Growing Pains

If I had a nickel for every time someone said "she'll grow out of it" or "it will get easier as she gets older", I would need a much, much bigger coin jar.

Tiger had another assessment yesterday and it could have gone better. She spent the majority of the assessment stimming. She was pretty uncooperative, everything was too hard, and her anxiety was, well, visible. She was throwing her head back throughout, bouncing around the room, using baby talk and making weird noises. It was hard to watch. The specialist had to skip sections as Tiger was clearly in distress.  The mere mention of a time limit caused her so much anxiety that she went into fight or flight.
I really wanted to call it off and pull my baby into my arms, tell her it was ok, schedule it for another day, try again next year? I was so glad Daddybear was there. He is so stoic, my rock in this sea of testing and diagnoses. He holds us together during those painful moments of realization.

Tiger is not getting better.


Tiger can learn all the coping mechanisms she wants, she can acquire new skills, we can learn new ways to work around difficulties, buy 3 sided toothbrushes and clothes without buttons or tags, seamless socks and we can try new therapies, supplements etc., but she won't outgrow her autism.

The High Functioning Life, if we can teach her to be stoic, that's as good as cured right?



HFL Mama