Anyone with an autistic child? Get in here.

[stang2be]

You know that with a AU diagnosis that he has a good change of qualifying for SSI benefits. I don't approve of taking a government handout but I figured I'd throw that out there.

I had looked into at one point but some of it until he is 18 is based on my income and being a DFWMustangs baller I made too much for him to qualify. Once he hits 18 and we get legal guardianship I think we can claim it based on his own income.

[StangTamer]

My two youngest kids have autism my daughter is 14 and my son is 10. They weren't able to diagnose them until my kids were 3.5 years old. They were able to start school the following year when they turned 4 years old. My daughter just about killed me and my wife because she was so hard to raise. It seemed like she never slept and just screamed and cried from the day she was born until she was about 5 or 6. My son is a lot higher functioning than she is. He will look us in the eye and he would communicate with us better and show affection. My daughter wouldn't.

The best thing we ever did was take them to the school and have them diagnose them. Once they diagnosed them they both got in school early (free daycare!lol). It made a 180 degree difference in them. Every school in Texas has to be able to have accommodations to me the needs of a child with autism. You don't need to pay for anything. Just check the ratings of the school and see if it is any good. Also, if your house hold income is under 45-50k a year you can collect ssi benefits. When I hurt my back and was out on workers comp my I was not bringing in squat. We received around 700.00 a month for each kid and they were able to receive Medicaid as well. There are a lot of benefits out there depending on income. The school will give you all the information you need and point you in the right direction on what to apply for. My kids are in the Lake Dallas isd school district and I am very impressed with their program. There are a lot of places that make you pay. But I don't think that they are going to be any better than what the public school offers.(well at least the school my kids go to).

[StangTamer]

My best friends son had severe autism. He suffered drop attack seizures, and passed away last year at age 16. He was diagnosed early, but the severity was not known at the time. He had so many issues in his life, it was very hard to watch. He had some success with a cetocenic(sp) diet. After watching several documentaries, CBD would have been an option for him due to the frequency of his seizures. At one point, he was having hundreds a day. By the time that treatment was an option, he was already gone.

Do not take this condition lightly. Do not try to work on him from home.


RIP Bryce. I still miss you little buddy.

Man, that is tough to hear. RIP little guy. As hard as it was raising my daughter I am so thankful she didn't have seizures as well. My daughter made our life a living He'll for the first 5+ years. But when I was on having a nervous breakdown I would think to myself it could be worse. One kid that goes to school with my daughter has Down Syndrome and Autism. Then there are the kids that have seizures as well. The sad thing is, they say that 90% of people that have children with autism get divorced!!! Don't kid yourself there were plenty of times I wanted to get in the car Nd not look back. But, I would have to be a huge prick to leave my wife to raise them by herself. We always joked and say, "Whoever leaves first has to take the kids.". We have been married for 15 years now.lol

[Sgt Beavis]

OK, so we have a plan on how to take care of this now. We're going to sign my son up for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas. The Blue Advantage Plus Gold HMO individual plan will be $235 a month with a $2750 deductible and $3500 max out of pocket for the year.

That is a helluva lot cheaper than paying for his therapy 100% out of pocket. I can take the $3500 out of savings or perhaps from my end of year bonus (I'm overly optimistic) I also have some HP stock that is worth about $2000 I'm going to sell after it vests. I should also have a decent tax refund next year because of my mortgage and charity deductions. The only real downside is that we have to wait until Jan 1st for it to take effect.

My wife wants me to keep our son on my company health plan as well because his current pediatrician isn't in the network for BCBS but is under United Healthcare. Does anyone know if I can get burned for having two policies?

[Sgt Beavis]

I thought I'd take a moment to update everyone.

1. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas is DAMN AWESOME! I recently hit the max out of pocket for my son's autism therapy and now they are covering everything. So Now I'm just spending $235 a month for his insurance premiums.

2. The insurance for my new employer, VMware, appears to cover my son's therapy. We won't be using it this year since we've maxed the out of pocket on BCBS but we won't have any problems using it next year. The max out of pocket is a little lower and I'm putting money in our health savings account to cover out of pocket So full of Win this new job is.

3. Progress: Carpenter recently had an intelligence assessment and it was determined he is 'at least' average intelligence. However it's believed his actual intelligence level will end up being above average because he has a huge vocabulary. Speech therapy has made a huge world of difference. He speaks full sentences. He asks for what he wants (still working on saying Please ) There are all sorts of great things to report at this point. Up next for him is getting fitted with leg braces. His autism caused him to walk tippy toed at an early age and he still does that. His legs have bowed slightly. So we're getting braces to get that corrected.

So all is moving well. The fears I had when he was first diagnosed are gone. I'm still concerned about many things but we also have a plan. A few pics to share.

I recently got him an indoor trampoline. This helps with sensory issues with the added bonus of wearing his butt out.


Drawing of his favorite cartoon character, Totoro.


Oh yea, i put this boy to work as often as i can.


What…what would you say you do here?


The weekend after I told HP to get bent..

[Cooter]

how old is he now? I spoke in complete sentences devoid of speech impediment when I was two.

I was doing basic multiplication before kindergarten.

I was then thrown into the public school system.

I have never been diagnosed, but I'm pretty confident that I'm on the spectrum.

Some things are much easier when you're intelligent... some things are very difficult when you don't connect well with your peers... or your care-takers/educators...

[fordracing19]

Thanks for the update Rick. Beautiful family.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk

[Cooter]

those last two pictures are awesome, btw!

[4king]

My wife is a teacher and there are some parents who just refuse to accept their children have special needs solely for the label put on themselves by having an autistic child. They put their kids through so much trying to keep up at the same pace for their own reasons making life that much harder for their kids.

It's great to see and hear things are going so much better. You may find that once he is in school he will excel at certain subjects better than kids his age but just has trouble learning at his own pace

[Sgt Beavis]

He's four Coot. I kinda know what you mean. I was assessed with a 147IQ but there were so many issues to deal with that I always sucked at public schools.

[Cooter]

He's four Coot. I kinda know what you mean. I was assessed with a 147IQ but there were so many issues to deal with that I always sucked at public schools.

My organizational skills are suck... But I could fuck up some tests!

By the time I hit 8th-9th grade, I found I could typically skim by with a B by doing as little homework as possible and just nailing every test and quiz.

I did that through highschool. So much wasted time and potential

It's great to see the difference in autism awareness and treatement/adaptation/etc. now vs. back when we were young

[01-GATOR]

That's great news

[Cobraman]

It is crazy how much he looks like you man. Reminds me of Christian and Kim's daughter - you'd never know she wasn't blood

[Sgt Beavis]

It is crazy how much he looks like you man. Reminds me of Christian and Kim's daughter - you'd never know she wasn't blood

Man, I get that so much from total strangers. Just puts a mile wide grin on me every time.

[95DRGT]

I saw a thingl on the news the other day where they said music was helping autistic children. One of the guys from Cheap Trick son has autism and he started some special songs to help him.