I am a married mommy of a six year old son. I have been in the restaraunt business for seventeen years and a chef for the last eight years. My husband Teddy is an artist. We are in the process of starting to save money to open our own restaruant and art gallery here in Robertsdale. We have managed to create a little bohemian life here in the country with our cats and a garden. We plan a vegetable garden next year so we can put more toward our savings. Our son Adrian has Autism and we are working to raise awareness of this issue among other families and the community. He is in a wonderful program in school and making remarkable progress.

http://www.myspace.com/twofreidas 

                                            Life on the Spectrum

   My name is Noelle Mileski. I am a wife, cook, gardener, music lover, poetry reader. I

follow fashion and have an insane love of shoes. I am also the mother of a child with an Autism Spectrum Disorder. For those of you unfamiliar with it, Autism is a condition affecting the processing, integrating, and organizing of information that significantly impacts communication, social interaction, functional skills, and educational performance. There are many manifestations and degrees of severity within the autism spectrum. Some people have only mild cases called Asperger's Syndrome and High Functioning Autism, while some cases are very severe and those people need lifelong care. My son falls somewhere in the middle.  

    Our journey with autism began four years ago. I had a pretty normal pregnancy and delivery. Adrian, my son, met most babyhood milestones on time and seemed just like every other little boy until he was about two years old. We noticed he wasn't speaking as well as the other children in his preschool. His would repeat what other people said rather than speak on his own. He did not play with the other children. Instead he would spend hours on a green rocking horse, sometimes even falling asleep on it. He put his toys in straight line instead of playing with them and we couldn't stop him from chewing anything he could get his hands on. I would ask his teachers if he played with kids and they would say he did it when I wasn't there. Months later, after I had felt like maybe I was overreacting and nothing was wrong, they asked me if I thought my husband and I should take him to see someone. When I asked why they didn't say anything to me sooner and why they ignored me when I asked them about it, they said they didn't want to make me cry. I learned later this happens a lot. No one wants to be the one to tell a parent their child may have a problem. 



                              

  In August of that year Adrian started a special needs preschool. He got speech therapy every day by a woman who I think was his first love. Even today he still lights up if you mention Miss Heather. He met other children just like him. As time went on he started making some good progress. He learned his ABC's and numbers. He got on a schedule. At home it was tougher. He would melt down when couldn't make his needs known. He still chewed on everything in sight and it seemed like he was dismantling the house from one end to the other. No one tells you when you first learn about autism how much stress it can cause. It never ends, it is a twenty-four-hour-thing. Before he started kindergarten we finally got the word from his doctor that it was autism. Even though we knew it in our hearts it was still hard to look at that piece of paper and see "Condition : Autism , Prognosis : Poor ." 

 This past year he started a program though the school system called Project Reach. It is for children with autism or autistic-like behaviors. It is also the only program like it in the state. The teachers take a limited number of new students a year and we got lucky when Adrian got in.  They teach the same things as the rest of the school, so they have to be very creative with the way they do it. The goal of the program is for every child who goes through it to be able to a functioning member of society when they grow up. He has done very, very well in it so I know it works.

  Day to day life is still hard though even with the best of programs, and help. He has meltdowns, although they lessened in severity. At six he is still not potty-trained. He has sensory issues which are common in people with autism. Some have issues with light or the feel of certain clothing . Adrian has problems with sound. Things that normally wouldn't bother anyone are painful to him. We have to run his bath water before he gets in it because it's too loud. He covers his ears at the sound of the vacuum cleaner and his bus pulling up in the morning. He also has certain ways he like things done. If he gets a cookie you can't take the wrapper off until he asks. If food is broken he won't eat it. He likes to watch movies but will spend hours watching the menu. People ask us how we do this everyday and the answer is we just do. It's stressful but its life.

  If there is are many things we want someone who isn't dealing with this to know it's to be compassionate. if you see a child in a store having a temper tantrum, don't think they are just being bad. Don't think they just have bad parents. They may a problem you can't see. I once had a clerk in Wal-Mart tell me my son shouldn't still be in pull ups at his age. I have no problem saying I ate her for lunch. Another big misconception is that people with autism have no feelings or imagination. Not true. My son is affectionate, loving, and one of the most imaginative children I have ever been around. Only a child with a good imagination would walk around in a Batman suit with a Sherlock Holmes hat and coat over it. 

 So even though it is hard we wouldn't change it. It's our life and we will, still, just keep doing it.






all copyrights belong to Noelle Mileski