Special Needs Stories: My Story
by Shannon Nash

April 24,1998 was the happiest day of my life. I had just given birth to a wonderful 8 lb. 11 oz. beautiful baby boy. My family had financial security. I was a successful CPA and tax attorney and my husband was a submarine officer in the United States Navy. We had a wonderful group of friends and family. As I sat in my hospital room holding my son and surrounded by my husband, mother and grandmother, I thought life could not be any better. I dreamed of all his firsts – his first step, his first word, his first little league game, his first high school football game, and so on. He was my special boy!

His early weeks were really quite normal. He made all of his milestones. Our first sign that something was a little different came at about 6 weeks of age. He woke up one morning and began to throw-up after every feeding. After several violent episodes it was time to go to the emergency room. We discovered that our perfect baby had little tiny gallstones! Gallstones are common for older people but in an infant! Luckily, you don’t need your gall bladder to live. Thus at the age of 6 months he had his gall bladder removed.

Life continued and our son seemed to be progressing at a normal rate. But by his first birthday party he was not walking. Okay, this is not the end of the world, after all many kids are late walkers. But there were other problems. His eyes had also begun to cross (a form of strabismus known as esotropia). In our son’s case it was getting severe. Thus, he had more surgeries (one at 12 months and again at 18 months). Again, these surgeries were very successful and we believed that our son was progressing, albeit at a somewhat slower pace.

At the age of 18 months our son began to walk! We were elated that he had finally reached this very important developmental milestone. Now all he needed to do was talk. So we did what every parent does. We inundated him with books, educational videotapes, and developmental baby toys. We thought his first word would come any day. However, he continued to babble and yes at times we could make out the mamas and the dadas but he didn’t know who was the mama and who was the dada. It was obvious that from a cognitive standpoint our son was not developing like other normal kids his age.

As first time parents, we really didn’t know what to expect and we certainly didn’t know anything about people with developmental delays. Sure we both had friends with autistic or mentally retarded family members, but we didn’t know anything about these people besides the fact that they existed. So we did what most new parents would do – we relied on our pediatrician. This pediatrician repeatedly told us not to worry and that our son would catch up to his peers. So we continued to pray and hope for the best.

At his 2nd birthday party, kids were running around, sharing their thoughts and all were happy to play with the clown that we hired to entertain them. That is all of the kids except our son. Some kids were potty trained, others were clinging onto mommy, but all of them were talking. Our son was barely communicating his needs, let alone verbalizing them. It was painfully obvious that he was significantly developmentally delayed.

After his party, we confronted our pediatrician and this time we refused to take no for an answer. At the same time we began having him tested by our state’s child development agency. They suggested that our son could be having hearing problems. We went back to our regular pediatrician with this news and he then referred us to an ears nose and throat doctor. Interestingly, prior to this meeting this pediatrician never mentioned hearing loss as a possible problem. The condition is known as Otitis Media or OME and looking back on things it should have been easy to diagnose. Our son had visited this pediatrician approximately five times between the ages of 18 months and 2 years and each time the doctor found that he had an ear infection. We would promptly treat the infection with antibiotics - which would clear up the inflammation but did nothing to drain the fluid that had been accumulating in his ears. The solution was easy and common. Our son had tubes placed in his ears to drain the fluid.

Again we thought, aha! We have found the problem and we believed that our son would now catch up to his peers. The first few weeks after the tubes were inserted our son seemed to be improving. He was babbling a lot more and responding appropriately to noises. But three weeks turned into three months and he still was not talking and his cognitive skills were not improving. So at 2½ years of age we were finally ready to admit that our son might have “special needs.”

I’m happy to report that our son is happy, healthy and 6 years old. He has several different official labels, but doctors and specialists agree that he is on the autistic spectrum. Officially, autism spectrum disorders are characterized by problems with social interaction and communication skills, and by the need for sameness or repetition in behavior. Translation: My son shares many common behaviors and characteristics of the standard definition of autism but the doctors cannot definitively diagnosis him in that way. Keep in mind that the autism spectrum is vast. Some kids will have very severe problems while others can be quite functional. For example, Lee Alderman, an African-American student made history in June of 2001 when he became the first autistic student to graduate as valedictorian of a Washington D.C. public high school! He now attends college at St. Mary’s College in Maryland.



1 | 2