The entire drive, our three-year old slept and my husband kept rubbing my hands. I was nervous.. Anxious.. Excited. Nervous because I had no idea what to expect. Anxious because I was scared they were going to take her in to a room without us. Excited because I felt like we were finally going to have answers.
My hands were sweating. I was hot. I felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest. I just kept saying 'Peace of God, be with all of us' the entire way. Every sign we passed caused my nerves to escalate even more. 'New Albany,' 'Newark.'
When we arrived, I had a million emotions swirling through my heart and my mind. As we were sitting in the waiting room, my heart started to sink as time passed. I filled out papers while my husband watched our three-year old. There were about 6 other families there all with children who have been diagnosed with Autism. And you know what? All of those kids were talking. They were listening. They were sitting by their parents.
And my heart felt like someone stabbed it. I felt like someone took the very breath from my body.
I became overwhelmed with pain.. Sadness.. Fear.. Anger. I know, I know.. You aren't supposed to be angry at God. But I'm just putting it on the table-- there's no use in hiding it. He sees my heart anyways and lying would only make it worse. He knows the truth.
I was angry because it was then I realized 'Maybe we don't have a handle on this.' I know you aren't supposed to compare. You're supposed to have faith.. Determination. But when I saw her spinning around the room... Melting down because they put an arm band on her (which they took off about 2 minutes later and gave her a name tag instead, thank God lol) I realized.. Maybe she's further behind than I thought?
It killed me inside!
My husband kept holding my hand, squeezing it. He would say 'I know it's hard. I know sweetie.' Thank God he was with me because I swear in those moments, he was the only thing holding me together.
Why was I so emotional? I always say I know that an Autism diagnosis doesn't mean my three-year old's life is over. It's not. I'm emotional because I see the development of other three and four year olds and reality sets in for me. They asked a question yesterday 'Where do you think your child is at developmentally?' And do you know how hard it was to think of your 21-month old daughter and think 'My three-year is not even to that point yet?'
They called us back and we met an amazing psychologist. I know 'amazing' is a pretty vague term, but I can't think of any other way to describe him.
As soon as we walked in his room, he led tayler to the toys and he got right on her level. I could have cried seeing the big smile on her face. She felt safe. That was relieving.
We sat and talked for awhile. He asked numerous questions, he gave advice... I walked away feeling like I had learned so much and we only sat with him for a little over an hour. I'm sure he has been doing this a long time, but I was amazed at how well he knew Tayler.. And we had only been there for an hour. It was like he knew her all her life.
She spent the majority of time lining up the animals he had there.. And the alphabet magnets he had on his filing cabinet. We told him that's her fixation-- numbers and letters. Just a few days ago, she made a sequence of 13 numbers, not in numerical order. She would then mix them up, move them to the next room, and put them in the exact sequence again. I was impressed considering I can't even remember a phone number when someone tells me.
As we were finishing up our meeting, he shut his laptop, looked right in our eyes, and said 'We look for three things when [officially] diagnosing someone with Autism.' (Her pediatrician confirmed the signs in January, but we needed a psychologist to diagnosis and give us the tools to help her.) He then proceeded to say that she was showing all signs, so we would officially be coming back for a more in-depth evaluation.
Once again, I felt relief and pain.
I already knew this. Why was I still crying hearing the words?
The psychologist sat and talked to us for quite awhile about what this means for us.. For Tayler. He gave us three things to work on over the next few weeks and he got is set up with speech therapy which I am over the moon about. I am anxious for the day I hear 'I love you' from my sweet girl!
We are working on eye contact over the next few weeks which is interesting to say the least..
Leaving Nationwide yesterday morning felt amazing. I finally feel like we have the keys (not even all of them) to helping her! I can't imagine how we are going to feel a year from now because I already feel as though we are making progress.
And I also realized that the Autism Spectrum is a spectrum for a reason. 'When you meet one child with autism, you have met one child with autism.' All of them are different, including my girl. She isn't behind. She isn't less. She's herself. That's it.
We have such an amazing support system for our family as well as Tayler. People that love her and want the best for her. My husband has been so patient with her, working on everything the psychologist told us yesterday. Watching him play with her, attempt to make eye contact with her... It makes me fall in love with him all over. I cried before going in to the appointment because I got text message after text message from sweet friends. My mom called me asking for all of the information her and my dad could have to help them understand the depths of Autism and how they can help... As I said, the support is amazing. I couldn't ask for a better family or friends.
Thank you all for sharing in our family's obstacles and triumphs. We love all of you. And as always, thank you for letting me share my heart.
I feel like we are finally headed in the right direction. I'm not naive enough to believe we won't have tough days, but I am thankful that we finally have a plan of action.. And lots of knowledgeable people on our side!
God is good, that's all I can say. I might get angry at times... Question certain things, but at the end of the day, I know He has our best interest at heart and He is holding our family in His hands.
Please just keep all of us in your prayers over the next few weeks. We have a lot of things we have to work on.. Some things we have to change.. Before her 2-day evaluation in March. And we will probably need even more prayers for that.
We still receive messages saying 'if there's anything I can do, please let us know..' And I touched on this in previous blogs-- all we ask right now is that you love on Tayler (and our 1 year old and our 3-month old.) Spend time with her. Play with her. Talk to her. She might not be able to talk back, but she can listen. LOVE her. BE THERE for her. SPEND TIME with her. Let her know you care. She needs all the support she can right now because she is going to have some uncomfortable changes in her future that push her outside her comfort zone.. And ours as well.
We appreciate all of you!
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