Chasing Autism 3: Kal'el's Prayer

He says' Dear God thank you for: school, the playground, Ms. Williams and Ms. Morton, Vanilla, Healthy, Kids, the vacuum cleaner' and more (not necessarily in that order 

Chasing Autism Part 2 : Please Eat

To be fair, I know what he is going through. I also have food aversions. It makes me gag to think about potato salad. And hence, I have never ever tasted potato salad. The smell of it, the look of it…Oh God… Back to the subject at hand. I have to consider how I feel about some foods as we attempt to tackle the smallest bowl of rice, carrots, and broccoli youhave ever seen. Yes I have tried serving everything separately. It makes no difference. He stalls. Suddenly he has to use the bathroom or he wants to engage in ‘conversation’ which consists of him copying my earlier pleas to get him to eat. For example, he’ll say, “Stop looking at it, like it is something new. Put it in your mouth and chew it. Look at me! Look at me! When you eat potato chips, you don’t eat like that. Put in in your mouth and chew it up.”    

 Right now he is on the toilet singing ‘A Taste of Honey’ by Liz Wright.

…about a half our later El ate three spoons of rice and carrots, ignoring the broccoli.  When I insisted he eat a bit of the green stuff, he put it in his mouth, played with it around his front teeth and gagged. I talked it down, told him to think of trains and trolleys and just get it down. He did it! 

   Now the challenge is mine. The ball is in my court to continue insisting he eat what is healthy, which means I need to prepare healthy food at regular intervals. Ugh, consistency and follow through. I confess we’ve been to this milestone before, but I fall off. So here we go again.

Chasing Autism Part 1

Chasing Autism will be a sub series of this blog where I discuss my son’s (and my) journey with autism.

     In the beginning, I ignored the signs. Rather, I ignored the standards by which my son Kal’el was being measured. Why? I ignored the standards because they have failed to resemble or represent me. According to height/weight charts I have always been over the top. According to my gynecologist, I have a tilted uterus. According to beauty standards of my youth, I stood outside of the model, which led to a horrendously painful and unnecessary experience with an orthodontist. So, no it was not surprising or particularly disturbing when the pediatrician said his head was too big. My uncles used to palm my head with one hand and lift me from the ground like a basketball.  My son did not respond to his name being called. If I am immersed in a task (reading a good book) I do not hear my name being called either. Essentially, anything that was normal for me and witnessed in my son was chalked up to heritage. So it follows that his speech delays could not be dismissed. You see, my family and I, we talk. We argue, we joke, we complain, we tell stories. I used to talk myself and my siblings to sleep.

     Let me explain, my son has always been verbal. He parrots what he hears. His tendency to repeat word for word was what finally made me think, ‘Wait a second, I need to look into this Autism thing’. I cannot imagine an existence where I am not able to speak for myself. All other quirkiness and social awkwardness aside, this is the tragedy of Autism (for Kal’el  [because, I realize ASD and its challenges manifest differently for each child]). Communication skills are necessary for freedom, autonomy, inter-dependence, emotional, physical and spiritual well-being. Effective communication is the gift I must give my son.

   As of now, he takes entire dialogues from one scenario and places them, seemingly according to tone, in similar conversations (Which is an improvement over chanting unrelated sequences). He does not yet arrange words to express his unique thoughts. He does not verbally express emotions such as, ‘I am angry’. We are working on that. The cartoon character Cailou plucks my last nerve with his whining but he is teaching my son emotional emphasis. This cartoon demonstrates a way for Kal'el to show disapproval without crying and melting down. So El is now applying varying volumes and force behind individual words to express certainty and urgency. For example:  I don’t WANT to go to school. 

    Another symptom used to diagnose his Autism Spectrum Disorder was the fact that my son did not feel the need to get my attention or approval when he found something new. Other children say, ‘Mommy, Look!’ incessantly. Not my boy.  Neuro-typical children will at-least check their parent’s eyes for cues that say ‘This is good or ,this is dangerous or ,this is interesting.’ Again, not my little one. Not only did he not seek to engage me, but he might gesture for me to leave the room so as not to disturb him.  This, however, is changing. He may just be repeating something he heard somewhere, but now he will say, ‘Mommy look, I’m dancing.’    

  

First day of Cultural Anthropology

How does the identification of cultural universals impact our understanding of what it means to be human?  

    Hypothetically, the identification of any number of universally shared values should create empathy, compassion and ultimately prevent war. But here is the tricky thing about language; words once grouped together, do not always say (just) what their individual definitions imply.  Sometimes the words spoken convey the exact opposite message. In this instance of 'identifying cultural universals', we back into ‘The’ culture qualified to determine what ‘universal’ is. The culture capable of stepping outside of its own influences and biases to achieve the objectivity necessary to see a common thread has thus elevated itself above the confines of culture. The message implied (though perhaps not intended) is hierarchy, superiority and ethnocentrism. ‘Do you think just like me or do I think just like you?’ In short, the quest to identify cultural universals creates a monopoly on defining what it is to be human. Who are these super humans that can shake the membrane of their own miniscule experience to define the whole? But the class is just getting started. I may be wrong.

 How does the search for universals help us better understand human cultural behavior?

      I think universals as a preconceived notion is a hindrance. The more we know, the less we see. If the canvases of our minds come with a work of Da Vinci printed, pre-approved as the universal model, could it alter, affect our ability to appreciate any patterns which he did not conceive? 

 What examples from your own culture can illustrate the ideas that our behaviors are impacted by our culture more than our biology?

     Ok. Shall we be honest about the biological demands our bodies make on us or shall we ,for the sake of academic propriety, fail to mention the horniness biological readiness that leads to teen pregnancy? We approach the phenomenon like an epidemic that has long plagued humanity. In fact the new cultural criteria that says  two parents should be financially ready(whatever that means) to nurture a child or children, is getting it’s behind kicked by nature's full proof hormonal overload plan. Wait, I do have an example of culture choking biology: Returning to work when my son was only three months old. It was devastating. In fact it still is. I feel I failed my son, by not by being present for him as he came to know an entirely new world. My body screamed, ‘Quit that job, this is your new job.” But cultural norms won that day.

    

‘Cultural anthropology is the comparative study of human cultures with the objective of deepening our understanding of the human condition’. (Nowak, B. & Laird, P.,2010) I respect the ambition, but isn’t it true that what we see is based largely on who we are. We bring our biases, our convictions, our beauty and shame to every experiment, to think that we can define humanity for every human is arrogant, maybe even detrimental.

Is it too late for Cultural Anthropology to become the collaborative study of human nature with the objective of achieveing respect?

Reference

Nowak, B., & Laird, P. (2010). Cultural anthropology. San Diego, Bridgepoint Education, Inc.    https://content.ashford.edu

Torn

     I’m torn. I want to get out of North Filthy. This neighborhood, these people, I fear the mentality that allows adults to throw their garbage on the ground, fist fight in the streets, speak obscenities in front of toddlers is contagious. But, what if it is already in me? What if I moved here because the trash filled gutters are familiar, comforting? What if the language of despair is my native tongue? What if people look at me the way I look at some of my neighbors?

     I do not want my son to wake up to this, come home to this. Yes, I scrub our floors, yes I correct his language, yes, we pray and say ‘thank you’ for neighbors, our playground, the kids and the ice cream truck. But what we rail against is pervasive and his development, his idea of self is developing now, in a pile of feces, like a maggot. And yet there is this truth also: here is where the work needs to be done. Here is where the cycle must be broken. I could shelter my child, protect mine and mine alone as is a mother’s instinct, but what of the children who do not have any other example of how to speak or be?  Don’t we former activist and children of the projects accuse those who ‘made it’ of abandoning their roots? These are my roots. If I push away, move away, sequester my son off to a private school, then what of these children. What of these adults?

Let’s not forget this question; who am I? Who am I to assume that ‘my way’ is the better way.....? I'm not even sure what 'my way' is. I just know I feel disgust,anger, sadness and dismay daily, in the face of this impoverished dignity.That is not the emotional example I want to set.

More like Snatch.com

     I recently tried an online dating site where you get to choose who you would like to know further according to a profile picture and a brief self-description. If such criteria were enough, if my ability to discern was not obviously impaired, I would not need to pay for what I thought would be Help.

     If only there was a site where I could choose two (or more) elderly happily married couples to select likely partners for me. We could solve two huge cultural problems with one stroke. Our elderly could move back into the center of society utilizing their hard-won wisdom. We could possibly save the institution of marriage by partnering with complimentary mates from the start.

     Aside from my blind spot when it comes to men, it seems I am behind the curve in yet another way. This site may have begun as a place where hopeless romantics turned to find true love, but I’m getting the feeling it has since deteriorated into the classified ads we see at the back of free city papers, and the infamous CraigsLost. Someone actually initiated a conversation by introducing himself as a submissive. Many profiles read ’I’ll tell you later’ all the way down the line. ‘Well what do I have to go on Homey? Why would I contact you based on that cheesy ass picture?’ I am tempted to ask. But I refrain. I do not want to risk being seen as angry on my profile page, just in case Mr. My Guy should happen to glimpse my picture and like it.  

     Ah well, though it seems unlikely that a cuddly geek who is willing to teach me to cook is on Snatch.com, I’ll wait out my subscription with my fingers and legs crossed.

,Storyteller

Tiny ideals

      My first apartment was a tiny efficiency. I was advised by my grandmother to look for any defects in the apartment and bring them to the landlord’s attention, so that they could be repaired, before I signed a lease.
       One of the things she told me to look for were mouse holes. I knew I was going to take the apartment anyway, but I was relieved that after a thorough examination, there were no mouse holes. One day, after work, I lie down in my very own place, in my very own bed and took a nap. When I woke, there was a mouse staring at me from a triangular crack between the wall and the floor. I was confused. That can’t be a mouse hole. When I scanned my mind for what I expected a mouse hole to look like, I found a perfectly arched doorway, like the ones I’d seen as a child on Tom and Jerry. I laughed at myself but felt alarm too.
      I went to an academically renowned high school. Despite my attitude shift and slipping grades in junior year, I managed to secure a full scholarship for college (which I declined). I thought, ‘ I’m smart.’ How did that idea from a cartoon survive in my head? Then it dawned on me; it had survived because I had no information to the contrary. That shook me. How many more ideas are there in my head that are unfounded yet never contradicted? How many times had I looked right past a friend, a mentor, an opportunity, a talent, all because my reference was limited ?  One would think this realization would have sent me running to the nearest university. But as far as I was concerned, the text books were filled with cartoon mouse holes.
         

First time

     Now that I am here, I am reluctant to write. I know that in a couple of years, maybe even just a couple of nights I will look back at this and sigh or cringe. I have kept journals for some time. Occasionally I dig up the red spiral binder from 8^th grade. Though I read it while alone, I feel embarrassed. That will happen here too, in public…Dare I proceed?

     I feel compelled to record what is happening in my otherwise invisible world. That is all. I do Not think I am right about anything. I do not believe that I am particularly creative and last but not least, I am far from grammatically correct. Yet, I sense there is something in here that needs to be out. It may be a single a sentence that bears no relevance in my life time. Ok. That is fine. I still have to do this.

     See you when the spirit moves me to share my view from here.

                                                                                                                              Storyteller