Autism Night

The Children's Museum of Stevens Point holds autism night on the first Monday of every month. A young mom was there with her four-year-old son, Austin. He was a very happy little boy with enough energy to run a marathon. When Austin was born he appeared to be a normal healthy little boy, but when he turned two his development hit a standstill and almost everything he learned dissappeared. With the help of specialists he is learning to talk again, although is speech is limited. Being the mom of a child with autism is without a doubt a full-time job. Austin eat's anything. He will literally eat his clothing. He also has a problem with running away. He's a master escape artist (they live on 40 acres of land with alot of water). He also has no concept of pain. She hasn't taken him to a grocery store in over 3 months. The last time she took him to a grocery store, he cracked his head open. His whole body is almost insensitive, except for his head. His mom has a hard time brushing his teeth and he's already had to have surgery to remove some of his teeth because of decay that led to his gums. Something that is unique to his form of Autism is that he does "edging". He has rituals that he does to calm himself down in exciting situations. When new people walk past him he swings his arms in excitement and hops up and down in order to take-in new information. He also lines up his hot-wheel cars. He lines them up every time in a specific order. If he turns his head for a second, after he lined up the cars, his mom will move one just a slight bit. When he turns around and looks back at the cars, he is quick to realize it.

The other family that came in had a son named Logan. Logan was very passive, but he was very verbal. He even came over by us to talk and asked us a few questions. Logan, has a lower form of autism on the "spectrum" as his mom called it. His parents knew that Logan was autistic from when he was only a baby. He was always behind on development. Logan only goes to a school for kids with special needs for half a day. He hates loud noises. The Children's Museum has a train that the kids can play on and he was scared to even walk into that half of the building because he doesn't like the noise. He doesn't handle busy areas or stressful situations very well. The difference between the two boys shows the variations of autism.