Why Am I Crying Wednesday

So obviously it is Tuesday, but for the weekly theme, I decided to do Why Am I Crying Wednesdays! Very similar to Reasons My Son is Crying, another hilarious blog. These will be weekly stories about a child I work with and the hilarious and/or pitiful reason they cried.  Side note: I do not mean pitiful in a mean way, I mean it in oh my goodness, you cannot really be crying about that, kind of way. 

So to begin this week's post, I will be providing a little background information about behavior! Applied Behavior Analysis determines there are four functions of behavior and they are usually determined in a functional assessment. This is pretty much an observation to determine why the child is behaving the way he/she is. The four functions of behavior are:

• Escape/Avoidance- the child is acting out or performing their behavior because they want to avoid the task or demand in place
• Access to Tangibles- the child is acting out or performing their behavior because they want something (candy, goodies, ya know) 
• Self- Stimulation- the child is acting out or performing their behavior because it stimulates them (this is a difficult concept to explain) 

And finally-

• Attention-seeking behavior- the child is acting out or performing this behavior because they want attention

The child of this week's post, is KING 👑, of attention-seeking behavior. I love this little kiddo to death, but I have to conceal a few laughs every other day because of his behavior. Here goes my story....

Every day after lunch, a coworker and myself take a group of the little kids to our Motor room (a room with a trampoline, a ball-pit, bikes, etc.) to let some steam off and play a few group games. Every few days we play a video called Walking in the Jungle (if you have nothing better to do, take a listen. It'll burn in your head for days). The entire time we play the video and perform the actions it says to do, this child is laughing and smiling. He loves the entire first 3:15 minutes of this video! But at the end, we have to run around. After we run, this child will immediately fall to the ground and scream and cry. Not even just a few alligator tears, a full tantrum. My coworker and myself know it is attention-seeking behavior because the first few times, we tried to console him, and he only cried louder. Then, we started to ignore it, and now here is where the best part comes in. Once we started to ignore the behavior, he began to sit in our laps, FACE TO FACE, and scream. When we look away, he cocks his head to the side, following ours, and screams LOUDER. 

Now you're probably saying, "Sam, that is so awful, console that poor child!" But that is the thing with attention-seeking behavior, if you provide the attention they are seeking- it reinforces the behavior, which is quite the opposite reaction we want! 

If you find this as hilarious as I do, look forward to next Wednesday for another Why Am I Crying Wednesday! 💦💧

Image Credit: Riley's World

We Aren't Broken

This video has become one of my favorites of all the random stuff that floats around on Facebook, I am totally a junkie when it comes to videos on Facebook! Anyways, this video I find most important for those outside of the field because the message from this dad is so inspiring and it really shows what love can do for kids such as Chris that have been diagnosed on the spectrum.

In the center, we get a lot of parents who are at their wits end, they have had enough and they feel defeated. It is actually quite common. Like the father in this video said, it is a 24 hour a day job. It never ends. We have children, like Chris, who are non-vocal, self-injurious, or violent, or possibly all of the above. It can be exhausting for any parent, even those who pretend they have it all together.

It is my job to help these children, and my job requires a lot of love and patience. I am no saint. It drives me absolutely insane when people say I am a "special person" for what I chose to do for a living. I will not lie and say my job is easy, because it is far from that. I have been hit, bit, kicked, you name it. But I love my kids and I know it is not their fault.

The best message I get from this video is that these children are not "broken" and do not need to be cured. They need love and understanding. We must all understand that they have bad days, just like we do. Could you imagine not being able to communicate when you are scared, or hungry, or tired? I know I could not. The world needs to realize that Autism does not break a child, it simply means their light shines a little differently than ours. With love, understanding, and a commitment to caring for these children, we can all make their light shine brighter.

When we were told to start a blog, I knew immediately that I wanted to write about the kids I work with. Not simply because they are hilarious (even though they are), but because I found when I accepted this job that mostly every one in the field did not know much about Autism before getting a job in the field, including me. I want to change that. I believe awareness starts with knowledge and I was as clueless as anyone else before getting this job, but now I want to scream autism awareness from the rooftops! (Not really scream though, since a lot of autistic children hate loud noises)

Being an original outsider of this field before my career, I hope my posts will be informative, yet easily understood. The world of applied behavior analysis (I will discuss this more later) is in depth and can be rather challenging. I want the world to understand that ABA helps children on the spectrum of course, but manly I want my readers to understand that my kids are just that- kids. Their differences make them special and lovable. I have no doubt that throughout the stories and experiences I share along the way, that you will see why these kids have my heart and why awareness for them is so meaningful to me.

The puzzle piece symbol for autism was originally created because the disorder was so puzzling, but I've begun to believe that it fits the disorder so well because each child on the spectrum is their own piece of the puzzle, never knowing quite where they fit in, but filling the holes in the lives of others.