Matthew Sumida: Christmas Train

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Christmas Train

We took Matthew to ride the Irvine Christmas Train with friends. Irvine Park does a great job with decorating and stringing lights everywhere and of course, there is a chance to see Santa. We did not plan for having to wait for hours in the freezing cold. It was also packed and very loud. It was sheer craziness. Regardless, there was something we walked away with that made us very grateful, and that is all the change that a year has brought for our little man. Last year this type of chaos would have triggered a monumental meltdown; Matthew would have been screaming and hitting everyone around him the entire time, unable to communicate as he had no language. We would have been unable to stay and he would have been out of control. Of course he was impatient last night as would any 3 year old be, but he is able to express what he wants and needs and process his environment so much more. He is able to let us know how to help him far more, even if what he needs is for us to cover hears ears to drown out the sound.

The kids did have fun once they finally got on the train and enjoyed seeing Santa. Even though it was not the most comfortable night, we always enjoying spending time with our friends.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...: Looks like fun but way to cold for my taste!
Cute pics and I like your hair.
Happy Holidays to all of you!
Kimmy; December 22, 2008 at 4:31 PM
Trojan Fan said...: He just gets cuter!
Hugs to Matthew!; December 23, 2008 at 4:30 PM

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Matthew Dean

We started this blog because we wanted to be able to keep our loved ones up to date on Matthew and the wonderful progress he is making. It has been a crazy time since receiving Matthew's diagnosis of moderate to severe Autism in February 2007.
Autism is classified by the World Health Organization and American Psychological Association as a developmental disability resulting from a disorder of the human central nervous system. It is considered to be a neurodevelopmental disorder. It typically begins before 3 and is lifelong. It is characterized by varying degrees of impairment in verbal & non verbal communication skills, social interactions, and restricted, repetitive & stereotyped patterns of behavior. Children w/autism often fail to respond to their name, are unable to speak or have delayed speech and often avoid eye contact. They tend to engage in repetitive movements like rocking, spinning, hand flapping and in self-abusive behavior such as biting or head-banging. All behaviors that Matthew was exhibiting regularly. At the time we sent letters to our loved ones, we described what autism was and that there was no cure for autism. Well...... that is not the case. You can recover from autism and to that end we are pursuing a combination of therapies. Matthew is in an intense intervention program consisting of ABA (Applied Behavioral Analysis), Speech Therapy and Occupational Therapy. He is in this program for between 6-8 hours daily. He is also on a gluten-free and casein-free diet which he has been on since February 2007. We began biomedical intervention in June 2007 as well and homeopathy in April 2008. We read stories all of the time about these parents who start the diet, biomed or other modalities and see a miracle before their eyes. We have not had that experience but with each added intervention we see improvement..... 10% here, 8% there. We know that we will reach that 100% mark and that day will be the second best day of our lives, the first being when our little angel was born! We will update this as often as possible to that you can celebrate Matthew's success with us.

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Christmas Train

2 comments:

Matthew Dean

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