Exciting changes!

WOW it has been a while since my last post (We want to see Dub's progress occur with some consistency before I blog it as official change), so I have a ton of exciting news to share! We are really beginning to meet the real Wilder; We are pulling him out of that window a little more every day. To all of you who have given of yourselves in so many different ways for Wilder: thank you.

Wilder's school teacher reports that he is interacting much more with herself and his classmates at school. She was even lucky enough to have captured the very first of these amazing moments in a photograph (the first picture in the slideshow above) which also helps us mark the very first photo that I can ever remember Wilder actually posing for. This is the very best picture in the world to me, and one that I had previously been uncertain if we would ever be able to see.

Little Dub can now also tell me details about things that are not in his direct line of vision. For example, he can tell me the colors of all of the Teletubbies now when laying in bed at night in the dark. I had mentioned in a previous post that he has never been able to imagine things and tell me details about them before, so this is really really cool!

That also means that he is hearing and processing questions and actually giving answers. He does realize i'm talking to him without my having to say his name 50 times. We see a definite heightened sense of awareness in him.

Last night we were coming home from playing with some friends and he was singing "The wheels on the bus" song. He went through every line that we always sing and then looked to his side, picked up a kleenex box and actually made up his own words to the song. He sang "The napkin on the bus says wipe your hands, wipe your hands... etc". This is probably one of the most amazing things that he has done ever in his life because it was his own abstract creation. I can't think of any other time that he has been original instead of echolalic or repetetive.

Wilder has always had a very hard time distinguishing emotions that other people display and reacting properly to them. For example, when Wilder sees someone crying he usually laughs. He gets angry when I smile at him sometimes. A few weeks ago, however, Waker was crying and Wilder walked over to him, patted him on the back, and said "are ok baby waker?" and then reassured him that "its ok baby waker" over and over again! he had some sympathy! He saw that it pleased me (an accomplishment in itself!), and he began doing it daily to receive the same reaction.

We have had Occupational Therapy at our house twice a week since November. One of the first reasons that we sought this therapy was because we were concerned about Wilder's inability to squeeze. He could not squeeze a handful of playdoh. He had never given us real hugs, only put his arms around us and said "squeeeeeze!" without actually doing so. He could not apply enough pressure to the pedals of his bike to get it to move. I am so happy to report that now Wilder is riding his tricycle all over the place, giving us lots of hugs, and playing with playdoh every day! Thanks so much Lynsay!

Wilder's stimming behaviors have decreased significantly. Wilder has a bunch of little toy people that he used to frequently gather, put in his bed, and kindof just roll around in. He would do that for hours if we would let him. Now when he plays he consistently pretends that one is daddy, he takes them to the tub and says "jump people!" and knocks them into the water. He still takes them to bed, but now he tells them to "lay down go night night people" and lays them on the pillow beside him. I estimate that before we began this treatment he did the stimming a dozen times per day. Now I count only 4-5 times per week, and - even more importantly - the intensity of his stimming has decreased overwhelmingly.

He also used to just stare at the spinning wheels of toy cars; now he pretends that the cars are running into each other and says "crashing!". I have not seen him inappropriately spin the wheels of anything in several weeks.

this week has brought with it another HUGE accomplishment: When I ask him if he wants choice A or choice B, Wilder can now consistently choose between the two things and answer his preference. Sometimes he echos the 2 choices first, but if i sit there without saying anything at all, he will then look into my eyes and announce his choice. This is just as monumental a step as his learning to say yes was!

I have twice this much to tell, but I will finish and post the rest later this week. Time to go to bed! Thank you all so much for taking such an interest in and showing such concern for little Wilder.