A is for Apollo

   A is for Apollo. This is a sentiment that I have been reminded of since my little man could talk. At just shy of two years old, my chubby-cheeked little monster told me "A is for Apollo." It has been nearly 3 years since he first told me this and I still find that sometimes I have to remind myself. Some days, it's harder than others to remember that he is my little ray of sunshine. Some days, it's as if those other "A" words don't exist. The good moments and days far outnumber the bad, but the bad... they can be BAD - as in Big Bad Wolf bad. Those are the days I find myself tested and tried before a jury of one - a sweet-natured, brilliant little ray of sunshine aptly named after the Greek god of the sun, the arts and music. A boy who, despite being the middle child in a set of three, is a natural-born hermit who would rather stare at the wall than make eye contact with you, or her, or him, or anyone for that matter. Unless you have something he wants, he will look THROUGH you rather than at you. A is for Apollo.

   Apollo's gentle brown eyes, often fixed in a vacant stare, belie his intelligence. He wasn't allowed in the public Pre-Kindergarten program because, at nearly 4, he could add. A skill, which I may add, he taught himself AND his older brother nearly 6 months before. At the time, he could also count to 50 (15 in Spanish), subtract, spell, write and read. He loves to make noise - that child can raise a racket. He enjoys digging in the dirt. He tolerates playing with his brothers for short spurts of time, but he took to the television like a duck to water and he fell fanatically in love with Team Umizoomi and Dora. Looking back, I realize that his hyper-focus on those two shows is likely how he pieced together the puzzle of numbers so early and why he was able to name off things in Spanish, even though I had never actively taught him Spanish. But A is not for Aptitude, A is for Apollo.

   Apollo was labeled "scary smart" by a behavior therapist, but my sweet little boy has fewer social skills than a fly. I can count on one hand the children with whom he willingly plays. I don't even need a whole hand. The number is 2. A sister and brother pair he met in an art class a year and a half ago. A pair that he doesn't see as often as I would like, but whom he falls immediately back into step with every time he sees them. I don't know why he allowed an attachment to them, but I am thankful for it every time they play together. We usually have a couple good days following a play date. The other foot always falls eventually, but for a brief moment in time, his disinterest in other children subsides and he will talk about what he did with them, he will interact better with his brothers and he will show the slightest semblance of what other parents may take for granted - a tendency for a child to be a social butterfly and bloom in the brightest colors in the presence of others. But not Apollo. He shines, just not in the way one would expect. Apollo is not a simple puzzle that can be pieced together once and then subsequently from memory or rational deduction. Rational is not a word we use often when describing my sweet boy, either when describing his own behavior or how best to interact with him. He may hide with his head in the clouds 95% of the time, but when the right activity, the right person, or the right nuance can bring him back to Earth, he SHINES. Brighter than the brightest star. But A is not for Antisocial, A is for Apollo.

   By the time Apollo was 2, I realized he did things differently than my oldest, who was 19 months old when Apollo was born. Apollo was quirky and had odd ways of doing things. Stuffed animals had to be in a certain place on his bed. He ate methodically, always finishing all of something before moving on to the next. At first, it seemed that he simply had a different personality type than my oldest, Orion. Orion was very type-A, in your face, needy and a social genius. Very few people can resist Orion's charms and that was apparent from the time he was born. Apollo handled people differently. Rather, he ignored them. We thought he was just a quiet child, less needy, less clingy. He was two and a half years old when his father and I split and just shy of four the last time he saw his father. My first "aha" moment came shortly after his father left the home. We had moved in with my parents and they had a sliding glass door, which was something our house had not had. He began to obsess over tapping the glass with his knuckle every time he would walk past it. It was never loud, never pronounced, but it HAD to happen or he became visibly and audibly upset. I began to bring up the quirky behavior to his pediatrician, voicing a concern over possible causes. I was told that I was overthinking things and that he was too young to be able to make a diagnosis. I was told to have him tested when he was in school. His quirks began to multiply - this is when his hyperfocus really manifested itself. Apollo would request to watch the same show 12 times in a row and would have an argumentative temper-tantrum if he was denied. My new role became a Pacifist to keep the peace for the rest of the family. But A is not for Abnormal, A is for Apollo.

   I did my research and brought up my concerns to a new pediatrician. To my surprise, this one referred Apollo to counseling and mental health services. The first step was to talk, to attempt behavior adjustment, to try to understand why he was eccentric and how to combat it. What followed was a rough summer of a continual descent into full-fledged outlandishness. We would go to the park and Apollo would talk to himself. We would go to the library and Apollo would have a meltdown if it was too loud or too quiet. His brothers would want to change the channel on the TV and he would shriek if they interrupted something he was watching - no matter if he had never seen it or if he had seen it a hundred times. Any time his carefully thought-out plan was interrupted, he would launch into a nuclear meltdown, pacified only by being put into his room and ignored while he cried out the frustration. Last fall, I pushed for my little ray of sunshine to be tested to find out if the cause of his quirkiness was due to him being on the spectrum. The preliminary test came back as positive. My world stopped for a brief moment and then crashed down on top of me. It was a relief to have something resembling an answer, but scary at the same time. Simply being on the spectrum is far from definitive. It simply means that Apollo is different. Not broken, but different. It means that my quiet, intense, artsy little boy has Autism. But A is not for Autism, A is for Apollo.

A is not for Asperger's - Apollo's likely diagnosis following more testing - A is for Apollo.
A is not for Asinine - how some of his behaviors appear to other people - A is for Apollo.
A is not for Abrupt - how Apollo comes across to many as he is prone to interrupt - A is for Apollo.
A is not for Aggressive - how Apollo gets when he doesn't get his way - A is for Apollo.
A is not for Acidic or Acute or Aimless or Amuck or Apathetic or Austere - A is for Apollo.

   April is Autism Awareness Month and I found it fitting to start my blog about our journey on April 1st. Apollo is due for further testing on April 16 to make a definitive determination of his diagnosis. At this time, the doctors may decide that he is not on the spectrum after all. He may be diagnosed with nothing. He may be diagnosed with another disorder. He may be diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome -a diagnosis that likely should have been applied to Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Emily Dickinson, George Washington, Mark Twain, Isaac Newton, Thomas Edison, Mozart, Nikola Tesla, Bill Gates, Thomas Jefferson and Vincent Van Gogh, among others. It's a diagnosis, not a disaster. We shouldn't hide from it. It may help us find the right door to open to get into Apollo's mind and to let him out - to help him function in a world he doesn't understand and to help him interact with a world that doesn't understand him. Apollo is not defined by Autism and Autism does not define Apollo. He is not an autistic child - he is a child with Autism.  But A is not for Autism, A is for Apollo.