Well, since I seem to have conveyed all my anxiety well enough to pass it on to everyone else, I feel like I should write a quick post to say that the first two days have seemed to go ok. It's hard to really evaluate, since all my information is coming from this young man of little words. He was already deep into a Disney movie by the time I got home Monday (The Sword in the Stone), and wasn't really psyched about telling me about his day.

I mostly asked him a lot of poorly-constructed questions, so that he just kept answering "yes". (Did you eat your lunch in the cafeteria? Did your teacher eat with you?) When I asked about recess, he responded "I didn't go down the slide." I can only infer that someone wanted him to go down the slide, but he refused. Or he actually did go down the slide, but doesn't want to talk to me about it...

He brought home a "madlib" worksheet he had done at school. Each page had an incomplete sentence- he had to cut out a word to fit in the blank, such as "I come to school in a ____" and he had cut and glued the word and picture for "bus". One page read "My teacher is a real ____." Henry had filled in the blank with "sweetheart". I asked him what some of the other choices were. He looked up at me with an impish smile and said "monster"! So I'm glad he didn't choose that response.

I wrote a note to his teachers yesterday, asking for guidance on Henry's birthday treat next week. They don't do daily communication notebooks at this school. But maybe I'll just force my own by writing them a note every day.

Yesterday evening, when I asked about school, he said "I went to art!" Henry's never been much into art- too challenging to his fine motor skills- so I was happy to hear his excitement. I asked what they did in art and he said "I made a dragonfly!"

This morning he started saying that he didn't want to go to (the new school), he wanted to go back to (the old school). I told him that I know it's hard to start something new and that it would take some time to get used to (the new school). I decided not to push it, and declared that by Halloween he would really like his new school. (Hopefully it happens before then, but I thought that time frame might give him the idea that it would be soon, but not right away.)

Thank you everyone for your support, and I'm sorry for all the nervousness spilling all over the place. As you know, the new school decision has been a stressful one. Of course all parents worry about their children. But our autistic children ratchet that up a level or two. It was very comfortable to have Henry at L's house this summer- a comfortable safe zone where he could also spend time with his brother. But I was caught offguard a couple different times when I realized that L couldn't understand things Henry was saying to her. She has known him his whole life, and spent the most time with him of anyone, outside our immediate home. She loves him like he's her own child. And she still doesn't know what he's telling her half the time. Really eye-opening. And really frightening, if you think about it too much: there are only 4 people in this world who understand everything Henry says.

How am I supposed to send him out in the world, knowing that?

It doesn't help that I've been reading a lot of news stories that I shouldn't. I read about bad things that happen to children, as if I think that reading about them will prevent them from happening to my kids. And then the details get stuck in my head and shake loose in the middle of the night.

This cloud will blow past- don't worry. By the time we get through this fun-filled long weekend and celebrate Henry's 9th birthday Monday, I will be all sunshine and daisies again.

Just keep swimming, just keep swimming... maybe we should all get Dory tattoos (or t-shirts, for the needle-phobes.)