Long autism day...

or week. Or month. You name it. Since puberty hit, i guess. Part of it, I'm sure, is me being pregnant and tired, and pretty much done with crazy for now.

Fortunately we had a Mobley appointment yesterday, in which we could discuss some of the more recent problems. I'm labeling them as regressions. Her stimming has gone sky high, she's hurting herself more, she's yelling and almost tic-like in her verbal stims (which the Mobley had mentioned previously that she's a tetch touretty. Really loud and deep, gruff barking, clearing her throat, grunting, etc) At the museum on Monday she bull-dozed a few elderly people over, with a weird, stomping pace that she just couldn't stop. And if you tried to look in her eyes, they just rolled away, she couldn't cope with it. 

I'm reassured that some of this is normal, with puberty in autism (I think I blogged about that before, adolescent regression of autism?). Part of it is that she's been sneaking the corn. She's allergic to it, not in an anaphylactic way, but very behavioral. She also craves it, much like any addict craves the item to which they are addicted. Zane and I finally managed to talk about it and realized that nearly every day she'd been sneaking something, she even snuck out to the truck and ate a cup full of sonic mints, which she HATES. She has regular peppermint, corn free in the house, and she still snuck out there. She was caught eating store-bought cake out of the trash at someone else's house. She's been eating the lotion she got for Christmas (and yep, pretty much anything that smells purty has corn-based carriers, lotion, soaps, cleaners) 

There isn't much we could do about it. I'm very much opposed to medicating for behavior. In the long run, it doesn't help because behavior needs to be replaced by more appropriate behavior. The Mobley agrees. I'm opposed to getting rid of all the corn, because we have kids with other allergies and it limits THEIR food. The Mobley agrees that even if we got rid of all the corn in our house, it wouldn't help, because it's a big freakin world out there. We can't do that her whole life. So, we're filling her spare time with LOTS of stuff, mostly chores because she does not like most hobby type stuff. She doesn't play. She might ride her bike for ten minutes, but she won't just play with toys or jump or swing. She LOVES to do dishes and laundry, so before she gets overwhelmed, we're directing her to check on those. She's taking the trash out alot. She's not coordinated enough to knit or crochet or sew, so I'm trying to find some other useful crafty type of hand filler. She's not coloring as much, just small artworks for friends when they come over. She's not writing much anymore either. She does love to listen to the Muppets CD she has, and she's been singing along.