Naptime has been happening more on the floor than in the big boy bed. (cannot get the pics to upload but it IS pretty hilarious what I find every day!)
Liam and mommy had a special date to storytime at the library this morning. It was so wonderful to have that bonding time with him.
Which brings me to my next thing...which is extremely hard for me to admit. I have some major concerns at this time about Liam being autistic. The disorder shows up between the ages of 2 and 3 and as time goes on Liam is exhibiting more and more characteristics. I kept telling myself for a long time I was just "over worrying" as always, or he was "just a boy" but I feel I need to express my concerns out loud because my gut instinct continues to get stronger. Just as it was very hard to fully admit, understand and come to terms with Liam's language and cognitive delays, this is even harder. I am having a meeting with his ECI case manager this week to discuss and plan further testing specifically for ASD. In many ways, he is a very "ordinary" 2 year old...but there are some serious red flags that I just cannot continue to ignore or say "it is just Liam". He continues his repetitive behaviors in the house of acting out Blues Clues as if he is in his own world. He often does not respond when I call him by name. He has to have all of his books standing up on their sides in a line now. At storytime this morning, he walked on his toes (which has become a daily event) and did a lot of flapping of his hands and arms when other children or adults were trying to talk to him and most of all, he continues to rarely give eye contact when talked to by stranges and sometimes even those who are familiar. He is unable to attend to a task (playing with blocks for example) for longer than 3 minutes without retracting back to his "own world". He has been a puzzle I have been trying to put together since the time he was born. Like there was just SOMETHING that was not connecting. He has gone in stages with hitting himself in the head when frustrated and throwing tantrums has been going on for a while...but tantrums that just never seemed like "normal" tantrums to me and mainly caused when he cannot handle transitions and/or there is a change in routine. He still will not call Rick or I by name...he can SAY mommy and daddy, but does not make the connection to call for us when he needs us. All of this is EXTREMELY difficult for me to admit, but storytime this morning made me about 98% certain something is just "not right". We have not spent enough time one to one in social situations since the baby came and I see a lot of regression in his behaviors...not "bad"/acting out behaviors, he just definitely seems worlds away from some other kiddos his age. Call it immaturity, Call it me worrying too much, Call it him being a boy and believe me, I HOPE and PRAY that it IS indeed one of these things...BUT my gut tells me otherwise and I would be unable to live with myself if we did not look into this further. He is my little angel and I want to do whatever I can to create a stress-free/frustration-free life for him. Knowing will be the first step and from there we can become more educated on how to be proactive with helping him to live a "normal life". I am crying as I type this because when you become pregnant and then have that little baby you just KNOW that they will be perfect. Life can be tricky. We are also having his hearing checked by another audiologist for a second opinion, so hopefully we can rule out that his communication delay is not due to his hearing. In addition, it has always amazed me how advanced he is in all motor skills (fine and gross) but I have recently learned that this could also be another red flag...the HUGE discrepancy in the communication/social and motor skills areas. I love my little man so much and just ask for lots of prayers that I can be strong for him. It is breaking my heart but all I want is for him to have the BEST.LIFE.POSSIBLE. Liam, we LOVE you to the moon and back!!! :-)
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