Author Archives: Tanya Savko

About Tanya Savko

My name is Tanya Savko. I am a writer, teacher, and mother of two sons. The "writer" and "mother" elements have been part of my life for quite some time, but the "teacher" title is new this year. My older son, Nigel, was diagnosed with autism at age three, in 1997. Between the ages of three and six he received intensive ABA-based therapy, which I believe was essential to how well he is able to function today. Unfortunately, negative peer interaction in middle school has made it necessary for me to take the leap to homeschooling him. We began this journey in February, 2008. The Teen Autism blog is a way to explore and understand whatever happens next. My younger son, Aidan, is eleven. He is an avid gamer and wants to design video games when he grows up. He is imaginative, sensitive, and compassionate. His Kindergarten teacher remarked how Aidan would always be the first to comfort his classmates if they were hurt or upset. He has mentioned to me several times that he feels like he is the older brother, always looking out for Nigel. I am truly blessed with both of them. I decided at the age of four that I wanted to write books. I have written ever since (although I didn't limit myself to books). My poetry and articles about autism have been featured in several publications, and my novel about raising a child with autism is scheduled to be published later this year. I decided to start the Teen Autism blog as a way to connect with other parents of autistic teens, to gain insight from those who have been through the teen years, as well as to offer encouragement to those just entering them. I welcome your comments, suggestions, and questions. It's good to know we're not alone on this journey.

The Organic Difference

I mentioned in a recent post how eating organic food has made a big difference in our family’s health, and I wanted to go into more detail about that. In the past two years, I have had only one mild illness, over in two days, and the boys have each had only two mild illnesses. I used to have spring allergies so bad that I would need to be on Claritin-D for two months straight. Not since I started eating organic food.  My nose still gets a little itchy and I sneeze a bit, but at least I can breathe at night.  I have not experienced any major congestion in two years.

The great thing about organic food is that you don’t have to buy everything organic to notice the benefits. All you have to do to get started is to look at what you consume every day and choose one of those items and buy it organic. For me, I almost always have cold cereal and milk for breakfast. So do my sons. We started drinking organic milk and noticed the difference right away. For one thing, it tastes so much better than non-organic, somehow fresher and more flavorful. I switched my cereal to an organic brand, and Nigel’s also. (Aidan is addicted to his Crispix. He’s an even pickier eater than Nigel.)

Next I looked at what else we eat a lot of in our house: fruit. Both boys eat apples every day, so I started buying organic apples. Yes, they are more expensive, but our health is worth it. And neither of the boys got sick at all until almost a year later, when the next school year started. A nasty flu was going around, but they were only down for two days. And I didn’t get sick at all.

I started buying more organic fruit, yogurt, eggs, and tried some organic meat. Words can’t accurately describe how much better it all tastes. I’m not saying that I’ll never go back to non-organic. On the contrary – I would say that at this point the percentage of my diet that is organic is probably only half, or less than half. I’m not the type of guest at a potluck who passes up a great-looking dish because it’s non-organic. And on the rare occasions I eat out, I don’t ask if anything’s organic. Eating organic isn’t like being a vegetarian or vegan – it’s not all or nothing, unless you want it to be. Another great thing about organic food is that it cuts out all the chemicals – the artificial colors, flavors, sweeteners, and preservatives present in most non-organic food that can be so detrimental to the functioning of an autistic person, as I mentioned in my previous post.

Try switching to organic even for just one or two items that you eat on a regular basis. It’s definitely worth the effort.  

Focus

Last week a friend of mine found a lost dog, a little Yorkie, running around in a street in our town, and she picked him up so he wouldn’t get hit. There was no owner information on his tag, so she called the animal shelter, but no one had reported him yet.  She then proceeded to go door-to-door in that neighborhood trying to find the owner and finally did. The Yorkie, Sam, belonged to two older ladies, sisters living together. They were ecstatic to have him back and invited my friend in for tea.

The younger-looking sister was tall and thin and began telling my friend all sorts of wonderful stories about Sam, going off on tangents about their family members, places they’d traveled, and other dogs they’d owned. The older-looking sister, who was shorter and appeared to have osteoporosis, would periodically roll her eyes and say with urgency, “Focus, Martha, focus!”

I laughed as my friend told the story, envisioning the exchange. It reminded me of all the times, especially in the past few months of homeschooling, when I had to redirect Nigel by telling him to focus on what we were doing. I often have to remind myself to focus with all the different projects and distractions I have going on. Focusing is how we achieve our goals in the face of daily life. It’s also how to keep things short and sweet when a stranger returns a lost pet. “Focus, Martha, focus!” I had to write that on a Post-it note and stick it on my monitor. It’s the best advice I’ve heard all week.

Autism T-Shirts

Yesterday I noticed at Café Press that there are a lot (thousands!) of great autism awareness T-shirts available. Some of my favorites can be seen by going to this link and then just clicking through the pages. “What? Is my autism showing?” is good, “Hang on, I know I have a social story for this” made me laugh, “Yes, my son has autism. No, he’s not like Rainman” is another good one, “When children cannot learn, it’s time to change the way we teach” hit home with me, as did “Parenting advice not appreciated unless you also have an autistic child.” Amen to that! I think I’ll buy that one! Wish I had it years ago!

There are so many good ones. One I really like is “got autism?” styled like the “got milk?” ads. I don’t know how Nigel would feel about wearing it, though. His favorite T-shirt has a silhouette of Bigfoot on it and says “I believe” across the bottom. He proudly wears it everywhere.

And then I saw a T-shirt that read “Autistic and proud” and I got chills and a lump in my throat. Nigel would probably feel self-conscious about wearing it. But I think the reason why it resonated with me is because I’m so proud of him. Yes, there are plenty of T-shirts that read “I’m proud of my autistic son/daughter/brother/sister/grandchild/etc.” on them. And those are great. But ultimately, I want my son to be proud of himself and all that he has accomplished: wanting to communicate, learning to talk, which was so difficult for him, figuring out how to filter his sensory issues (equally difficult), learning about all the social expectations of this NT world and dealing with its ignorance. But even if he hadn’t done all of that, I would still want him to be proud of his unique, amazing self. All auties should be “Autistic and proud.” I salute every one of them.

Bitterness

Over the weekend, I did some looking around online at autism sites written by “auties.” (I’m still getting used to that word, which is why I put it in quotations. It took me eight years to come to terms with using the word “autistic,” so “autie” will sound different to me for a while.) I was sad to see that many of them are quite bitter. I can’t say that I blame them, because with the harassment and ignorance that Nigel has dealt with, I’m sure there are plenty of other auties who have experienced the same treatment. And as they head into adulthood, that’s a lot of accumulated years of negative exchanges.   

I found a bumper sticker that says: “Cure Neurotypicals now!” And in smaller print below: “Offended? Good. Now you know how we feel.” Meant to be funny, I presume, with an ounce (at least) of seriousness. But some of the web sites I viewed over the weekend seemed just plain angry. I want to tell the authors something, with all my heart.

 I’m sorry for how you’ve been treated. You have every right to be angry. But holding on to that anger will only make you feel worse. Remaining angry will not alleviate the anger. Remaining angry will not punish the people who hurt you. Remaining angry will only hurt you. Please, for your emotional well-being, channel your anger into something positive, like creating an online support group for others who have experienced the same thing. You will know you are not alone, and you’ll feel at least a little better.

Nigel gets angry about bullies. Most likely, as he gets older he will experience more bullying and more ignorance. I don’t like thinking about what he has gone through, what he will continue to face, how things will be for him in high school, possibly college, a future workplace, and the general community. I hope that I’ve given him a strong enough base of love and self-worth that he can successfully let go of his anger and not allow it to consume him.

I don’t want Nigel to feel bitter when he’s an adult. I want him to feel cherished, appreciated for who he is, and important. I want him to feel loved.

The Autism Fairy

I found out an amazing coincidence yesterday. I ran into an acquaintance of mine from a couple of years ago, and we started talking about our sons, since we remembered that we both have sons of approximately the same age. It turns out that his son and Nigel were born on the exact same day, same year, same hospital, within two hours and fifty minutes of each other. Bizarre. I thought, aside from the autism, they must be a lot alike.

And that got me thinking. Out of the seven or so babies born in that place at that time, we were visited by the Autism Fairy. The luck of the draw. But I don’t think that in a Why us? sort of way. There are times, like when I was at work and the school would call me about a behavioral problem, and when I was at the movie theater and the manager and Nigel came to me in the middle of the movie, that I think Why me? at that moment, because I am stressed. But my big-picture thought process is more accepting.

I’ve heard it said that God, or the Universe, won’t give you anything more than you can handle. And if I had a dollar for every time I cried, “I can’t handle this!” I could easily buy myself a nice case of wine. But you do what you have to, you get through it, and, ultimately, you handle it. Maybe not optimally. But you do the best you can.

Because I believe that we were chosen to have autism be a part of our life’s journey. We are a special needs family. And the Autism Fairy visited the right room in the hospital that day. I’m sure of that.

7 Dietary Changes to Try

It can be extremely difficult to regulate your autistic child’s diet. I know that song and dance all too well. But it is something we parents must attempt. Diet – what we put into our bodies – affects our health even more than most of us realize, and this is certainly true for autistic individuals, as evidenced by the success of the GF/CF diet. But since we did not have a successful experience with that, I have modified Nigel’s diet over the years to one that seems to work the best for him. Following are seven suggestions for diet modification:

1) Try the GF/CF diet. It might benefit your child. Be sure to maintain consistency with it for several weeks to accurately gauge its effectiveness.

2) Limit sweeteners, especially artificial ones. Nigel is okay with the occasional bit of natural sugar that crosses his path, even a little corn syrup now and then, but he absolutely cannot have any artificial sweeteners. He becomes completely agitated and unmanageable, reverts to echolalia, and general chaos ensues. That means mainstream sodas (Coke, Pepsi, etc.) are out, but once in a while I allow him to have some even though I regret it later. He is particularly sensitive to Aspartame, which I’ve read many bad things about on the internet.

3) Limit other chemicals: artificial colors, flavors, and preservatives. I’ve read that the Red No.-whatever colors are the worst, but the rest can’t be far behind. We frequent the natural foods section of various grocery stores and buy all of our cereals and snacks there. No Trix or rainbow-colored goldfish crackers!

4) Try organic food. Yes, there’s been a lot of debate about if it’s worth the extra cost or if the money’s all in the organic labeling. That may be true in some cases, but know this: In the past two years since I started buying organic food, and not everything – just about one-third of the food we consume is organic – I have only been sick once and it was extremely mild. Both of my sons have only been sick twice. Twice, in two whole years! And those were also mild illnesses. For kids, that’s pretty amazing. I am sold on organic foods no matter what I read or what anyone says. They are so much better for your health. They automatically exclude artificial colors, flavors, sweeteners, and preservatives. And pesticides! And they taste far better, too.  I think I’ll write a whole post about organic food.

5) Push fruit. Fruit aids the digestive system and is full of vitamins. Of course, consuming vegetables is just as important, but if your child balks at most vegetables (like mine), you may have better luck with fruit since it is sweeter.

6) Encourage water consumption. This will be very difficult if your child acts like water is poison. My younger son used to fall into that category. I was able to get him to drink more water by bargaining with him with what he wanted: If you drink half a glass of water, then you can have a glass of lemonade.

7) Limit meat consumption. Meat is more difficult to digest, so I cook with smaller amounts and on fewer days of the week. You don’t have to cut something out completely to see the benefits of scaling back.

Conversations With Nigel

Usually, my sons go to LA to visit their dad for two weeks in March for Spring Break, but this year their dad came up to Oregon to visit them. So I have not had an actual phone conversation with Nigel, other than “the-scout-meeting’s-over-come-pick-me-up,” since last July. In the past two weeks I have been reminded of what that’s like.

As with most of his conversations, phone or not, if Nigel’s not speaking about an Obsession of the Week, I have to drag any information out of him. He will rarely volunteer information unless it’s regarding something of interest to him, some piece of trivia about Back to the Future, natural disasters, ancient civilizations, or an explanation of his latest Lego creation, for example. He could never be accused of “B.S-ing” about something he did not know, and I doubt that will ever change.

But when I haven’t seen him for weeks, I want to hear more about how he’s been, what he’s been doing. And those are often difficult topics for him to discuss, especially if a TV is distracting him. I know this, it has always been this way, and so I am patient.

Me: So what did you do over the weekend?

Nigel: [silence]

Me: Did you go to the beach?

Nigel: [silence]

Me: Nigel? Did you go to the beach over the weekend?

Nigel: Yes.

Me: Which beach did you go to?

Nigel: I don’t know.

Me: Did you visit anyone?

Nigel: [silence]

Me: Nigel?

Nigel: [silence]

Me: Nigel, is the TV on?

Nigel: Yes.

Me: What are you watching?

Nigel: [silence]

Me: What are you watching on TV?

Nigel: The Lost Pyramid.

Me: Is it on the History Channel or Discovery?

Nigel: [silence]

Me: Is it on the History Channel or Discovery?

Nigel: History.

Me: Okay, well, I love you.

Nigel: I love you, too, bye.

Relieved, I’m sure, he hangs up. He knows I love you is the last thing we say on the phone. And I am always so glad I can hear him say it.

A Great First Day

I talked to my boys last night! Of course I love to talk to them anyway when they’re in LA, because I miss them, but last night I was excited to hear about Nigel’s first day at the Village Glen Day Camp. It sounds like he had a great day! I asked him if he met any kids his age and he mentioned three boys that he had met, with their names and ages. One of them is also thirteen, which made me so happy for Nigel, since the NT kids his age are socially more mature than he is. I’m so glad that he met someone his age who is also at his developmental level, someone he can just be himself with.

Next I asked him what they did at the day camp. In his typical flat, but beautiful, voice he told me how they “played inside games because it was hot outside.” Also typical is having to drag information out of him if he is talking about anything other than an OW.

Me: What kinds of inside games?

Nigel: Charades and board games.

Me: Which board games?

Nigel: Clue and Battleship and Jenga.

I wanted to ask how he did with Charades, but I figured he wouldn’t know how to answer that. Instead, I smiled, visualizing him playing with his three new friends.

Me: Did you like your first day?

Nigel: Yes, I had a good time.

A huge thank you to Alexis and Niika for making this possible!

Nigel’s Opportunity

When I recently wrote about my sons going to visit their father in Los Angeles for several weeks, I mentioned that one of the good things about that is that they can do things in LA that they wouldn’t be able to do in southern Oregon. Tomorrow Nigel will start attending a summer day camp program that is specifically designed for high-functioning autistic (and Asperger) kids. Nigel is so excited about “meeting kids like me!” He had to do a phone interview last month with the program’s coordinator to make sure that his level of functioning would be compatible with the group, and it sounded like he did fine.

I am so grateful to my brother and sister-in-law, Alexis and Niika, who live in southern California, for researching this program and offering this time to Nigel as a gift. I appreciate their generosity and this opportunity that they have provided for Nigel. He has long been looking forward to becoming friends with kids who will “understand my differences,” as he puts it.  He is probably also hoping to meet a friend who will share his enthusiasm for planning an Oregon Trail trip or will help him to Rube-Goldberg the house! I just hope he has fun and enjoys doing what he loves so much: hanging out with his peers, feeling like he belongs.

Long-Distance Obsession

The last time I talked to my sons, who are visiting their father in Los Angeles, I was excited to tell them about my Mt. Shasta climb, but Nigel was more interested in telling me about his OW (Obsession of the Week): Clovis people. Clovis culture is a prehistoric Paleoindian culture of North America at the end of the last ice age, about 13,000 years ago. I can tell he is rabid about it. He could talk of nothing but the obsidian spear head that he plans to make, using rocks to sharpen it, as the Clovis people did. Then he will lash it securely to the ‘spear.’ The obsidian he says he will obtain from the desert in southern California the next time his dad takes him camping; I don’t know what he plans to use for the spear. This should be interesting . . .

But it gladdened my heart to hear Nigel so wrapped up in his OW. That tells me that he is adapting to his new environment, comfortable and secure enough to let his obsessions occupy him, rather than watching videos all day and exhibiting echolalia. The best part about his obsessions is that they cause him to use a ton of spontaneous speech, and that’s something I always love to hear.