"MY LAST YEAR.....

....AS A PRE-TEEN"!!!!
That is what was announced to me yesterday morning. The date of Erin's birthday.
Erin turned 12 years old yesterday. She is in the 6th grade and taking regular classes
without the need for an aide. Erin's report card was 6 A's and 2 B's.
Erin was born into this world SCREAMING. I gave birth to her in a Birthing Center. There
were no medical interventions..meaning, no epidural, no pain medication, no immunization
at birth...just me, Patrick and a wonderful midwife.
Erin was 10 pounds at birth and just at 23 inches. I thought I had given birth to a toddler.
She was always large and today, at the age of 12 years old, she is already 5' 9"....
Erin screamed until she turned 3 years old. She was frustrated. Erin started walking
at 8 months. She hated laying still. She would roll out of her bouncy chair when she was
2 months old.
When Erin began to talk, she became the happiest toddler in the world. She never stopped smiling. Erin became joyful and that has remained the same.
Erin did not speak until she turned 4 years old. She started talking and has not stopped.
Erin had trouble reading in Kindergarten and was almost held back. She taught herself
to read by the beginning of First Grade.
Erin has always accomplished whatever she has set her mind to. When she wanted to ride
her bike, without training wheels, she practiced on the grass until she could do it.

We do not know why Erin has come so far. She has had continuous Speech therapies. During
her most vital years Erin participated in 20 hours a week of OT, Speech, Play and Recreational Therapies. We did this until she was about 9 years old. Then she met all of her goals. Erin is a Success Story without all of the drama.
Erin still has some sensory issues...she is still Autistic. She is not cured or recovered. She remained gluten-filled and casein-full her whole 12 years, yet is surpassing her NT peers in academics. Socially, Erin is a butterfly whose wings are forever soaring.

I cannot wait to see what the future holds for Erin...the World is hers and thereis no holding her back. Happy Birthday Erin...keep reaching for those stars...they will be yours.

GUESS WHAT???

I'M AUTISTIC....

My son, Patrick is in the 3rd grade. He brought his report card home yesterday.
4 A's, 2 B's....all 4's in behavior and social skills...not bad, huh?

Today, a classmate did a report on Albert Einstein. The little boy reported that Albert Einstein might have been Autistic.
A classmate asked, "What is Autism"?
Little Patrick raised his hand and said, "Guess what?, I am Autistic"...
The classmate says, "Oh, Autism means you are smart".....

I love that school......

REDEFINING AUTISM...

We have been inundated lately with Autism. There is stories about Autism everywhere.

I heard a person say, in the grocery store line, Autism is being "shoved down our throats". "If I see that Jenny McCarthy one more time, I will puke"...not my words, but I tend to agree with these people.

Jenny McCarthy has no idea what Autism truly is....she is just so hell-bent on being in "mob" mode that she is not thinking about what she is saying.
She has a huge mouth, but, so do I.

The problem I have with Jenny McCarthy is that she is promoting herself as a “autism” expert. I don’t really trust her any more than I trust any doctor who says they can “cure” autism….Jenny alleviated her son’s GI symptoms..she did not cure his Autism.If you observe her beautiful son, he still shows many Autistic characteristics.GI problems are not symptoms for Autism.Jenny McCarthy is promoting the GFCF diet as if she invented it. Believe me, it has been around a lot longer than Ms. McCarthy.Ms. McCarthy does not impress alot of people except those as desperate as herself.Do I have issues with her? Heck yeah!!She has taken Autism and made it a “dirty” word.Not in our house…In our home, it is 5 children who function appropriatly at school, in the community and in private. This took alot of hard work and alot of therapy, and all with wheat and dairy.Go figure!!!

Jenny McCarthy calls the MMR vaccine the "Autism Vaccine"...funny, my most severely affected child with Autism NEVER had the MMR vaccine....how do you account for his Autism, Jenny?

Jenny is new to Autism....it really scares me that she is leading desperate parent's down a really dangerous path.

When Jenny stated that there are no older children or adults with Autism, that "Autism is New"...

You must read the whole interview, but here is a snippet...this really shows how incredibly "brain-washed" Jenny McCarthy has become...

PR.com: As these kids grow up and get into adolescence and into their early twenties, what happens? You never hear about autistic teenagers. You never hear about autistic college kids, or even kids who had autism when they were young and now they’re recovered. What happens to them on their journey?
Jenny McCarthy: It’s interesting, because autism is so prevalent now, just in the past six or seven years. These kids aren’t adults yet. They’re out there, but it surely isn’t one in ninety-four boys (the current statistic). But let me tell you, when all of these kids are in their twenties, it’s going to be an amazing world to see. I don’t know any [who] are older. People are saying autism’s on the rise just because people are getting diagnosed more. Bullshit! Then show me one in ninety-four men walking around with autism.
PR.com: You never hear about it, you never see it. Where are the autistic adults?
Jenny McCarthy: It’s cause there weren’t any. It’s all now.

Amazing, huh?

Hey, Jenny, c'mon over, I will be happy to show you an older child with Autism...and hey, while we are at it, let me introduce you to some adult friends of mine who happen to have Autism....

Here is the link to the rest of the interview..just for fun...

http://www.pr.com/article/1076

Propaganda at it's very best....

OUTNUMBERED....

I was sitting at dinner, observing my children eating and conversing with each other. Typical talk from what society believes to be, non-typical kids.

Erin and Meaghan are talking about pre-teen stuff, like music and Hannah Montana (of course). They are discussing how to use a knife and fork correctly (Erin had a light-bulb moment--priceless).

Little Patrick is talking about what is going on in school this week and sports, of course. He is now hugging both sisters around the neck.

Kiernan is happily eating his chicken breast and humming...he is so happy when he gets chicken for dinner.

The kids helped me make dinner. 3 of them cleaned the trampoline room. One wants to clean the toilets....I told her I would do that tomorrow.

We are a large family. We forget we have children with Autism.
This does not mean we do not have children with Autism...but, we forget becasue, they go together so nicely.

Maybe it is because us Neuro-typical people in our home are so outnumbered by the persons with Autism, that in our home....Autism is the "normal".....

Instead of trying so hard to get our children to behave like a normal child, we have let them remain comfortable in their skin. We have seen great progress both emotionally, educationally, and physically. We have been complemented, too many times to count, on how well our children behave. We could not be more proud of any of our children.
The only thing that Autism has taught us is that we must work just a bit harder to get these children ready for Society. They are so above average, that average is not acceptable.

I rest my very tired head, every night...I say my prayers and thank God for giving me the ability to be these children's Mother. I thank God for the blessings I have received. I thank God for letting me be Outnumbered...because, through my husband and my children, I have been more blessed than I can ever have imagined.

HEADLINES...How Jenny McCarthy SAVED Her Son...

This is an excerpt from US Magazine...



Jenny McCarthy opened up exclusively to Us Weekly about her son Evan's battle with autism, and how she won't stop her fight to be heard.

When Jenny found out that her son had autism, she said that she made a deal with God that day. If God showed her how to fix Evan, then she would teach the world how to do it. "My perception of what is really important changed. Needing to have the best designer shoes? When your kid's sick, it's like, "Who cares?" McCarthy tells Us.
As for more kids, Jenny says "No, I got my ass kicked, I got it kicked ... Now all my attention is toward maintaining Evan's recovery, helping all these families, being a great girlfriend to Jim and that's it."



Oh, my, goodness !!!

Poor Evan, to now know his Mother thought of him as so broken she had to "fix" him.

I saw an interview with Ms. McCarthy on one of the "magazine" shows with Billy Bush.
Jenny was showing Mr. Bush Evan's school room that is in her house. He is home-schooled, because she says his immune system is so bad, he can pick up many germs.

Children with Autism need to be inclusioned with "neuro-typical" children, because this is where they learn to socialize. Not in a closed classroom with absolutely no classmates.

In US Magazine, Jenny is saying she must maintain Evan's recovery...that makes absolutely no sense. You are either recovered or not. If you must maintain it, then the Autism is still there. Autism is not a diagnosis that is removeable. A child can improve on their Autistic symptoms, but they are still Autistic.

Make up your mind, Jenny....

On Oprah, he is cured..On Larry King, he is cured....in US Magazine, he is recovered.

Evan is a beautiful little boy. He is lucky to be growing up in a home that has no worries about the cost of helping him and his Autism. Autism is very expensive. Jenny McCarthy lives in a huge mansion with financial support surrounding her. Jenny is very disillusioned when she puts herself out there like "one of the normal parent's" who has to put off paying a bill in order to pay for a therapy.

When talking about having more children...Ms. McCarthy talks about having her ass kicked....pretty sad. I hope that when Evan grows up and is able to grasp the things his mother has written about him, she is able to explain away her insensitive remarks about her son.

When you are in the public eye, you are open for scrutiny. Our family has experienced this, not too the extreme as Ms. McCarthy, but we were scrutinized pretty good.

Jenny McCarthy makes some pretty bold claims.
There is so much information on autism that is not relayed on talk shows like Oprah and Extra. Jenny McCarthy, when grasping for facts, throws out insults. Jenny McCarthy is really not the Autism expert she portrays herself to be. She did not invent the GFCF diet. The diet has been around at least 15 years...we had our oldest on the GFCF diet back then.
The thing that really gets me the most about Jenny McCarthy is the fact that when she asks for testimonials on improved children with Autism, she does not want to see the children that are improving without the GFCF diet or without chelation. She does not want to show the world that children, such as my own, are progressing as fast or faster without the use of biomedical interventions.

I have said this from the beginning of the whole Biomed vs. Non-Biomed "war"....there needs to be two sides shown to everything. You must give parent's who have children that are newly diagnosed with autism the ability to make decisions with a clear head. Not with propaganda and celebrity-endorsed alternative treatments.

EXTREME MAKEOVER EXPERIENCE...

I have been thinking alot lately about our home and being selected to have an Extreme Makeover. I get asked daily what it was like and were the people really that nice, like they
are on television???
I have kept pretty quiet about this publicly. I really did not want to seem to be gloating or
arrogant. My family truly does feel blessed and we know God had a huge hand in this.

In late October of 2006, I received a statement from our mortgage company (who is now
out of business) stating they were going to start foreclosure proceedings as early as 30 days
from the date of the letter.
I take my kids to school every morning. Patrick would drop us off in the morning and I would
walk home to get Caitlin off on the bus.
The first week of November, I walked home. I always do my talk with God on my walks, this
morning was no different, except that I asked God to help me financially. I never have done
this before, and I felt guilty that day. I asked God to take the burden of losing my home off
of my shoulders. Suddenly, I felt a great relief come off of my chest....I really felt like every-
thing was going to be okay.
The next day, I receive a call from my neighbor, who nominated us for Extreme Makeover
Home Edition. He said he had received a call from a producer on EMHE who wanted to
talk to me ASAP. I was so nervous.
I talked to the producer for over 2 hours that Monday...he told me he would be here to see
us by Thursday of the same week....yes, that fast.
My husband and my heads were spinning.....what if we don't get it? What if they don't like
us??? (how could that be?).
We did not have any idea of all of the behind the scenes work that goes into making our dream
come true, but Man, they work their tails off.

All I will say is this about the process, because it is a very personal experience.....the people
who are involved from the camerman to the stars of the show (Hello Ty, Eduardo, Paul, Paige,
and Tanya) are 100% behind you and your family. You worry about nothing....your home,
your kids, your family, your neighbors, etc.

I will say this....when I heard Ty yelling in the megaphone "O'Donnell Family, Patrick, Jeanette,
Caitlin, Deirdre, Erin, Meaghan, Patrick, Kiernan..come on out", I thought I was still dreaming
from the night before.
When I saw them standing in my front yard...I saw Angels surrounded by light....I still feel
that way.

We have had many nay sayers trying to say things like:
"They don't deserve that house"...
"They will just trash that house too"....
"They won't be able to afford the bills".....
"Why did they get that house, we need it more"....etc.

I wish everyone could have this experience. I really do.
I wish everyone, once in their lives, could win the lottery like
we did....
We know we are lucky...we know we are blessed....we will never take this gift
for granted.

Our show is being reaired on Monday evening and Tuesday evening on
TVLand....this always brings up the memories we felt that week.
I wish the show could show all of the fun we had on vacation in Crested Butte, CO.
I wish the show could show the dedication and devotion the team at Adaptive Sports
in Crested Butte showed our children. With respect and dignity.....amazing.
I wish the show would show all of the behind-the-scenes personel that spent endless
time building our home. All of the volunteers from our community who rallied
together to build our home.

Every time I walk in this house, I feel them.

In our kitchen is a tin ceiling. There are hand and fingerprints all over them.
People aske me why I don't wipe them off...
I always answer, "Those hand and finger prints were put there by someone who
gave up a few hours to make sure that we had a home that was safe and secure for
our children....I like them...the fingerprints remind me of this".

In December, it will be 2 years since our Extreme Makeover Home Experience. I think
about it every day. It just doesn't happen to your family....you become a part of it...
Not too bad, huh????

A QUIET DAY....

I know....how can you have a quiet day with 6 children? Especially when 5 of them have Autism???
Easy, as we continued to have more children, we had to come to an agreement on how to raise our children. Should we raise them as children who will contribute to society, or should we let them have Autism be an excuse for their behaviors and their educational future?
At 11:00, I took little Patrick, 7, to a UT-OU football party. A very big deal around here. I got back home and Patrick told me the mail had arrived. He could not get the mail, because Kiernan was home and needed attending to (you cannot leave him for a second).
In the mail was Erin, Deirdre, and Caitlin's report cards. I am proud to announce all A's and B's on all 3. I would like all A's, but c'mon....A's and B's are pretty darn good.
Erin went out about 2pm shopping with her best friend and her mother. I put a 20 pound turkey in the oven and went to the store. I had enough store points to get the fabulous roasting pan I have been saving for....yippee!!! Little things make me happy, can ya tell???
We watched the game, UT won....we ate turkey....I picked up little Patrick from his party...Erin returned home and sang opera all evening. Kiernan twirled in his chair and bounced on his ball. Caitlin got her pretzels...Deirdre arranged for bowling tomorrow with her church group...and Meaghan wrote a beautiful song and sang it to us....
Yep, A Quiet Day....