Matthew Sumida: December 2010

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Christmas thru the years....

My precious boy has grown up so much...I can't believe he is not a baby anymore. It has gone by too fast...sometimes I just want to slow the clock down.
Here is a stroll down Christmas card lane.

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

Our sweet, beautiful boy! We love you so much, I hope you always know that.

Thursday, December 9, 2010

Hard Times

I finally uploaded the photos from the end of season soccer party. It was such a great experience for Matthew and I feel like he really benefited from it. I am looking forward to spring soccer!

Our awesome coaches who made it so much fun!
We love you coach Jon and Joe!

Matthew was so excited to get a trophy!
*****
So, keeping things real, it has been 2 of the worst weeks I can remember. I was hoping the new meds would help but things seem to get worse by the day. I feel like I am watching Matthew unravel and I can't do anything to help. I imagine it is difficult to be in his skin right now. The meltdowns, insomnia, rigidity is wearing on us right now. Please say a little prayer that the doctor is able to find the med/dose that will help Matthew get back to his sweet, happy and sunny self.
I HATE autism!

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Matthew is in love!

Can you say head over heels? Matthew just adores his Pandy. Pictures say it all!

Nothing like a wet puppy kiss!

Matthew has been so patient and gentle with his Pandy.

He begs to snuggle with Pandy every night.

Pandy is crate trained but we let him stay in bed with Matthew until Matthew falls asleep and then move Pandy to his own crate next to Matthew's bed.
Truth be told it has been a brutal few weeks. We had a change in Matthew's med and the fallout while the doctor tried different meds/doses has been exhausting. Meltdowns every few hours and behaviors we haven't seen in a long time. Of course the person it is hardest on is Matthew, and Pandy has been a great source of comfort to him. After 2 weeks of upheaval I think the doctor has hit the target....I don't want to jinx it yet so I will just save it for another post.

Matthew. you are such a wonderful boy and we love you so much. We are proud of how hard you work. Your smile fills my heart!

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.