You can cure autism, eh?

          I’m sure I should probably offer some sort of explanation as to why “a few days while we travel” has somehow turned into almost two months, but there is no reasonable explanation other than the fact that I needed a break.

          When last we spoke (a mostly one-sided conversation, as can often be the case with me) I shared some of my less admirable moments as a husband and father. As much as I am sure we’d all love to go back and relive my greatest failures and short-comings I find it more appropriate that we move on to a little more of the story that made up our journey together as a family. I do need to remind you that the next part of the story is where things start to get slightly more… interesting. We still live in the town where many of these stories occurred and still have occasional contact with some of the major players in them, so I encourage you to do your best to look past what you may deem bad behavior and decisions and realize that all parties involved were struggling to find answers. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about a messy life it’s that it affects everyone.

Playin' the guit-fiddle

As this post goes up we’re driving to St. Louis. I was asked pretty last minute to lead worship for a friend’s weekend discipleship event. Our family currently attends at least 3 different churches every week. I lead worship in different capacities at 2 of those churches. There are 3 or 4 other churches in our area that I serve at about once a month leading worship for their Sunday morning services. I was reflecting with my brother-in-law the other day about how I found myself in this position. I never wanted to be a worship leader. I never set out with that goal in mind.

More of my greatest failures...

There are instances in my life that are such grand, spectacular failures that I wish nothing more than to go back and relive them in order to change my actions and therefore the outcome. Those same failures are the ones that have forced and inspired such personal growth that I cannot help but recognize their crucial role in shaping me into the man I am today. My regret is only that in order for me to grow up those around me must suffer such pain and frustration at my hands. I long for the wisdom that comes from experience and failure without the consequences and I’m reminded of cake, keeping it and eating it too….

My greatest failures.

                I struggle with how to portray what our life was like in Late 2006-early 2007 without sounding whiny or childish. I’ve talked about many of the difficult situations that we faced but we hadn’t seen the worst of it at that point and I think something inside of us knew that. I remember racing each day as if there were this unseen impending doom hanging over my head. I find it interesting how the human mind can swing so quickly from pride to pity. Looking back I know that many of the trials and pain we endured were at my hands, but I’m foolish to assume that I could have saved us from it all. I’d also be foolish if I thought I was blameless in it all. The truth is that I failed regularly and spectacularly, but it wasn’t all my fault. It wasn’t all my fault, but much of it was. The next few days are about that.

Why I'm smarter than my wife.

               Once Hannah and I started doing some real research on what autism is, we really believed that it explained so much of what we were facing with the twins. Our next obstacle was getting them diagnosed so that we weren’t just the crazy parents who assumed that there was something wrong but were so afraid that they’d be wrong and then be out of excuses. Because we’ve lived most of our lives on faith since we were married (which is another way of saying we were too broke to have insurance) the only chance we had of getting a diagnosis was through the ECI program. We brought the suggestion to the ladies who visited our house once a week and were pretty well blown off. I can’t really blame them. All of this occurred before autism had really become the fad diagnosis it is today and awareness was pretty low. I feel the need to explain myself for just a moment: I believe that the reason we have seen autism move from a very rare, virtually unknown disease to the levels we see it out now (The latest numbers say something like 1 in every 80 children) is because of 3 things; 1. It was under-diagnosed for many decades, 2. Some environmental factor is causing its increase (see “Concerning vaccinations for my opinion on the matter) and 3. It is over-diagnosed now.