Often times, as things are happening, we don’t see the big picture. We see the here and now…..because, well, it’s happening here and now. Sometimes we speculate what course things will take as time passes, but most of the time, we’re surprised to find that things went differently than we thought they would. Or we’re completely taken by surprise because we never even thought about where our paths would take us at all.
What you see today on the GinaK site is a great example of me not knowing what the big picture would look like down the road. This has all taken me by surprise.
When I was pregnant with my first child, I kept a journal in which I wrote letters to the precious little one growing inside my womb. Everything seemed to be perfect when Zachariah entered the world. As he grew, he seemed to hit all of his milestones early. We knew we had a genius in the making.
Zach started walking at 8 ½ months old. At around 9 or 10 months, we noticed that Zach started picking up some funny antics. We just thought that he was going to be the family clown…..just like my dad and my brothers. Zach would do things that would make us laugh, and in turn, he would continue his antics to make us laugh even more. At 11 months, Zach had some words in his vocabulary. We saw things happening with Zach’s behavior that kind of made us puzzled, but we really didn’t have another child to compare him to, so we thought it was just part of his personality.
At 13 ½ months, Zach’s world changed. His baby sister entered the world. The day after she was born, Zach’s small, but seemingly growing, vocabulary disappeared. It would be another 3 years until we heard him speak again. The behavioral quirks that we had noticed earlier intensified. He would spin around in circles for long lengths of time. He would turn his little match box cars upside down and spin the wheels over and over again. He would literally do this for 15 minutes or more at a shot. He would rock back and forth in his highchair over and over until we thought the force of it would knock it over. We would call him by name and he wouldn’t even look our way. Eye contact was no longer happening.
At first we thought it was his hearing, but after two sessions with an audiologist, we were told that his hearing was exceptional, to the point of being able to hear frequencies that most people can’t hear, which also made him more sensitive to sounds that normally wouldn’t bother us.
At 12 months of age, I could see Zach spiraling into a world of his own. I knew something was going on. When my daughter was born, it was obvious that he fit the criteria for a diagnosis of autism. It took us 5 months and a contact name from a Good Housekeeping magazine to find someone that could help us. Zach started early intervention at 18 months. He’s been in intervention since then.
He’s now 8 years old and we realize we DO have a genius in the making. We realize we DO have a perfect little boy. He still struggles with his vocabulary, but there’s constant progress. Zach finally became full potty trained just after his 7th birthday, something we never thought he’d be able to do. He’s a curious little man with a insatiable lust for insects, the weather and new places.
I look back on that journal that I kept before he entered the world and realize that I got SO much more perfection in this little boy than I even dreamed possible when I was pregnant with him. Sure, every day is a day in which Zach fights to connect with our world, and to try to get us to connect with his world. And yes, many of the dreams that I had for Zach before he was born have never taken seed. In a way, you could say that as parents, we mourned the death of some of those dreams. But in their place, we witnessed the birth of a miracle. Both in Zach and in us. Dreams are still being made, but they’re different than what I ever imagined them to be. Some have become reality, others are still dreams. We’re working on those.
And now, another dream becomes reality.
A couple years ago, I lobbied a stamp company to create a set that would benefit Autism Awareness. Nothing ever came from lobbying. Back then, I didn’t see that the path I was had a much bigger picture that I couldn’t see at the time. And to think that only a little over 6 years ago, I was still adamant that I would never pick up a rubber stamp. Nope, I didn’t see the big picture at all! I started stamping in 2001, fell in love with it and have never looked back
Back at the end of November, GinaK approached me with the opportunity of being on their Senior Design Team. I was shocked and surprised, but jumped at the chance! Still, I didn’t see what was to come.
In the middle of February, I got to thinking about April being right around the corner, which also meant that it would be Autism Awareness month. I was bummed at the thought of yet another April going by in which there wasn’t a stamp set that could benefit research, a cure or awareness. That’s when the thought hit me. GinaK!!! Why didn’t I think of it earlier???
I emailed Gina and proposed the idea to her. She emailed back just 5 minutes later, excited about this opportunity and said YES! I knew there wasn’t a lot of time to put something together, but Gina was VERY optimistic that we could have something in our hands in time for April 1st. One instance after another has confirmed to me over and over again that this was meant to be. Zach’s disorder, taking up stamping, having Gina’s and my path converge…..it was all part of the path. And it all came together, like the pieces of a puzzle, to create the big picture I see today.
Gina has been an amazing person to work with. She took a dream and turned it into reality. Never once did Gina doubt this dream. Since I first contacted Gina about this project, there has only been a month and a half to put this project together. I am amazed and in awe at how things have fallen into place.
It is our hopes that you will partner with us to make this dream an even bigger reality by supporting the cause of Autism Awareness and research. You only need to do what you already love to do. How awesome is it that we can join together as a community and bring hope and intervention (and someday, even a cure!) to the children and families that battle Autism everyday!
Zach has come a VERY long way in his 8 years, but it’s an everyday fight. We are blessed beyond belief to have the support, intervention and caring people to work with that we do. At a staggering rate of 1 in every 150 children being diagnosed, there are so many more children out there that deserve the same thing.
RIGHT NOW is the time for solving the puzzle, the mystery, that is autism. And right now you can have a part in this with us.
I’m excited to see the big picture that I know is in the works with this project. What a beautiful picture it will be!
