Thursday, September 14, 2006

Non-PC play and Celebrating Each Day With Autism

It's ironic how inappropriate play becomes another kind of inappropriate play. I heard from a fellow recovered parent recently how he celebrated inappropriate activities, and how often it often looked like favoritism to his NT daughter.

He writes 'My daughter, now 17, gets it. She also lets me know that I let J. get away with lots of things that she could never have gotten away with. One day, J. wrote all over his bedroom wall with a marker. How can you yell at a kid for drawing after spending 2 years and many thousands of dollars trying to teach him how to hold a pencil? How much can you yell at him for playing hockey in the house when you spent years not knowing if he could ever play any sports?'What a fabulous example.

I could totally relate, and shared my examples:

I cheered Leo on when he made a gun out of Legos, or played swords with his friends, much to the disapproval of certain parents. He was finally interested in appropriate things and knew how to play and be social with his friends! Leo would run around pretending to be a power ranger and blow stuff up. Love it! I celebrate each time I see this. And I still get the chills when I compare Leo's art on the hallways of his elementary school - all from a child that needed the help of a rubber band to hold a marker.

I'm all about inappropriate play! Also, we have skateboards, a pull-up bar, soccer balls, and footballs in the house. Both my kids learned to ride bikes in the house (trust me it's not big, but long).

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