Autism & Sacrament Meeting

Last Sunday my nephew who has autism came to church with me. We went to go out the car, when low and behold he escape from me and went across the street to play in someones backyard. During Sacrament Meeting he escaped me and his dad and ran around the choir seats. He came and ran towards me; before he could get a way from me, I caught him. He made more noise then usual. His dad took him home early. He was on his way for a melt down.

He usually doesn't act like this. Usually he is more calm. What happened? Why was he acting like this? Why can't he behave like *other* children? The answer to all of the questions is; my nephew has autism.

He likes a schedule, he likes what is normal to him. When he is out of his norm. that is when he acts the way he did last Sunday.

People still say: "why he doesn't look like he has autism"

What does autism supposed to look like?

So now my mom and I got on a discussion. One thing I told her was that I believe in "strengths and weaknesses." Ponder about this for one moment. You are not going to ask a musician to perform brain surgery. The strength of a musician is to perform music.

Special needs have some amazing strengths. One strength is to except people, and love them without restraint or judgment. To love without restraint or judgment, is the Pure Love Of Christ. That is an amazing strength indeed.

Within our discussion, she told me something different. The autism spectrum is large, very large. So her thought was ( note, this is just thinking ) that in some way we are all on the spectrum. Everyday the autism spectrum is getting larger and larger. Everyday people are limited in strengths. Not everyone is a doctor, musician, writer, painter, carpenter, educator, and etc; be we appreciate others talents and strengths. We can go to them ask them for their help in their expertise in their field.

While I was working with special needs, is that the first thing that I have notice is that special needs are so ready to accept people. They don't care who you are, or where you come from. They just love you, you are their instant friend. If anything that is one thing that all special needs can teach us. How to love people, and in that same instant be a friend to all.

Cheers Everyone!

Reading challenge

It has just occurred to me that upon right hand side bar, I have two books that do not have links to them. "Don't call me Katie Rose," and "Time Riders," you might be wondering what they are about. These two books are out of print, you can however find "Time Riders" By Sierra St. James, at amazon.com for a little over $200.00, no kidding. "Don't call me Katie Rose" you can't find, lest I can't.

"Don't call me Katie Rose;" by Lenora Mattingly Webber, is an old love of mine. This book was read to me by my mother when I was very young. I also read it as a teen.

Synopsis:

"Sensitive Katie Rose Belford longs to be called Kathleen, which she feels is more glamorous, but that's an impossible dream in her informal family! Katie is on of six children, and her widowed mother has little time for Katie's "airs."

During a very eventful year-which includes transferring to a new high school and meeting a divinely handsome boy who just might be a beau-Katie struggles to come to terms with herself, her more extroverted family, and her name."

A delight. This book should have never been out of print.

The next is "Time Riders" By Sierra St. James. Another delight, and just all around fun.

Synopsis:

Sheridan and Taylor are ordinary college students until a mistake by twenty-fourth century scientists drags them 300 years into the future. They find themselves in Tachames, a colorful, orderly, and completely corrupt city. Religion is banned. All citizens are tracked. As the government and a mafia like organization called the Dakine struggle for power over the population, Sheridan and Taylor search for a way to escape the deadly walls of doomed Tachames. Echo, a mysterious, brilliant "wordsmith," says he’ll help them escape; Sheridan is drawn to him and wants to trust him, but Echo has secrets of his own.

Time Riders is an exciting and suspenseful adventure through an Orwellian world of lost freedom and humanity; yet the novel is interlaced with the humor of Sheridan and Taylor communicating through twentieth-century idioms that bewilder their Tachamesian hosts, while preserving their secrets and freedom.

Now you know why two of my books on the list do not have links.

Cheers Everyone!