Team No Sleep- Autismspeaks Walk

We are walking for our son Seth who was diagnosed with Autism in October 2015 when he turned 21 months. Seth was born nice and healthy just like any regular baby. He was reaching all his milestones, said mama, dada, waved bye bye, etc. All until one day he got really sick and caught bad reaction to virus that made him get a mild belspasy. The right side of his face was drooping. It was a scary moment for us between back and forth visits to the hospital and doctor. Shortly after little by little we noticed a change in Seth. He no longer was saying mama or dada. I felt him different from my daughter Heather. I was always told not to compare boys to girls because they develop differently which is true but I felt it was too drastically. He wouldn't react to certain expressions or things I would say. It felt as if he was going in the opposite direction as he turned one. He wasn't respoding to is name up util the point I thought maybe he was losing his hearing. We then took him to get a hearing test, which he passed. I addressed my concerns to the doctor and at this point he gave me the number to early intervention so that we can have Seth evaluated. I would spend all hours of the night googling everything we were experiencing with Seth. It really felt as if we were trying to figure out the pieces to the puzzle. All signs pointed to autism, I didn't really know what autism was so I google even more and researched about it. I kept on and on although many people kept saying oh he is fine, he is just a late bloomer, or he is ignoring you that's normal things boys do. I just didn't feel right and felt the urgency to get an answer to Seth's behavior. Early intervention evaluated Seth and recommended he gets occupational therapy once a week and work with a developmental instructor five times a week. I then asked could he be autistic? The evaluators said he does have a lot of sensory signs and suggested we see a neurologist. Of Course i googled all of that as well and took him to neurologist who then told us and confirmed that Seth is autistic. He suggested ABA therapy, which we were already two steps ahead because of early intervention. As each day goes by we are learning about Autism and how to adapt to our new lifestyle. Yes at times it can be overwhelming, but it also has made our family stronger. Seth is such a happy and unique boy he really does complete us. We are extremely grateful for all the help we have received from family and friends so far with Seth. I have to give credit to his developmental instructor Dianna, his occupational therapist Chrissy and my husband who all wor very closely with Seth everyday. Seth is making pogress and is ow pointing to request, improving his eye contact and babbling more sounds. This is our reason for making the extra effort to help raise funds for the autism awareness walk to continue finding the answer to help autism and reverse it! Thank you all we are truly blessed with such a great support team. Let's go and show awareness, Team No Sleep!