Saturday, May 17, 2008

Since it's Saturday... and now the end of the week, I thought I would give everyone a summary of how Sam's week went. We've had some highs and lows, but the fact remains...Sam continues to make progress everyday. He is talking up a storm and is speaking so clearly. He's even starting to put 3 and 4 words together to make sentences. Some highlights of the highs in Sam's life this week is that the Sheidy house will have a new fenced-in backyard in 2 weeks to keep Sam and Gabby safe. Mom and Dad will be able to enjoy the deck that we haven't been able to use really since we bought the house over 2 1/2 years ago. The cost of the fence is being funded through a Grant we received through DDS (otherwise known as the Dept. of Mental Retardation). We've also pretty much finalized the Walk for Autism T-Shirts for Sam. We were down to the wire this week on getting the images that my nephews girlfriend Kelly designed complete and getting quotes from various printers. We had gotten quotes as low as $500.00 and as high as $900.00+ for 50 shirts to be printed! Obviously, we chose the printer that quoted us $500.00. And thanks to the wonderful people that Mom works for at Nature's Grocer, Sam has a sponsor and we have received an extremely generous donation from Bob & Sue Spector whom will be helping us out with the cost of the shirts. I am proud to have the Nature's Grocer logo displayed on Sam's shirts. If any of you get a chance, stop by the store and say hello to Bob & Sue and check out the store. Mom loves being there! Now I don't want to make anyone sad with Sam's low of the week, but I do want to share an experience we had at Buckland Hills Mall on Wednesday night. I took the twins to the mall to get out of the house while Adam was working in the garage. After a little shopping, the kids wanted to play in the play area there, which we have done so many times before. They were having a blast......until.......a rough looking young family came in with their 3 kids. The oldest boy being maybe 13, the daughter being around 8 and the youngest boy 4 or 5 years old. As I was checking my voicemail, I heard a commotion and looked up to see Sam getting punched by the youngest boy. I've never in my life seen so much anger in a childs face than what I saw in that little boys face. As this was happening to Sam, I could see something in my Sam that made my heart break and opened my eyes to this whole Autism thing. Sam was standing there smiling at this boy who was hurting him...he was smiling. The parents of the young boy did not discipline their child, but instead stopped him from hurting Sam and hugged their boy. I grabbed Sam and Gabby and pulled them out of there and found a place in the corner and held him and cried. It was awful. This all happened because Sam wanted to play in the Telescope Cut-Out area with him and the boy didn't want him there so he started swinging. As I held Sam, I looked at him and told him that he has such goodness in him to still want to be with a person who hurts others. I told him that he is such a good boy. I've heard and read that children with Autism don't know what emotions are. They don't understand what happy, sad and angry is. I know that when I have cried, Sam has laughed at me. That's okay though, cause he ends up putting a smile on my face when he does that. In a funny sort of way, I'm thankful that Sam doesn't know how bad this world can be...he doesn't understand right now. Someday he will...I just know it.