The Beginning

Carson was born August 13th, 2008 weighing a whopping 10lbs!!! He was a very healthy baby and had no complications. He was a happy baby and met every milestone on time. The first sign we noticed was when he was 18 months old and he still didn't talk. I asked his pediatrician about it and he said that some children talk later than others and if he is still not talking by his 2-yr checkup that he would refer us to Childrens Hospital for an evaluation.

His 2nd birthday came and went and still Carson had a vocabulary of zero words. We were very concerned and made another appointment with his pediatrician. We were also a little concerned about his recent behavior but we didnt think it was anything abnormal for a 2-yr old. This was the first day that the word autism was brought to the table and Billy and I quickly dismissed it and said no thats not it. Everything I had read about autism did not describe Carson at all. He smiled, made eye contact, he didnt line up his toys by size or flap his hands like many children with autism do.

We started by taking him for a speech evaluation. We found out he was at a 10 months level for language and he was immediatley placed into speech therapy. He started Speech Therapy in August of 2010. We had no idea what we were facing and we thought he would be talking in just a few months but we were surprised when it didnt happen. His speech therapist advised that we have a few more evaluations done so we took him for a hearing test and for a Occupational Therapy evaluation which evaluates his fine and gross motor skills. He qualified for Occupational therapy as well and started the next week. Carson started help me grow services and had several more evaluations.

We had specialists coming to our house every week for home visits and more evaluations but we still didnt know why he wasnt talking and why he was falling behind. We decided to take him for a behavioral evaluation but we had to wait 6 months for the appointment. He continued speech therapy and occupational therapy while we waited and he also started group therapy. He was making a lot of progress in therapy but still not talking.

Finally the behavorial evaluation came and by this point we were starting to lean towards autism. We hated the idea of it and hoped and prayed he wouldnt be diagnosed. His behavorial evaluation was a 2 day evaluation with a psychologist, pediatrician and a speech therapist. After the 2 days we met with the psychologist and it was that day when we finally had answers and he was diagnosed with ASD and a global delay. That was in March of 2011, only 5 months ago so its still very fresh and new for us.

Before his diagnosis we prepared ourselves for it. When we heard the actual words it didnt come as a huge shock but still it wasnt an easy thing to hear. We have accepted it and we are now doing everything we can to help him so he can lead a normal life and accomplish everything he wants. He is a smart little boy and we know that with the help he needs that he will amaze us and do great things with his life!