Catching Up

Updates on life, the kid, and the business

Hi all! I took a couple of weeks off from this newsletter. I’m a former political science professor, who started blogging back in 2003. Presidential elections are my Super Bowl. I went into Geek Zone tweeting with friends and staying up late watching results. I always enjoy the process regardless of the winner.

I wrote about the election in my other newsletter, Laura McKenna’s Apt. 11D. Some of the posts dealt with special education or disability issues, because that’s my lane. I wrote that there’s no connection between vaccines and autism, and talked about the origins of that conspiracy theory.

Today’s newsletter is an old-school blog post — personal updates and some links.

Autism Work

In the midst of all that political looniness, I gave a webinar for parents about filling out the paperwork for SSI, Medicaid, and the state systems. It took me four days to prepare that talk. It’s not easy to boil down an insane-in-the-membrane system into an interesting 40-minute talk!

Check it out, if you have trouble sleeping. But seriously, these governmental programs are an important way to supplement our vulnerable kids in the future. I want all parents to enroll their kids in the system.

I’ve got more webinars coming up. This Wednesday, I’ll be hosting a CPA, who will talk about special needs trusts, ABLE accounts and more. In two weeks, an education consultant is going to talk about how to prepare your neurodiverse student for college.

I like doing these webinars, because they help me organize content for my book. I like chatting with other experts and parents. However, they take me away from finishing my book. If I don’t get more uninterrupted writing time, I’m going to turn into Jack Nicholson in The Shining.

For my business newsletter, I wrote about how colleges support students with disabilities. I might publish it here as a standalone newsletter later this week. Feel free to subscribe to it, if you like shorter bits of information.

I’m starting a new gig in the spring. I’ll be continuing to help parents with autism-related issues, but it will be on a larger scale. To prepare for that job, I’m taking an education law class. It’s time-consuming, but illuminating.

I sat through 18 years of IEP meetings for my son, which produced documents that should be used to line hamster cages — utter rubbish. I’m not entirely sure that schools can be forced to do the right thing, but it definitely good to know the laws on these matters.

A couple of weeks ago, BuzzFeed reprinted an HuffPost article that I wrote about my boys and the prom three years ago. Someone owes me some royalties.

Autism Parenting

The autism mom stuff never ends, but it’s getting easier. Ian is taking four classes at the community college — three tech and one music. This is his first full time semester. The slow approach was right for him; he’s nailing his classes with only a little help on long written assignments.

Parents of autistic teens are sometimes frustrated because their kids aren’t ready for college right after high school. Many of those students had been in mainstream classes in high school and had very few supports. Their friends are going. The parents need a break. No matter how we want them to take the next step, some kids aren’t ready for the independence of a college campus at age 18.

But parents should know that our kids keep improving. They might not be ready for a hurdle at age 18, but could be totally ready by age 21. I keep growing. Our kids are, too.

Even though Ian’s doing fine at the community college, his situation isn’t perfect. When he’s not in class, he’s home with nothing to do. He finishes his homework too quickly. Community colleges don’t have much of a social life. Most days, he’s editing wikipedia pages about computer games in his room by himself, which doesn’t feel super healthy to me.

Because Ian has epilepsy, he can’t drive. The nearest bus is 1-1/2 miles away along a busy road with no sidewalks. He’s trapped here. He needs us to drive him back and forth to his college, back and forth to the gym, and back and forth social skills class.

Solution? We’re sending him to Landmark College in Vermont. He did their summer program last year and loved it. They offered him a full time spot and a scholarship. To fully cover the tuition bill, we had to scrounge funds from other sources. We don’t have a 529 for him. Did you know that the state DVRS offices will pay for college tuition in certain cases?

I’m sure that he could get a perfectly adequate computer science education at the community college, but Ian needs college for independence and social life. We’re only planning on sending him for a semester or two. He can have the independent experience and get some help on the liberal arts requirements that he’ll need for his degree. Then he can transfer to a more affordable college or go back to the community college to finish his degree.

Ultimately, Ian needs an apartment in a walkable small city. Not being able to drive in the suburbs is a nightmare. My next hurdle is to learn how to get him a disability designated apartment.

Everything Else

Is there anything other than work and driving the autistic kid back and forth to college. Of course, there is.

Some pictures: