independant (maybe) one day. And that's the best chance for him long term.

I hope what we're doing helps, even as the cost scares me.

4 more weeks

I have four more weeks and I lose my job. I'm quite terrified as I have not found a replacement yet. A lot of interviews, which is nice, but no one coming through with an offer. It seems like the best chance is across the country. A daunting prospect, to say the least, but also a tempting one. Sort of a brand new, clean start, in a way. But way too far from family. I'm it for money coming into the house. The only other revenue stream is the state of California (respite, IHSS) and they aren't very reliable right now. We expect to lose what little support they provide soon enough. We're just glad that Monster is on Medi-cal for health insurance (disability) and Mr. is covered under IHSS (as Monster's aide). The only one who won't be covered is me, but I'm also the only one who doesn't take Rx meds everyday.

On a happier note, Monster and Mr. Steel went to 6 flags today and Monster rode a few rides, one of them by himself (and he did that twice, according to the Mr.). Tomorrow is a sensory friendly film at AMC. Night at the Museum 2, we'll see how long Monster lasts.

Swimming

Nothing really to say today, but I was looking through some videos and thought I would share a cool one of the Monster swimming.

The Boy is Growing Up

Well, as time marches on for all of us. Just as wrinkles, I mean laugh lines, are forming around my eyes and mouth, Monster is growing and changing as well. Tonight, he pointed to his mouth and said "tooth". I think his first tooth is loose.

Now for most parents, this is a time of joy and nostalgia. Their baby is growing up. Somewhere, I'm sure I feel that as well. But the overwhelming feeling I have is panic and fear. Panic that he's going to freak out, fear that he's going to regress as he attempts to absorb a new change within his body; yet something else that becomes out of his control. It's possible that I'm just over-reacting. I'm prone to that, I know. I'm constantly on the look out for the next trauma, the next stumbling block, the next unexpected, overwhelming occurrence that can send him back into himself.

Which is the greatest fear of us all. We spent so long looking at this beautiful, charming little creature live within his own little world. We were spectators, the audience watching a performance spoken in another language, missing the joke, not being able to read the subtitles. Then, slowly, bit by bit, we learned the language. Not fluent enough to get the joke, but enough to be able to anticipate what's next in the plot. Some of us stop here, having to learn to speak their language, to watch the performance.

But some of us, some very fortunate blessed us, are invited into the performance. We get the joke.

And sometimes the performance bleeds out into our world. He steps off that stage and into the audience. Not only do we get the joke, but he gets our jokes. This can happen all of a sudden, or so I've read elsewhere. For Monster, it was more gradual. A series of brief, tentative forays off that stage and into the audience. Maybe a word here, or a phrase there, but nothing fluid, not at first. His visitations in this world became longer and longer, his retreats back into his shorter and shorter, until he decided, one day for whatever reason, to move here. Into our world.

Like many who leave a world that is comfortable and familiar, he still visits that other place in his head, especially when this world is too hard, too confusing, too uncomfortable. And each time he leaves us, the panic sets in. The fear that it is actually our world that is the vacation house, that his permanent residence is in that other place, the comfortable place in his head.

And so, with this natural, normal progression of his development, this sign that he is slowly leaving childhood behind-just a first step down the road to adulthood, and a minor meaningless one at that-I worry, I panic.

So often, in the past year or so, my worry may be proven unfounded. He continually astounds and surprises me with his abilities to cope (which I swear are better than my own, truth be told). I hope this is one of those cases.

My baby is growing up. I hope I can survive it.

California Special Elections

I have no idea what the future holds, but in a rare move of solidarity, the voters of my state rejected all budget measures deemed "necessary" by our guvonator and passed the one that limits legislative salaries.

So we called Arnie's bluff, now let's see what the legislature does in response. Times are going to get much worse in the Golden State before things get better. Those who can least afford it will end up paying the price, long term, including our children. With me losing my job soon, any cuts in services are going to have an even bigger impact on Monster. How could we afford to cover what we currently pay for his services, food, supplements? How can we afford not to?

It's gonna get worse, before it gets better, I hope to the gods it gets better soon.

Croupy kid

Well, he's coming down with something. The barking continues and seems a little worse.

Well, damn. At least I got the decongestant in early enough so he is sleeping much better. Unfortunately, the dyes are going to hurt his behavior in school. And he was doing so well since he started back (he was homeschooled over the fall).

He's being mainstreamed 3 times a week with mixed success; this won't help his anxiety any or his focus in the general ed class, poor baby.

My Barking Boy of Steel

Well, we had another bad night, but for different reasons. First off, we went to grandma's for dinner which means we get to choose between following the regular bedtime routine, and being up way, way late (reducing the amount of sleep) or skipping all those pesky relaxation parts, but having a decent shot at a good night's sleep. Second off, he was having breathing issues which woudln't allow him to stay asleep.

I chose bed time option B in the hopes that short term struggle will provide the best long term gain. Sort of like quitting smoking cold turkey rather than tapering down.

Since we were at my mothers-in-law's house, he didn't get to play on the internet, hang from teh trapeze (did I mention we have a trapeze in the living room?) jump on his trampoline or play his DVDs. He also didn't get to eat what he wanted, but rather what little he could/would eat. He was so over tired and over stimulated that he couldn't calm down at all. He needed new shirt, that one didn't feel right, he needed a different pillow (or rather, just lay on top of mom), he had to spin or clap during all the Lion King songs, he had to watch Lion King in the mirror, rather than on the TV itself, he wanted to watch the light pattern on the wall/ceiling.

I, of course, can't give in to many of these-the clothes part is fine, as is laying on top of me (except for the pesky problem of breathing with a 60 lb weight on my chest). else he gets farther out of control. It's a fine line between using stems to self-regulate and using stems to self-stimulate. The staring into the mirror, spinning in his swing and clapping/jumping (if one can jump while sitting down) will just amp him up further.

We manage to make it to the scene Monster always stops at (Pumba yelling "She's going to eat me") and head over to the other room. Here he can't get comfortable, or calm down. Tossing, turning, snuggle up to Mom, push mom away, run toes down mom's leg (Note to self: Trim Monster's toenails) Eventually, Whale song begins. Sigh.

Whale song is a series of vocalizations that he does for a variety for reasons, auditory sensory input, keeping himself awake, torturing his mother. High pitched, loud and grating to *my* senses. He knows this and will routinely do this when he thinks I'm being mean and not letting him get his way. Sometimes, like last night, he does it because he just needs more sensory input than the quiet, dark room can provide. Usually, I can sing to him in place of his whale song, but he only wanted me to sing songs he could sing with me, another way for him to keep himself awake.

We wrestled, while I tried not to lose my mind at his sounds. Hubbie came down once when an inadvertant elbow poked hit me somewhere sensitive. I tried to keep him from scraping his toe nails down my bare legs. It was a rough 30-40 minutes, but we both survived relatively uninjured and he fell asleep. Unfortunately, the Boy of Steel didn't have a full quiet night of restorative sleep. Instead, he started barking.

For those who don't know, barking is that sound a child makes when he/she coughs when she/he has croup. So far, Monster doesn't seem to have croup, but something is draining into his throat (sorry, TMI) interupting his breathing and causing him to bark from time to time. His barking would wake him from the sound sleep into that quasi-sleep state, where he wants to snuggle Mommy or Daddy. Eventually we gave him decongestant and he was able to fall into a somewhat deep sleep.

Now the reason we don't give him decongestant sooner is the only one he will take has the dreaded dyes in them. If we force another type on him, he wakes completely up, having gotten just enough sleep to prevent him from falling asleep again for several, long hours. If we can avoid them, we will. Dyes can cause him to develop a rash, tummy problems and lack of focus. Then again, so can sleep deprivation. Our own rock/hard place decision.

As usual, he woke up at the crack of the freaking dawn (I hate long summer days). He was very cute in his own snuggly/cranky way. Eventually, he got dressed and ready for school. The only two bad times were when I wouldn't let him bring all his DVDs to school (He has 3 Whole Foods bags of about 10-15 DVDs each) and when he wanted to ride in Daddy's truck, not Mommy's car. I think he was happy to be going to school, even if it was to just get away from me!

Hopefully everything will be more on track tonight. I already know Tuesday and Wednesday nights are going to be tough-I have a meeting at school and Hubbie is going to a nutrition class. Like a recovering addict, we take one day at a time.

Woo-freaking-hoo!

Bad Night for the Boy of Steel

Monster didn't fall asleep until nearly 11:00, when bedtime is usually 9:00.

I wasn't there. I was playing around here, on twitter and at a message board I use to live at and Mikey thought he would give me a break by putting the monster down. over 2 hours later, they both fell collapsed from exhaustion. With me, he generally falls asleep about 10 minutes after we turn off Lion King (at least since we started the new night time regime, see below). I'm also sure hubbie didn't do the night time routine quite right (and why would he, we aren't interchangeable). Who knows which is worse, my not being there or his not doing things the same way.

Part of me wants to feel guilty. The other part of me really enjoyed the Guillermo Del Torro movie I watched (Devil's Backbone for those interested).

Such is the way most of the time. Relaxation comes at a price for all of us. I can wrap up these nights in self-important rhetoric-he needs to learn to be more flexible (uh, hello, he's autistic), it's an opportunity for him to learn to handle insecurity, blah, blah, blah. I can wrap these nights up in self-righteous entitlement. To be honest, comparatively speaking, this isn't anything compared to the way things were. No one was bitten, no one is bruised or bleeding. There was a time when bedtime was a full contact sport that took 2-3 hours on a bad night. Now monster tries to drive me insane with his whale song. Hubbie is deaf to the whale song torture, frustrates the little one horribly.

Doesn't matter, in the end. Sometimes I need to recharge my batteries and some times I'm just a self-centered Twit (or is that Tweet?). Sometimes I want to show Hubbie how hard it is to deal with Monster's bedtime routine, and have to laugh at my own martyrdom when hubbie falls asleep before monster.

And sometimes, like tonight, it's all of the above.

I know three blog entries in one night is likely excessive (or at least, narcissistic), and I doubt I'll be as prolific in the future.


Boy of Steel (AKA the Monster) Bedtime Routine (this week, anyway).

First, Warm bath with 2 cups of epson salts and about 1-2 tablespoons of lavender oil. I let Zach tell me what words to write on the wall (bathtub crayons, wonderful toy) and which toys we are going to play with).

Second, vigorous drying with warm towel. I let Monster decide which clothes to put on when.

Third, swinging during the sneak peak portion of the night's movie-which has been Lion King lately.

Fourth, after sneak peaks, it's time to climb into the TV room bed-just a twin mattress on the floor.

Fifth-lavender oil massage, starting at the feet. Deep pressure up and down first legs, then arms. Gently pulling on his legs/arms. He really likes his toes done.

Sixth, joint compressions, ankles/knees/hips, wrists/elbows/shoulders

Seventh, brushing legs/arms

Eight (if I get this far) lavender oil massage of his back, followed by brushing.

Nine, watch movie until Monster decides he's done and then go to bed.

Total time is about an 60-90 minutes. So far, it's working well (6/7 nights successful, just this night was bad)

The Current Treatment Strategy

Since I started this blog to keep track of what we are doing for monster's autism, the place to start should be what we have done to date. Maybe when I get around to dealing with the rest, I'll even blog about the beginning of the journey. Then again, maybe not.

Currently, we are looking into what is called bio-medical treatment. There seems to be as many theories as to the cause of autism as there are children who are diagnosed with it. Some say their brains are wired wrong; some say it is an autoimmune response triggered by vaccines; some say it is a response to our environment; or genetic or all of the above, or none of the above. These may be the next leap of human evolution or not (as rockmom so patiently explained to me).

My son can't wait for the experts to figure out the why part, which means we don't have a clear idea of what to do next. So rather than listen to, and follow, what the "experts" say, my husband and I have decided to take a cost/benefit approach to treatments.

Meaning, we look investigate any and all treatments out there in the world (both real, imaginary and internet), evaluate what the risks are to Monster (physically, mentally), the cost to us as a family (monetary, time, effort) compared to what the supposed treatment claims. We get a fair amount of flack for this approach, but we've never really cared that much about that; we are use to walking our own obscure, illogical, odd path.

To this end, we have tried gluten free/casein free diets (and are currently casein free), dye free diets (and still are dye free), hyperbaric oxygen therapy (may work, but at over $300 a pop, out of our price range), a variety of behavior strategies (RDI, floortime, ABA, all of which we still use), Sensory diet, massage and our current approach, bio medical.

The bio-medical approach is based on the idea that autism is the result (in whole or part) of our children's inability to breakdown and handle their physical environment (i.e. toxins, foods, etc). That their immune system is run amok because of some sort of trauma (such as vaccines) or deficiency. I'm making a muck of the explanation. Basically, autism is either an immune response or an allergic response or a response to nutritional lack or all of the above.

We dipped our toe into this lake when we went gluten/casein free. Monster was drinking 48-64 oz of milk at about 3 years of age. We knew he should be drinking less, but that constituted the bulk of where he got his calories and we were hesitant to restrict/reduce it (some would call us permissive parents in this, oh well). He also would get rashes at odd times, that weren't related to anything. I wish I could say we carefully researched this and applied our considerable intellect (ha!) when coming to this decision, but the reality was a family we knew tried this and their son started talking. At this point, monster had ZERO speech and we were desperate. So to Whole Paycheck (i.e Whole Foods) we went and out came the casein and gluten. His diet shrunk immensely. His behavior got worse, but we plodded through. Suddenly, one day, I didn't realize that buttered popcorn would have butter in it, and gave some to monster. He flipped out. The rash came back full force and he literally bounced off the wall. A similar reaction did not happen when he stole some bread one day, so we allowed gluten back and kept dairy out.

Now we are dipping the whole foot in. We can't afford to do the whole DAN! doctor thing, so we have applied our cost/benefit analysis and came up with the following:

A digestive enzyme (he has tummy problems)
Epson salt baths (detoxifying and soothing)
Lavender oil massage (soothing)
Calcium/Mg supplement
Omega 3 fish oil supplement.

We are also going to see a pediatric gastero-something or other and an allergist.

Who knows where this is going to end, but so far, the evidence is cautiously not pessimistic.

Inaugural Entry

My first blog.

Mostly.

Who knows how it will go.

So I guess I should start by introducing myself to the faceless imaginary people I suppose will be reading this. I'm a mother to a spectrum child. In other words, I have a son with autism. Often times I refer to him as "the monster", not because of his autism, but because he can be a real character. A charming, cute, manipulative little pain in the ass.

Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away, I would have started with "I'm an engineer" or "I'm a consultant" but that time has passed. In an alternative universe, I was an ambitious rat who was going to rule the world, ala Pinky, but I was forced off that treadmill by what some call the new epidemic. I'm the tragic heroine of my own Lifetime TV movie of the week (and a bad one at that). Currently, I have no identity. I have no ambition beyond continuing breathing and waking up in the morning.

Cheerful, aren't I? I want to be that strong, exemplar figure to whom people look for wisdom and inspiration.

Uh-uh. Ain't gonna happen. That takes way too much energy and drive. I have little of either. I seem to have left both back on that treadmill I got pushed off of. Instead, I've turned into that whiny, pathetic drama queen who wants to do nothing more than sit on my ever spreading ass, forever lamenting my lot in life and waiting for someone to hand me the solution to all of my problems, or at least the money I can use to drown them.

Ok, that's not me either. I guess the real me is somewhere in between the TV heroine and the societal leper.

And with an introduction like that, who wouldn't want to follow my blog?

I'm just a mom of a child who has a condition for which we don't know the cause, the course, the cure or the treatment. This blog is mostly to keep track of our (as in my and my husband's) current answer to each of those. If someone is interested, cool. If not, well, that's ok too.

The title of the blog is in reference to two things. (1) that Autism use to be blamed on "Refridgerator mom's", women who were unable to connect with their children, thus dooming the children to a life of Rainman, which describes not a single mom I know with a child on the spectrum; and (2) as a nod to what I use to do for a living, make steel (as in melt down scrap in a big furnace and pour it into molds).

So, Hi there! Nice to meet you. Welcome to the exciting, nonstop, never ending ride of a Furnace Mom's Life.

A video, just because