Category Archives: Nuts and Bolts

The S Word

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Recently it has been suggested to us—and I’m not going to name any names here, not going to disclose who could have made such a detestable suggestion—that Martin might heal better if we were to move to the suburbs.

We are not suburban people. We are a city family. We pay top dollar for overcrowding, grime, shouting, car horns, and traffic. In exchange, we enjoy multi-ethnic and multi-generational neighbors, quality restaurants, every life necessity within a five-minute walk, the Met, museums, theaters, and a ZIP code where Wal-Mart is not welcome.

It’s not that I look down on my friends in the suburbs. They have vegetable gardens and swing sets and garages. Entire garages all to themselves! It’s like they own weekend houses for every day of the week. But it’s not for us.

Right now I do wish we owned a weekend house, some retreat somewhere. That might put an end to this “move to the suburbs” talk.

Alas, we don’t. We’ve never wanted anything more than our apartment, never felt we would even consider leaving the city.

Will we consider it now? Yes.

Would we actually move? That’s another question.

My initial reaction to the suburbs suggestion was no.  That’s it. That’s the line I will not cross. That’s the thing I will not do.

Yet haven’t I always said there is nothing I would not do to recover my son?

My second reaction to the suburbs suggestion was skepticism. How could that be necessary? Is the urban jungle so bad? I feel fine. Adrian feels fine. The parks are full of healthy kids.

Yet I am not blind. I’ve had my suspicions. I saw how well Martin did when we rented an isolated house in Maine this summer. Autism is now widely regarded as linked to an underlying immune disorder, and persons on the spectrum react poorly to radio frequencies, air pollution, electromagnetic fields, excessive stimuli. We have noisy, dirty construction sites on three sides of our building. Let’s face it: In a city-suburb face-off to produce the most air pollution and radio frequencies, the city would kick some suburb butt.

My third reaction to the suburbs suggestion was trepidation. What if we tried moving, and it helped? What if we had to stay in the suburbs? What if we—liked it?

That’s about when my angry, cynical side chimed in. The suburbs, with their chemical-laden golf courses and manicured lawns? The suburbs, where home lots abut power plants and electric lines? That will help Martin heal?

Adrian and I are wrestling now with the whole suburbs idea. Autism-warrior-me is wrestling with angry-cynical-me. We’re all exploring alternatives. A short-term relocation or other trial run. Making our apartment as safe as possible.

In some ways it comes down to identity. I identify myself as a city person. We’ve changed so much already. I’ve quit my job and given up most of my volunteer work to focus on Martin instead.

But I didn’t work my way through college and law school to become a suburban housewife.

Or did I?

A future in the suburbs for Martin?

Hard Truths

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Where have I been, these two months?

Let’s talk hard truths.

I’ve been dealing with Martin, who’s been nowhere near where I’ve wanted him.

Over this summer, something went awry, and his progress hit a plateau. I did not see significant improvement.

Honestly, I don’t really recall seeing any improvement. We had some firsts, like supermarket walking and approaching a stranger. At the end of July, a friend sent me an email stating that her husband, upon interacting with Martin for the first time in several months, “thought he seemed great—real improvement since last time!” But the jagged ascent to which I’ve become accustomed—progress, little setback, progress, little setback—evaporated. At times the summer felt more like uneven descent: no progress, little setback, no progress, little setback.

Finding My Kid is “a parent’s real-time blog of autism recovery.” It’s hard to post reports when no recovery is evident. It really is. It’s even harder when the author descends into hopelessness, into questioning whether she’s abandoned her career, her church work and activism, and large chunks of her social life in pursuit of a goal that never will be reached.

Then, two weeks ago, Martin tanked. I mean, tanked. One day I felt like, though progress had leveled off, at least I had a child without perceptible autism, and the next day I had a child with myriad classic signs of the disorder. In our apartment Martin ran compulsively to and fro, chanting “d-d-d-d-d-dah, d-d-d-d-d-dah.” He lost eye contact and name responsiveness. He threw tantrums when not allowed to watch one video repeatedly. Echolalia resurfaced. It was as if a year of progress disappeared overnight.

I consulted with his doctors and therapists. The prognosis was unanimous: stress. Adrenal stress, systemic stress from doing too much. Martin’s delicate system cannot keep up with the amount of detoxification we’re imposing.

We pulled back immediately. I took him off almost every agent meant for detoxification, whether heavy metals, parasites, viruses, or otherwise, and I kept him on only supplements and agents meant to support his adrenals.

With those changes, Martin shows signs of improving again. The repetitive behaviors, though still present, are diminishing. He’s making eye contact, albeit unsustained. Adrian and I are subjected to near-constant whining (hey, Martin is a four-year-old, after all) but fewer tantrums. I’m not going to say Martin’s recovery is back on track. I’m not even going to say we are where we were a month ago, when I already was unhappy with his progress.

I will say that, I hope, the ship is turning again.

So why recommence blogging now?

Because I have no excuse not to. Finding My Kid comes with an honesty pledge. Posting reports only when recovery is proceeding apace—well, that’s just not honest.

See you soon.

[Addendum: If you’re taking the time to read Finding My Kid, you probably already saw the piece in this morning’s New York Times about the the links between autism and immune disorders. I’m always happy when the mainstream press edges toward acknowledging that autism is medical and should be treated as such.]

Something Is Different

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Sorry that this post comes so late. I started writing it ten days ago, then got delayed because Martin has been home sick from school. (A common childhood virus got him—for a change, nothing to worry about.) I return now to the blog with an enthusiastic update:

We’re in one of those “something is different” times, when Martin seems to be achieving some new skill every day.

I love the “something is different” times.

Here are some participants in the ongoing parade of firsts:

Blowing bubbles. After more than a year of trying—grabbing the bubble wand and sticking it in his mouth, yelling “phew!” but barely aspirating, and so forth—Martin has mastered the art of blowing soap bubbles. Doesn’t sound like much? A year ago Martin couldn’t pucker; his “kisses” consisted of bumping his wide-open mouth into my cheek. As of last week, he’s combining a solid pucker, ocular focus, and breath control in one task. He even unscrews the bubble container top and holds the wand himself, steady. This is huge.

Stepping off the escalator. This relates to our old foe, proprioceptive awareness. As City denizens, we’re on escalators constantly, most often in subway stations. The end of an escalator used to involve me yelling, “Okay, Martin! Now! Now! Step now!”, then holding him up by the arm when he inevitably stumbled. I’m down to chanting softly, “And. Here. We. Go!” as Martin lifts his foot and we step off together.

Imitating. Martin’s imitation skills are in full swing. We traveled recently, for a visit to Martin’s doctor. Martin likes to flush the toilet in the airport bathroom, and until now he did so with his hand. This time, at LaGuardia, I watched him trying to hoist his little leg high enough to flush with his foot, just like Mommy does. I hadn’t told him to use his foot; he was just imitating what he’d seen me do. Later, as we waited for our ride home (“Adrian”), Martin picked up a pay phone and asked, “Hello? Hello?”

Imagining/associating. For a while now, Martin has been creating a musical instrument out of anything he can get his hands on. “I’m playing the suitcase like a bass!” “I’m playing my shoelace like a flute!” “I’m playing George’s tail like a saxophone!” (May God bless George the cat.) Even an actual musical instrument can have multiple functions; a toy piano turned sideways is an accordian, and a guitar under the chin makes a violin. Now he’s categorizing less and free-associating more. In the doctor’s office was an air purifier, about 18 inches tall, which blows air through an angled top. Martin tried to sit his behind onto the angled top and said, “I’m using the tushy-dryer!” He also told me, when he saw some rain, that the clouds were “going potty.”

Finding humor. Once upon a time, Martin was upset by anything unexpected. Last week he flipped open the top of his drinking Thermos. Because I had mixed “naturally effervescent” kombucha with the filtered water inside, the beverage rushed up the pop-up straw and squirted Martin’s face. Startled, he looked at me for my reaction. (That’s an achievement in itself.) I laughed; I couldn’t help myself. To my surprise, Martin started laughing, too. Later, on the airplane when we were traveling, Martin asked for an ice cube from the club soda I was drinking. (That’s a no-no for Martin, of course; who knows what kind of water is in an airplane ice cube, which was floating in my aluminum-canned drink. Ugh, and double-ugh. But we live in the real world, and do the best we can with what’s on hand, so he got an ice cube.) I tried to deposit the ice cube into Martin’s mouth but missed and somehow rubbed melting ice all over his face. No tears. More laughter. I capitalized on the ice-cube moment and reminded Martin, “Remember when the kombucha squirted you? Squirt!” The kombucha memory kept the giggles coming. We two managed to crack ourselves up for a good five minutes.

Drawing inferences. Because his babysitters are taking summer classes of their own, I’ve been picking Martin up at school more often. In the lobby of his school last week he watched me read his teacher-correspondence notebook and peek inside his lunch container. He said, “I ate all my lunch.” Which means: He got it. Martin inferred that I was opening the lunch container to check for leftovers, he recalled his own lunchtime performance, and he provided me relevant information.

Expressing emotion. This is just, just starting to happen. Martin talks a lot about falling in a pool, which refers to an event that occurred some months ago at my parents’ home. I’ve heard the story a million times, but last week Martin added a new detail: “When I fell in the pool, I was scared.” Two weeks ago Martin visited Adrian’s office. He ran from conference room to conference room, peering through windows at the tops of skyscrapers, then declared, “I am happy.” Finally, we had a guest musician at church, who played guitar and sang an original song. Martin told me afterwards, “I liked the guitar player at church.” These were the first times I’ve heard Martin make original expressions of emotion.

Yes, something is different. And I am happy.

Martin takes in the City.

Mommy, Gone Missing

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I’m back from Germany, as of late Wednesday evening.

Just in time to (1) watch the Rangers blow their series against the Devils, shattering dreams of repeating 1994’s Stanley Cup run; (2) get caught, twice, sans umbrella in the thunder and splattering rainstorms passing through New York; (3) waste an afternoon at the Apple Store “Genius Bar” attempting to rectify a software glitch; and (4) spend a pretty decent day with Martin.

He had yesterday off from school, so we made a day of doing exercises and running some errands.

After breakfast—leftover green pudding, which Martin practiced scooping and eating by himself—and HANDLE exercises, we headed out to the Union Square Greenmarket for meat and duck eggs. The trip presented an RDI opportunity: Martin and I discussed which subways we could take, and where we would transfer, and how we would board either the 4 train or the 5 train. (Like many ASD kids in New York City (I’ve discovered, from talking with other parents from his school), Martin memorizes train lines and insists we take a particular train, even if another hits the same stations.) He did swimmingly. On one train he opted to stand and hold a pole, and he kept balance as the car braked and rattled and jerked from station to station. My little straphanger.

At the Greenmarket he was calm, enough, as we visited the farmers I know. He willingly held my hand while walking, and stayed close when I needed both hands for my wallet and insulated food bag. Only when he spotted the Union Square playground did he get fussy and impatient. I bargained another five minutes’ shopping time (“…and then we’ll go to the playground…”), and we hit the playground.

The playground, where we had one of our little miracles.

The playground experience with Martin has evolved. A year ago the process was exhausting; Martin had so little environmental awareness that I had to scamper to position myself below him constantly, in case he failed to realize that the jungle-gym or bridge was ending and launched himself off the end. Sometime during summer 2011 we moved to a new level, wherein I could sit on a bench and watch Martin from afar. Still, I could not let him from my line of sight, insofar as he rarely kept track of me and might wander away.

That’s where I was yesterday—observing Martin from afar—when I saw him glance around (searching for me!); realize he didn’t know where I was; whimper, “Mommy! Mommy!”; and then become agitated when he couldn’t find me.

That’s right. My ASD son, who once upon time bolted every time I released his hand, got upset because he couldn’t see me.

I called, “Martin! Martin! I’m here!”, and waved until we made eye contact.

He smiled. I cried a little.

Soon after that, we left the playground, stopped at the bank, took the subway home, ate lunch, then went back out for organic green juice and to purchase a gift at Jacques Torres. Pretty routine stuff, except when you consider that, when you have a kid on the spectrum, everyone else’s “routine” is a victory.

And there it is. What I saw yesterday for the first time will soon be routine. Martin will keep tabs on me. Not quite like I keep tabs on him, but something more like a preschooler should do.

After all, we’re a team. Martin and I.

Eating Bon-Bons and Watching Oprah

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I am at a conference, the annual meeting of a church governing body I serve as a volunteer. At lunch I sat next to a minister I’d never met, the pastor of a Brooklyn church. We engaged in the idle chatter of New Yorkers. Is Brooklyn part of Long Island? Will the new Barclays Center arena be large enough for the Islanders to consider playing hockey there? Do Upstaters despise City arrogance?

Soon the pastor asked, “So, what do you do?”

“I’m a full-time mom.”

“How many kids do you have?”

“Just one. He’s three years old.”

“Just one? Time for more kids!”

You can guess how I wished to reply. Something along these lines:

“Actually, my son has autism, and we’re trying to recover him, which means that I need to plan and execute eight million RDI and HANDLE exercises, and he can’t eat food with preservatives, or pesticides, or sugar, or starch, or soy, or gluten, or casein, or pretty much anything, so I need six or seven hours a day just to plan, shop for, and cook his meals, and then there’s juggling doctor appointments and administering supplements and making sure we never run out of those supplements, which barely leaves time for finding a special-needs kindergarten, researching new treatments, converting a modern home to organic and chemical-free, and snuggling my son. Usually I do all that on six hours’ sleep, or less. Also, I have a husband, and I like him, and occasionally I want to spend time with him. So, no. No time for more kids.”

Instead, I replied, “We’re pretty happy with just one. He keeps me busy.”

I felt (imagined?) the pastor’s disapproval with that response. I’ve felt it before, from others who don’t know about Martin’s condition or the journey we’re taking. And I understand. They must wonder: With one child who spends six hours a day in school, what do I do with myself?

I shudder to wonder what the disapprovers would think if they knew, in addition, that I have babysitters to help several afternoons per week.

I joke with Adrian about my schedule, about how I spend my day. When he calls from his office, he usually asks, “What are you doing?”

To which I invariably reply, “I’m eating bon-bons and watching Oprah. Why? What are you doing?”

I think I might have got the bon-bons-and-Oprah shtick from Peggy Bundy on Married . . . with Children. (Peggy probably meant it, though.) Now it’s become my and Adrian’s routine to recognize that I’m much busier than I ever was even as a full-time lawyer.

I suppose I could have employed that routine on the pastor at lunch: “I don’t have time for more kids, because I spend it eating bon-bons and watching Oprah.”

Then again, he might have been suspicious. A few weeks ago, Adrian’s secretary asked me, “You know the Oprah show went off the air, right?”

I’d had no idea about that. Is that true?

In any event, since Adrian’s secretary broke the news, I’ve been eating bon-bons and watching a lot of Ellen.”

The Ineffable

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Sleeplessness visited Martin again last night, the third time in a week. He was up from 1:00 until 4:30 am.

I’m tired.

Yet I’m not freaking out. To the contrary, I sense that Martin is doing well, that he’s back on the upswing.

I “sense” that he’s back on the upswing. That’s my way of saying I can point to nothing major. Martin has not ceased all echolalia, or started maintaining extended eye contact, or become graceful. In some respects, major signs point downward. Sleeping, for example. I can’t pretend that’s going well. Or keeping things out of his mouth. Objects are still finding his way into Martin’s mouth at an alarming rate. Fingers. Shoelaces. Lotion bottles. George the cat’s ears.

On the other hand, dozens of micro-signs point to improvement. I’ve witnessed the following:

•      Martin ran from the parking lot next to our building to his school bus without turning his head from side-to-side. I cannot remember seeing him run an extended distance looking straight ahead.

•      Martin was tired, so I let him ride to the store in his stroller instead of walking. We stopped at the organic restaurant for green juice. Martin climbed purposefully out of the stroller and mounted the stairs to the restaurant without pause. No dawdling, no tripping, no fussing. He looked like a neurotypical preschooler.

•      Adrian has been traveling this week. Out of the blue, not immediately related to any discussion of Adrian, Martin said, “I want Daddy to come home.” He was not repeating. He was expressing a wish about an absent person.

•      Two weeks ago we visited Martin’s friend Walter at his apartment. Martin observed that Walter still sits in a booster chair. Martin, who for months has ignored his own booster chair, has decided to imitate Walter. Now he’s sitting every home meal in the old booster chair. (He also runs and jumps in every available rain puddle. Thanks, Walter.)

•      Martin has taught himself to buckle the T-formation “seat belt” on that booster chair. That’s initiative and manual dexterity.

These types of developments can be easy to miss. Indeed, they’re nearly ineffable. But they add up.

They add up to a sense that I need not freak out.

Potty Sayer

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“I need to sit on the potty,” Martin said.

This was Saturday afternoon. We were just spreading our picnic blanket on a stony beach at Montauk Point State Park, at least a quarter-mile of precarious terrain from the nearest restroom—and we know from past experience that Martin would rather have a potty accident than pee outside.

So if we were the parents of a neurotypical almost-four-year-old, we might have dreaded the words. But we aren’t, and we didn’t. Instead, I told Adrian, “I got this one,” grabbed Martin, and headed around the bluff toward the lighthouse restrooms, scuttling as swiftly as I could over a pile of rocks with a 45-pound preschooler in my arms. I spoke into Martin’s ear: “No pee pees yet! Hold them in. You can make it. Wait for the potty. No pee pees in your pants.” Martin, in return, poked his fingers into my nose and giggled.

We arrived at the restroom to find a line waiting. I raised my voice from a private whisper to a stage whisper—“Hang in there, buddy. Hold it in till we get to the potty”—hoping one of the queued women might take the hint and offer us her place. None did. We waited another several minutes.

Finally I lifted Martin onto a toilet seat, where he deposited his peepees into the bowl and then said, “I’m all done.”

Martin has been potty-trained, more or less, for several months now, with two exceptions. First, he still wears an overnight diaper to bed. That’s for security purposes; most mornings the diaper is dry when Martin wakes. Second, Martin has had trouble learning to tell us when he needs to go. Instead, he says something like, “I’m doing peepees,” or, “I need new pants,” three seconds too late. Up until now we’ve just been sitting him on the potty as often as possible, and he’s done his part by, usually, holding his business until a potty break.

So you may imagine our joy those occasions when Martin not only recognizes in advance that he needs to go but also thinks to inform us. That happened five times this weekend: once at the beach, twice at church, once at home, and—the biggest victory—once in the car, when we were stuck in Sunday-afternoon City traffic and unable to pull over, whereupon we asked him to please “hold it” until we got home and he did, an entire half-hour.

The round-trip from the Montauk beach to the potty and back again took me and Martin at least 20 minutes, delaying our lunch. No matter. When we returned to the picnic blanket, Martin in the same still-dry pants, no accident, Adrian lifted our big boy into the air and shouted,

“Ha ha! Way to go, Martin!”

Failure to Grieve

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This week I attended an excellent presentation by Sarah Birnbaum of New York Special Needs Support. The topic was navigating the “Turning Five” process, i.e., getting a child into New York City special education for kindergarten.

It was a tough evening for me, emotionally.

There was a time when I thought that Martin might be ready to join a mainstream classroom as early as kindergarten. (Martin is not yet four years old; he is scheduled to begin kindergarten in autumn 2013.) Although we have made much progress, particularly in healing Martin’s gut and easing atypical movement and behavior, we still have a long way to go in language development and attention. We won’t try to place Martin in any classroom more advanced than his current skill level; because we are committed to lifetime success, we’d rather coddle him for an extra year or two than see him flounder because we shot too high.

So we’re looking at special-education primary schools. And so I related when Sarah said something like (I’m paraphrasing), “You may find it upsetting to visit these schools and fill out applications, because it’s not something you ever envisioned yourself doing, not a place you ever expected your child to be.”

But did I relate in the same way that the other assembled parents did?

I think Sarah meant that it can be hard to accept that your child is not suited for a mainstream classroom. And she is right—perhaps particularly so in the context of parents who do things like attend presentations on kindergarten admissions sixteen months before their children are due to start kindergarten. No one really wants to admit that his or her child has special needs, right?

Therein lies my thought for the day. I’ve read, in multiple sources, that the parent of a child with autism should grieve, i.e., should mourn the loss of the child who was expected, in order to better accept the child who is.

Adrian and I expected a high-achieving child, no doubt about it. From his earliest days, Martin was photographed wearing onesies and caps with the logos of our alma maters. We as parents debated topics like whether to speak to Martin in two languages or three, at what age he should begin music lessons, and whether the risk of concussions meant he should not play hockey. If we had a great fear, it was whether a spot would be available for him at the mainstream private school of our choice.

It’s been two years since we first began to notice signs of autism, and more than eighteen months since the diagnosis. Yet I have not allowed myself to mourn the loss of the child we expected, because I do not believe we’ve lost him. Martin is recovering, however slowly. I refuse to accept that he will face limitations based on autism. I admit that Martin has special needs now, but I do not admit that he’ll have them for long.

I do not grieve.

Nonetheless, as I sat in a presentation on finding the best alternative classroom, I found myself hiding the fact that I wanted to cry, and I wondered:

Can this hope actually make things harder?

My little superstar getting some exercise.

Darn You Double-Crossing Cruciferous Vegetables

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Arugula, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, bok choy, cabbage, cauliflower, chard, collard greens, daikon, kale, kohlrabi, mustard greens, radishes, rutabaga, turnips, and watercress.

Cruciferous vegetables are good for you, right? They’re high in fiber. They’re mineral- and vitamin-rich. They contain isothiocyanates, which help the body fight carcinogens. And for purposes of Martin’s specialized diet, they’re not too starchy or sugary.

Slam-dunk.

But nothing in the world of autism is a slam-dunk, really. I’ve been warned against feeding Martin any raw cruciferous vegetables. That may not seem like a big deal. On the other hand, I love dehydrated kale chips, and Martin used to love them, too—an easy, on-the-go snack available without moderation.

Now he doesn’t get them anymore, at least not often. With the familiar caveat that I am neither a scientist nor a doctor (and I give no medical advice), here’s my understanding of why raw cruciferous vegetables can affect ASD: Thyroid functioning is key to brain function and mental health. Many environmental chemicals, including BPA and flame retardants, are endochrine disruptors, which means that they can interfere with thyroid functioning and thereby hinder the developing brain. Cruciferous vegetables, while unquestionably not the same kind of thyroid criminals as those aforementioned synthetic chemicals, naturally contain chemicals known as goitrogenic isothiocyanates, or simply “goitrogens” (think “goiter”). The goitrogens inhibit the body’s metabolism of iodine, which is crucial to the production of thyroid hormone. Decreased hormone production means poor thyroid functioning. Poor thyroid function has been tied to autism.

This video from The Renegade Health Show explains (if you can tolerate big words, and lots of them) the effects of isothiocyanates on thyroid function. Kevin on the video concludes that only iodine-deficient persons, or those with pre-existing thyroid problems, need to worry about raw cruciferous vegetables. (And even those people may be able to counter the effects of the goitrogens by boosting their iodine intake.)

Most commentators seem to agree that cooking cruciferous vegetables, even lightly, inactivates the goitrogenic effects, which is why this concern applies primarily to raw cruciferous veggies.

So should Martin avoid them entirely?

I agree with Renegade Health’s Kevin that raw cruciferous vegetables pose no risks for the majority of the population. More specifically, I agree that they pose no risks for me; I eat buckets of arugula salad, I dip raw cauliflower in hummus, and I’m pretty sure that my life would be a lesser existence without the Dijon-marinated raw kale at Sacred Chow in the Village.

At the same time, whereas ASD and thyroid complications often travel together, allowing Martin to eat raw cruciferous veggies may well be a sort of danger.

I’ve decided to strike a balance. (I like saying that, because it must often seem like I’m willing to go any extremes, whatever the issue.) To ensure that Martin gets ample iodine, even without dietary supplementation per se, I sprinkle kelp flakes on his food in place of salt. Then I’m careful not to allow him unrestricted access to raw cruciferous veggies. Instead, he gets only the two foods he adores most: kale chips and green vegetable juice. I prepare kale chips no more than a couple times per month. As to the green vegetable juice—which in our case comprises organic green leafy vegetables (for goitrogen purposes, spinach is mildly better than kale or cabbage), cucumber, ginger, celery, lemon, and half an apple—it’s really a double no-no, because of the one-half apple. Nevertheless, I let Martin drink up to 12 ounces once per week.

As a side note, I consider dehydrated kale chips raw because they’ve not been heated to more than 115 degrees Fahrenheit, or 46 degrees Celsius. Definitions of “raw,” for purposes of the raw-food movement (which is not the topic of this post), vary. They include insisting that food be unheated and recommending that it not be heated above human body temperature. I’d love to wade into that debate, and more raw foods in general—but I keep returning to my mantra: There are only so many hours in the day.

And of those hours in this day, I’ve probably just given too many to the topic of goitrogens.

Tanked. Temporarily.

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We’re tanked.

This past week Martin has displayed long-forgotten symptoms: clumsiness, running circles around our apartment, low name responsiveness, even some toe-walking. Toe walking! What’s up with that? His attention has gone MIA, and his daytime sleepiness makes me suspect nighttime restlessness. He is inserting into his mouth anything he can get his hands on. And when he can’t get his hands on anything, he simply inserts his hand.

Times like this used to trigger hopelessness in me. All this work, I would think, and we’ve gone nowhere?

I’m more sanguine these days. So we’re tanked—big deal. Paradoxically, Martin’s language has been stronger than ever, notwithstanding the symptomatic behavior. As to that behavior, maybe the blame lies with the onslaught of pollens and other allergens our early spring has brought. Or else residual dust or cement particulates from our recent mini-renovation (we had some work done in the apartment when I took Martin to visit his grandparents over spring break) could be bothering Martin. Most likely, we need to tweak something in his supplementation protocol.

Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out. I know that we’re tanked only temporarily. I’ve seen what Martin can do and know we’ll get back there, and beyond.

Of course, feeling calm overall, on a general basis, does not translate into rationality every minute. This weekend Martin and I were riding a carousel, on horses side-by-side, when I caught him arching his back and stretching his neck to look at the ceiling and even behind him. That’s a sensory stimulant, one that’s been gone more than a year; it used to be hard to take Martin to restaurants, because he would throw his head back so far from the highchair that he blocked aisles, and I fretted about decapitation by waiter or bathroom-bound patron.

On the carousel I was alarmed and disheartened to see the behavior reemerge.

“Martin,” I said, “sit up like a big boy. No throwing your head back.”

Martin complied and straightened his back, but 10 seconds later he leaned back, hands clutching the horse’s pole, and gazed upward.

“Martin, please. Sit up like a big boy.”

Martin complied again, then said, “There are flowers up there.”

“What?” I asked. “Where?”

“Right there!” He threw back his head and pointing to the carousel’s ceiling.

I looked and saw what had caught his eye: lovely flowers hand-stenciled above us.

False alarm. No sensory stimulation. Just Martin appreciating the world around him.

“Martin, those flowers are lovely.”

Adrian helps Martin with his balance on a weekend stroll.