Ohhhh the Drama...

Warning: Extremely long post…The longest I have EVER done-just to warn you.

I try really hard not to blog about my frustrations with Kayler. Part of the reason is that I don’t want to seem like a whiner. The other part is that sometimes, I truly have no frustrations with him, and I cherish those times. Right now is not one of those times.

At church Sunday, he was terrible in Sacrament meeting. I’m sorry to say…unless you have had a child like him, you will not know the true meaning of “terrible” until you have experienced it, or watched him. My parents came to our church once a few months ago, and after we left, my dad patted me on the shoulder and said, “Kandice, if you go inactive I would never hold it against you.” It is that bad….

He continued on being naughty in Nursery. First off, our nursery is SO big. It has 3 of the best leaders though. They are my friends Erin and Kyndi, along with our neighbor Toni who has 5 very rambunctious kids of her own, so she is used to chaos. They are all great leaders, but our ward has SO many kids. I think there are usually 20+ each week. Well, Kayler escaped somehow last week. Luckily my brother was in the hall and captured him and took him back to class. That worries me so much because our church is on the Naples Highway. He is strong enough to open the outside doors, so if he happens to get out again….who knows what will happen.

The next thing that bothered me is that I noticed a little girl with scratch marks on her face. Her mom asked what had happened and I knew right away it was Kayler’s fault. I called Erin and she said that he had attacked several kids, and had been doing not so well. A lot of parents stay in Nursery with their kids, and a lot of them were asking what the heck was wrong with Kayler, why would he act that way, etc.

So I was SO embarrassed. I had decided awhile back that I didn’t owe anyone an explanation of why he acts the way he does. After he hurt several children, I decided to put myself in their situation, and if it were me, I would want an explanation. So I talked to my friend Nikki, who had an autistic child in the Nursery class she had taught. The mother of that child had a meeting with all the nursery kids’ parents and explained his behavior. They also called a special person to be her little boy’s teacher-one on one.

I am not one for meetings, but I did put together a letter and was going to send it to all the parents of Nursery kids in our ward. It is long, but if you care to read….go ahead:

January 14th, 2008

Dear Ward Members:

If you are receiving this letter, it is because your child attends Nursery at Glines 1st Ward with our little boy Kayler. It has been only after much prayer and consideration, and Kayler’s recent behavior at Nursery that we decided to send these letters.

Most of you receiving this letter know our family. If you are new in the ward, our names are Kandice and G.J. Searle. We have 3 children. Hallie is 8, Gavin is 6, and Kayler will be 3 in May. We have been in the ward for just over 5 years. We live at 1521 W 2950 S and our phone # is 781-0397 or 828-0397 if you ever need to contact us.

When Kayler turned 2 last May, we noticed his behavior starting to change. We thought it was the terrible 2’s at first. He became aggressive-biting, hitting, screaming, scratching, etc. He was soon afraid to go into public places, had certain toys that he would carry for weeks on end, and repeated behaviors and phrases that were very odd to us.

We went through the summer trying to figure out what was wrong with him- if anything. Finally in the fall, after 2 evaluations from 2 separate teams of Dr.’s, Kayler was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome. While it is in the Autism Spectrum, it is different in many ways. Here are the symptoms of a typical child with Asperger’s:
• Abnormal nonverbal communication, such as problems with eye contact, facial expressions, body postures, or gestures
• Failure to develop peer relationships
• Being singled out by other children as "weird" or "strange"
• Lack of spontaneous seeking to share enjoyment, interests or achievements with others (a lack of showing, bringing, or pointing out objects of interest to other people)
• Markedly impaired expression of pleasure in other people's happiness
• Inability to return social or emotional feelings
• Inflexibility about specific routines or rituals
• Repetitive finger flapping, twisting, or whole body movements
• Unusually intense preoccupation with narrow areas of interest, such as obsession with train schedules, phone books, or collections of objects
• Preoccupation with parts of whole objects
• Repetitive behaviors, including repetitive self-injurious behavior
• Being very physically aggressive if others invade his/her personal space
While Kayler does not have all the symptoms, he does have most of them. The most prevalent symptom he has is being very aggressive when other kids or even adults touch his toys/body etc. He gets very attached to specific toys, and when another child even acts like they want to touch it, he sees it as a very large threat and usually always acts out by biting, scratching, etc. We know that he has done this often in Nursery. He even does it to us as parents, his siblings, grandparents, cousins, etc.
We are truly sorry in every way if your child has ever been hurt by Kayler. We apologize ahead of time if by chance he happens to do it again. It is such a struggle for us as parents to see our little boy act out in such an unacceptable way to express his frustrations. It is embarrassing for us that he hurts other children. We know that we wouldn’t want our children hurt by others, so when our little boy is the one doing the damage, we feel so helpless. We often just want to keep him at home away from other kids and even adults. All the Dr.’s and therapists who have worked with Kayler have reassured us that keeping him away from social situations will only make him worse. The only way he will learn to be and act better is to keep exposing him to normal situations such as church, family functions, etc.
We know that it is easy to think of us as bad parents, and to imagine that we don’t teach him right from wrong or discipline him. While we are only human, we work very hard with Kayler as well as our other children. Kayler is in therapy groups 2-3 times a week. We work on his many skills, his behavior, and most importantly-try to help him function as normal as possible, especially in social situations. He has made a lot of progress, and in fact-sometimes when he is at home with familiar surroundings and situations, you would never guess that anything is wrong with him. It is only outside the home where the situations and circumstances are beyond his control that he has problems. Also, we have tried staying in Nursery with him to prevent his bad behavior, but surprisingly, even with our best efforts, he acts worse with us there, not to mention we both have callings to fulfill outside of the Nursery.
We aren’t asking for sympathy, acceptance of his behavior, or anything of the sort. It is easy to label him as a complete brat. The truth is that even though his actions make him appear that way, he truly does not know what he is doing sometimes, and doesn’t understand consequences or that what he is doing is hurting another person. If anything, the main reason we sent this letter is to help you as parents understand a little bit more about why he acts the way he does. That way, if you come in contact with him acting badly, or if your child has a bad experience with him, you will know what to expect and how to react. We know that a lot of parents stay in the Nursery with their kids. If you see him acting out, you are more than welcome and have our permission to redirect his attention to prevent him from being aggressive with another child. We know that 18 month-3 year old kids don’t understand a lot of things. It might not do any good to explain to your child about Kayler, but it is worth a try. It might prevent them from getting hurt by him.
More than anything, we just want Kayler to be a normal little boy and learn to grow with this disorder. We love him so much, and have learned a lot of patience from working with him. We know that by a lot of love and therapy on our part as parents as well as our families, he will succeed. We truly appreciate anything that you can do as friends, neighbors, and ward members to help us with Kayler. Thank you for taking the time to read this letter.

Sincerely, G.J. and Kandice Searle

So I worked hard getting the list from our Primary President, and I also asked her about getting a special teacher just for Kayler. She didn’t seem too sold on the idea, but whatever. I got all the letters put together and ready to send, then I got a phone call from my mom. I don’t really talk to her about Kayler, because her ideas are a lot different than mine, and I usually end up feeling bad. Well, this time was no different. She told me that the letters were absolutely the most ridiculous idea she had ever heard of, and that I should be so embarrassed to send them. She also said that Kayler does not belong in the church, and that she knows he is going to escape and get ran over on the highway. She thinks that G.J. and I should take turns going to church for a couple of years until Kayler gets better. (Yes, she can be blunt and quite extreme at times) I love my mom, and accept her advice, but now I am more confused than ever.

So here I sit, really not knowing what to do, and I need advice. Should I send the letters, should I not take Kayler to church, should I demand a special teacher for him…?I just don’t know. So, any and all ides would be appreciated. If you actually made it through this super long post....thank you! Have a great day, and wish me luck.