January 15, 2025 • 57 mins
Join us for an inspiring and heartfelt exploration into the world of parenting children with neurological differences. Our guest, Kari Baker, shares her courageous journey from a thriving career in financial services to her new path as an advocate for invisible neurological differences. Through candid anecdotes, Kari reveals how her son Brady’s diagnosis of autism and ADHD reshaped her family’s life and led her to establish Kind Families, a community aiming to support parents navigating similar challenges. Together with Ann, who’s raising three adopted children with various neurological differences, we uncover the significance of embracing life's unpredictable turns and celebrating the unique gifts of each child.
We discuss the impact of faith, joy, and a personalized approach to nurturing each child's strengths, all while navigating the day-to-day realities of special needs education and social interactions.
Our episode also shines a light on the resilience required when parenting a child with neurological differences. Kari and Ann share their experiences with educational choices, bullying, and fostering self-advocacy in social settings. From homeschooling decisions to recognizing unhealthy friendships, we focus on balancing protection with empowerment. As we address these challenges, Kari aims to inspire and provide solace to families who are walking a similar path, reinforcing the importance of adaptation and embracing change to meet the evolving needs of children with invisible differences.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne.
I am Anne, and today we have avery special guest.
Carrie Baker is an author,speaker, podcaster and founder
of Kind Families.
Kind Families supports kidswith invisible neurological
differences, and the KindCommunity is for parents,
caregivers, friends andadvocates of kids whose brains
(00:31):
work differently than theirpeers but have no outwardly
visible disability.
I want to tell you, carrie, howexcited I am to have you on, as
I have three kids withinvisible neurological
differences, and I also do.
I know it is.
Yeah, it is very difficultnavigating the world with
(00:53):
invisible differences, and so Iappreciate what you are doing.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Well, thank you so much, Anne.
I'm just thrilled to be herespeaking with you, and I know we
have lots to talk about, so youknow you don't do anything
halfway, do you?
I've been accused of thatbefore.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
yes, yeah, I mean, I read every word of your book and
you are amazing.
I so love that you took whatyou and your son have gone
through and started an entiremovement, basically to help
others who are going through it.
So can you talk more about whyyou wrote the book?
(01:31):
Finding Kind and DiscoveringHope and Purpose While Loving
Kids with NeurologicalDisabilities?
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah, absolutely Well .
I've often said that I'm inkind of version 2.0 of my life,
because up until a couple ofyears ago, I was a financial
advisor.
I was a certified financialplanner.
I helped people with their 401kplans, companies with their
401k plans.
So this is a whole new path forme really, but it was one that
(02:00):
started to really start to growas a seed in my heart when my
son, brady, was diagnosed withautism when he was three years
old, and that was something thatwas not in my plan, in my life
plan.
Honestly, I did not know onething about autism when it came
into our lives and becameapparent that that is what my
(02:23):
son had, and so it was along-term shift of perspective
for me.
For the first few years, really, I was just trying to bob and
weave and do as much as we couldfor Brady and thinking we could
you know, quote unquote fix thethings that he was struggling
with and over a much longerperiod of time, through a lot of
(02:46):
different ways, through meetingother families who were going
through something similar,through a faith that grew in my
heart through the process andunderstanding that Brady was
made exactly the way he wassupposed to be made with all the
gifts and talents and all thechallenges that come along with
them, just as all of us are.
And so in the last few years Ireally started feeling pulled
(03:11):
away from the financial servicesworld and pulled toward this
kind community and I did feellike the invisible nature of
autism and ADHD, which my sonwas also diagnosed with, and a
lot of other neurological soupingredients that I like to call
it.
It presented some differentchallenges.
(03:33):
I mean, I'm super grateful forall the things he can do, that
he has got, all the abilities hedoes have, but because he looks
like every other kid on thestreet, it did present some
challenges for him and for mepersonally, because there were
unexpected behaviors, there wereunexpected reactions, there was
(03:56):
an inability to relate to otherchildren the way that other
children were trying to relateto him and trying to grasp that
and figure out ways to help him.
It took us down a differentpath than I ever thought I would
go down.
(04:17):
Now I have been accused of beingone of the most social people
on the planet.
So having a son who had areally hard time relating to
other kids and really justwanted to be as far away from
them as possible in any kind ofsocial situation was a new
experience for me and the morecomfortable I got with who he is
(04:38):
, all the things he came, allthe gifts and talents he had, I
realized I was having theseconversations with other moms
who were kind of just at thebeginning of their journeys and
they were going through the samestruggles that I was going
through initially and I washaving coffees all the time.
I was having conversationsafter church and at one point I
(04:58):
remember my husband said youknow, maybe you should figure
out a way to address more thanone person at a time with some
of the things we're talkingabout.
And another friend of mine atchurch had listened to all of
the stories that I had talkedabout in a Bible study group and
she said, carrie, you ought towrite a book.
And I'd never even thought ofthat.
(05:19):
But the more comfortable I gotin who I am as Brady's mom Brady
is, as this amazing, kind kid Ifelt like there were other
parents like you that wouldbenefit from hearing the story.
That number one they're notalone through something that
(05:46):
other families have gone through.
And I certainly don't have allthe answers and didn't try to
pretend to in any of thecommunications and writing that
I do, but it's a way for me totell other parents you're not
alone.
Your kid was made exactly theway he or she was supposed to be
made and our job as parents isto celebrate who they are and
then help them with thechallenges that they do have in
(06:07):
navigating a world that justreally isn't set up for them.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
So that way, oh, yeah , I mean you've touched on so
much and we're gonna break allof that down.
Uh, with your book.
You say that it's a story ofacceptance and joy in the face
of a life plan which you justsort of touched on, and it took
(06:31):
an unexpected detour.
You know, when we're young andwe're growing up, here we are,
we're dreaming about what ourfuture is going to be like.
You know, even into our 20s, Ithink, we're thinking about you
know what's going to happen, andsometimes life kind of takes
over and it takes us in adifferent direction.
(06:52):
And I know that I have fivekids and I never planned on that
, Never and I have three withautism, ADHD and some other
invisible differences, and it isvery life-changing.
I adopted all of my kids andthey, yeah, I mean I never
(07:14):
expected all the twists andturns that our life has taken.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
And that's so true and I think that was part of
that wasn't part of.
It was the biggest part of mecoming to acceptance is me
finally letting go of that, thatvision and that dream, because
I was clinging to it for dearlife for a couple of years.
And that's why I mean we gosh,we worked so hard because I was
just like if I just work hardenough, if I just run hard
(07:42):
enough, if I get him to theright therapist like all this
will go away and my little planwill just fall right back into
place again.
you know, Right, right, right.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
And you do think that you think I mean, we started
the therapies, we got to thedoctors.
You know we did all of that.
We thought that, you know,special needs preschool was the
answer for one of our kiddos.
That that would be.
You know, special needspreschool was the answer for one
of our kiddos.
That that would be.
You know, he would be.
He hardly spoke, he had just afew words.
(08:11):
When I got him at almost fouryears old and I really thought
that if we got him, you know,just completely consumed with
all these people and tools andeverything, that he would soon
be able to speak in fullsentences and paragraphs.
You know, and it well he doesnow.
(08:31):
But it took a long time to gethim there and you just don't
realize how much hard work it'sgoing to be along the way.
And it's been a journey.
You know, I was an assistantdirector for kids with autism at
a school and with my threekiddos, I mean, every single kid
(08:54):
on the spectrum is different.
So there's no, you can't likeread a book and say, okay, this
is the plan of how we're goingto reach A, b and C, and you
know there's no really planbecause every kid is so
different.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
Right, it's funny, you know.
I mentioned that my husband waslike how could we reach more
people?
Well, initially, when we werefirst going through it, that's
what we were looking for.
We were like there needs to bean autism concierge.
You know, like somebody who.
You know, it's like somebodywho, who you?
know, looks at your kid and thensays, okay, based on him, you
need to do A, b, c, d and E, andthat isn't out there.
(09:33):
So maybe you know, when we getthrough this and when we figure
it out, that'll be our business.
(09:59):
We'll, we'll just make that ourbusiness.
You know, oh, my goodness, hownaive we were in thinking all of
that, and it became more of anoutreach not to say this is what
you do, but this is how youstill find joy in the be
challenges that are going toface us, that are going to
surprise us, and we're going tokeep making mistakes, like we
did early on.
But at the base of everythingwe do, it's got to be an
understanding of what hisidentity is based in and that he
(10:21):
was put on this planet to bringjoy, and to everybody else as
well.
And we've got to help him dothat and not try to fit him into
a box that was never made forhim in the first place.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Oh, I love that you come up with so many great
nuggets.
Your book is full of them.
I just kept writing stuff down.
I mean I'm serious and I don'tfeel that way about a lot of the
books that I read on autism andthings like that, but you
nailed it, thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
I feel like so much of what came to me is an
inspiration of faith and it's amessage that I really believe
God wants other families to hear.
And so when I, you know, Ireally kind of give all that
glory to God, because thosethings were not part of my
(11:16):
vernacular until I had this kidthat he gave me and the cool
thing is, gave me.
And the cool thing is and thisisn't going to be the same for
every parent out there but I wasso focused on my original plan
that I didn't realize that I hada whole other purpose out there
(11:37):
.
So it wasn't just to be evenabout Brady, it was about me.
And you know, I'd always wantedto be in finance and I thought
that's what I'd do for the restof my life and suddenly that
just didn't mean anything to meanymore and this became my heart
.
I do say in some speakingengagements I've had that my
hard thing became my heart thing, and that's how you can really
(12:01):
see where your purpose isguiding you.
You can really see where yourpurpose is guiding you that
sometimes these challenges thatwe go through are just opening
doors that you need to walkthrough for the next thing that
you're meant to be doing, and soit's been a journey for all of
us and it is, yeah, for everysingle person in our household
(12:24):
and any person that enters intoour world.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
I mean, it affects everybody In a good way, though
I'm not going to say in becausethey are such blessings.
And what was the journey foryour son at the very beginning?
Because you talk about how hardit was.
(12:47):
You've talked about it here alittle bit and in the book.
But what was so difficult inthe beginning?
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Well, so initially I had no clue that Brady was
anything but a little peculiar,because I didn't know anything
about autism.
I did not understand it at all.
And so he I remember taking himto his two year well check
appointment and the doctor saidwell, he walked on time and he
talked on time, so autism is offthe table.
(13:15):
And I was kind of like autism,I didn't know, that was on the
table, you know, and so it waskind of startling and so, but it
also gave me this false senseof comfort.
Well, the doctor said he wasfine.
So all of these little peculiarthings are just me not knowing
that much about kids.
I didn't have Brady until I wasalmost 40.
(13:36):
So, and my friends had all hadtheir kids much earlier, so I
wasn't really around a lot oflittle kids.
I didn't know what was typicaland what was not but, I did know
.
You know, I I did have this kindof gut feeling.
Every time we went to a playdate, he would just run away
from the other kids, he wouldrun out into traffic.
He cried every single day whenI brought him to school.
(13:58):
Things that you know pottytraining and other things that
were just pieces of cake for myfriends, you know, were not
pieces of cake for us, you knowhe would these meltdowns in
public places over things that Icouldn't figure out.
(14:20):
One of the things that was mostconcerning to us is he would
have what we called sad momentsand he would be sitting on a
couch watching the Wiggles.
He was very, very, veryinterested in the Wiggles.
They were his main passion whenhe was two and he would be
jumping on the couch and dancingalong to the song and then, all
(14:41):
of a sudden, tears would juststart falling out of his eyes
and I could not figure out whattriggered it and I couldn't make
him happy.
I couldn't.
There was nothing I could do.
The only thing that I could dois let him have some alone time,
and then he'd walk out 10minutes later and say I'm okay,
mommy.
And so there were things likethat that were really concerning
(15:05):
me.
But I honestly don't know if Iwould have figured it out if I
hadn't picked up a magazine thathappened to be on my desk one
day when I was really sittinghome.
I had just dropped him off atschool, I'd had a conversation
with one of his preschoolteachers about some of the
challenges he was having there.
He wouldn't sit in circle time,they told me.
(15:26):
When they asked him a question,instead of answering he would
just repeat the question back tothem.
And so I was just kind of, youknow, ruminating on all this
stuff back at my desk and Ipicked up this magazine and
there happened to be an articlein there written by a woman
whose son was diagnosed withautism, but not until much later
(15:47):
in life, and he had suffered alot in his youth and his
adolescence, and it was a reallyhard story to read.
But as I am reading thedescription of this boy as a
child, it dawned on me that itsounded just like Brady.
He didn't want to be with otherkids.
(16:08):
He ran away constantly.
He would have these meltdownsthat were kind of unexplainable
and we couldn't console him ofunexplainable and untreat you
know.
We couldn't console him, and sothere was a quiz in the bottom
of that article for somethingwhich at the time was called
Think Asperger's and now it'scalled the Social Challenges
(16:29):
Questionnaire.
But the same organization stillhas that questionnaire out
there and it's used as ascreening tool for autism.
And I went through that onlinequiz and I answered 15 out of 15
questions yes.
And it came up that my sonneeded to be evaluated for
autism spectrum disorder and itjust floored me.
But you know it for him, youknow we, just as we started
(16:54):
diving into what are the, whatare the next steps, and we saw,
you know, we heard 40 hours aweek of therapy and speech and
OT and PT and all these things.
And you know, not knowing that,all of these things were
play-based activities for him,and one thing that he always
thrived on was the one-on-oneattention from an adult.
(17:15):
I mean with peers.
He really struggled, but manadults loved him.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
They still do.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
He could talk like as a three-year-old.
He could talk like he was a65-year-old English professor or
something, and so adults lovedhim I have one of those.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
You have one of those I do.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
So you know, when we started getting into the rhythm
with him, he loved it.
He had this one-on-oneattention from all of these
different therapists who werewonderful, and we used to joke
that they were all women.
Of course, at the time.
There are a couple of men thatactually help out now, but at
the time they were all women andwe called them all of.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Brady's ladies you know, like the Beyonce song.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
You know Brady's ladies.
But so for a long time hedidn't really even understand
that this wasn't how every otherkid on the planet, you know,
functioned.
He didn't have a sibling, hewas an only child, and so in his
mind it started when he wasthree years old.
All kids did this In his mindit started when he was three
years old.
All kids did this, but when hewas in kindergarten and first
(18:22):
grade, he had an aide in theclassroom and I remember him
asking me one time well, why doI have an aide and nobody else
has?
an aide in the class and I justtold him.
I said well, brady, you knowthere are certain things that
you're really really good atthat other kids need help with,
like reading.
He's a super quick early readerand some kids have a really
(18:44):
hard time reading, and so youknow it's that's the way it is
with you and being around otherkids.
You know you struggle with thatpiece of it and so we're trying
to help you with that.
But and then he let that go andit wasn't until he was in
second grade when we decided,because the school was really
not being accommodating to Bradyand the things that we thought
(19:07):
he needed, we made a move to aspecial school for kids with
learning challenges not justautism, but dyslexia, adhd
across the board and we decidedthat it was going to be
important for Brady to know whyhe was there and there were
going to be other kids talkingabout their diagnoses.
It was a school that went fromfirst grade to 12th grade, so he
(19:30):
was going to have interactionwith all different ages.
So that's when we made thedecision to tell him about
autism and ADHD.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
And how did he respond when you told him?
Speaker 2 (19:43):
So, as you made the comment that I don't go halfway
on anything, I had the wholepresentation prepared.
I had a video with this puppetwho referred to Perry the
platypus from Phineas and FerbTV show, which he loved, and I
had all the famous people whohad Phineas and Ferb TV show,
which he loved and I had.
I had all the famous people whohad autism and ADHD and all this
stuff and he just kind of tookit in and um, I I think I
(20:09):
actually wrote about this in thebook and I'm waiting for this
big, you know special momentbetween us and he just said.
The one thing he said was um.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
And he just said.
The one thing he said was willI get better, mommy?
Speaker 2 (20:21):
And I said honey, there's nothing to get better
from.
This is the way your brainfunctions, and it's not wrong,
it's just different.
And so and then he said, okay,can I have screen time now?
And he ran off and it didn'tregister that he had actually
(20:50):
understood our conversationuntil a teacher at the school
called me after school and shesaid I just have to tell you
what Brady said in class today.
They were talking about anxietyand they were asking the kids
to share, like what kinds ofthings do you think would cause
anxiety in a person?
And so kids were saying, youknow, like flying or talking in
front of people or something,and Brady raised his hand and
said it would cause anxiety ifyou knew you were different and
you didn't know why.
(21:12):
Oh, that's so beautiful, and soit was.
That was my confirmation thattelling him was the right thing
(21:34):
to do first of all, and arminghim with as much information
about how his brain works aspossible and that he was, there
was a relief associated with itfor him.
Now it doesn't mean that hedoesn't have moments since then
where he said, mom, I hate mybrain.
You know when he's having ahard time or when he's kind of
coming out of one of these sadmoments and he'll say, mom, I
hate my brain.
And that is when I have to sayhoney, you can't hate your brain
(21:58):
, because your brain is what'sproducing all of these other
wonderful things too.
So you know it's been a journeyfor him as well, and you know
he doesn't.
We have told him that he isable to tell anybody he wants to
tell about his autism and ADHD.
(22:18):
We don't want him to think thathe has to keep it a secret.
We did encourage him that.
You know, some people might notunderstand autism the same way
I didn't understand autism whenhe was first diagnosed.
So you might want to wait untilthere's somebody that you care
about and that you know, youknow cares about you, but you
are welcome to share it howeveryou like, and there have been
(22:39):
situations where he's wanted tokeep it to himself and others
where he's, you know, been veryforthcoming with it.
Right, but that's his decisionto make at this point Now with
the book.
You know I had been writing fora long time and when I first
started writing it was all aboutthe hard stuff.
You know time and when I firststarted writing, it was all
(23:03):
about the hard stuff.
You know, it was all aboutthose tough moments and the
meltdowns and figuring it out.
But as he started to grow andwe started to see all these
amazing things that he was doing, I realized that I needed to
shift that in the book to, yes,a conversation that's going to
connect, I hope, with a lot ofmoms and other families about,
you know, having figuring out achild has autism and invisible
(23:27):
neurological differences andsome of the adjustments that we
had to make in our lives becauseof that, but that I wanted this
whole section also to be aboutall the awesome things that
Brady has done.
Whole section also to be aboutall the awesome things that
Brady has done.
And so when I was able to putall of that together and he read
(23:49):
the book, he was, oh, he wasall in.
So, even the hard stuff you knowhe made me, he made a comment
to me.
He's like mom, now I get itbetter.
I understand, you know what youwere going through and that it
was hard for you and why.
But he wants other kids to lookat our story and say, look,
(24:10):
this is just a differentbrainwiring and it doesn't limit
him in any way as to the thingshe could do any way as to the
things he could do.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
So One of my favorite things about your book is that
you started with his words, yeah, and that you end with words to
him from you yeah.
I thought that that was sobeautiful.
I loved what he said.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
It was so him, anne, if you met him.
His foreword, that was justkind of an idea we had talking
around the dinner table onenight and, to be perfectly
honest, I'm a bit of a controlfreak with stuff like this, so I
wasn't sure what the result wasgoing to be, so I was kind of
like well, why?
Don't you write something, andthen we'll take a look at it and
(25:00):
we'll see what it is.
And he brought that in in onedraft and it was exactly the way
it was.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
So you didn't change anything.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Well, we did a few grammatical edits, but other
than that, that is purely hisvoice.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
So beautifully written.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
And you know he is a kid with a gift, first of all
for writing.
He's written about 150 ADHD andto relate it just perfectly to
his personality, so for thosewho haven't read it yet, he
talks about Star Wars and Lordof the Rings, those two book
series, or movie and book seriesthat are very near and dear to
his heart, and he was able torelate his own experience, you
know, to those things.
And he also has a deep faith,which I didn't know was possible
(26:07):
and which I really doubted Iguess was possible, with
somebody whose brain really wasthriving in the black and white
and not in the gray.
You know, and I think and Ihope and I pray that what he
wrote in there, that he'sfearfully and wonderfully made
(26:30):
and he is and it really getsthat from an inner knowledge
that he is and inner knowledgethat he is.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
And so, yeah, my kids have an understanding of God
and my one son, who's eight, hehas such a deep relationship
with Jesus and it's so great tosee Because, yeah, people on the
(26:59):
spectrum can be so black andwhite, like you said, and if it
doesn't fit in, you know, youjust can't accept it.
But you know, in a lot ofChrist and everything about the
Bible, you know it's about theunseen and so you know you need
that tangible thing to kind ofprove what you're being told.
(27:20):
And I love the fact that theyare just taking it for its word.
It's so amazing, you know.
I want to touch on something inthe times in my life where God
has found me and changed me themost was in the unexpected, and
(27:41):
I call them mile markers, wherewe, you know, hit this mark in
the road and we are never thesame again.
There's no going back to thatplace and trying to rewind and
become that person again.
You just can't, and I would notbe where I am today if it were
not for those mile markers.
(28:02):
And those mile markers got meto exactly where God wanted me
to be and you actually, at onepoint in the book, like in the
news of having an autismdiagnosis to an earthquake, and
I can relate to that.
When my son, my now 11-year-old,it was about five years ago, I
(28:26):
think I've had him for eightyears and I knew that there was
something.
I mean I knew he had autism.
I mean we figured autism, adhd,I mean hyperactivity,
everything.
I mean he had A to Z, it seemedlike.
But when they asked me to do agenetic test because they
(28:50):
thought that there was somethingelse, so we did a genetic test
and here he has DeGeorgesyndrome, which is a deleted
chromosome.
Oh wow, and because he looks sotypical I mean there's some
small things like he has alittle fold in one of his ears
(29:12):
and there's like really smallthings but if you look at him
you would think no.
But they called me and said hehas DeGeorge syndrome and you
know out of everything that allmy kids have been diagnosed with
.
That hit me and I had toresearch it and we had to do all
(29:34):
these things.
We had to go to the DeGeorgeCenter Clinic in Columbus, ohio
and all these things to try toget more information and try to
help him be his best.
But you know, what it comesdown to is when we get dealt the
unknown that's when it becomesthe scariest.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Well, that's when we have to trust too, and I think
that's one of the reasons thatit took me so long is because I
didn't have that relationshipwith God when we started on this
journey.
I put it all on me.
I put 100% of the weight of hisdiagnosis and treatment and
(30:19):
everything else on.
If I do enough, there'll be agood outcome.
We'll just be able to get rightback on the original path that
I was supposed to be on.
You know, and not understandingthat it you never.
Just, like you said, I love themile marker reference that you
know, once you get there, youcan't turn around and, like I
(30:41):
was talking about with theearthquake it was.
You know, once that earthshakes underneath you, those
plates don't go back to wherethey started.
Grasp on how good God can be inthose hard times, that I will
(31:07):
approach those challenging timesin my life with a different
perspective than I did early on,because I will be able to look
back and see exactly how he tookthis hard thing that I didn't
ask for, I didn't want initially, you know, and then turned it
into this beautiful gift and butit is a.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
it took me a lot longer than I would have liked
for it to take, so you know someof us, you know we just take a
little bit longer, and I thinkthat that's part of it.
You know, it's all part of thejourney.
One of the things that you talkabout, which you kind of
mentioned, was, you know, thatwe were made on purpose for a
(31:52):
purpose, and the things thathappened to us as well are there
on purpose for a purpose, and Ilove that.
Everyone has a purpose.
And at the beginning, your sontalks about this and honing in
on what they are good at, youknow, finding what they're good
at.
And my kids are so unique andthey touch this world in so many
(32:16):
beautiful ways.
And one of my boys that Italked about earlier, he has so
many invisible challenges and hegoes to a special needs school,
but I'll tell you that he isone of the most kind and loving
kids and it's finding thosethings that they're good at, you
(32:37):
know.
So they feel really good aboutthemselves.
And we figured out that he isso good at drums.
We didn't know that he would,but we exposed them to
everything and he went to a drumclass and here he is doing
fantastic and he actually saidto me drumming makes me feel
(33:02):
important and so go ahead.
No, I mean he just struggles inso much it just literally I
mean it melted my heart and Idid kind of like cry a little
bit because I was just sothrilled that he felt important
(33:23):
yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Yes, and you know it's.
We have been trying.
For instance, right now he's myson is in a hybrid homeschool
situation, so he's off schoolMondays and Fridays, and we had
to do that, you know,unfortunately because of a
bullying issue that happened athis prior school, and so we're.
You know we were kind ofthinking, okay, okay, he's in
(33:45):
eighth grade, let's take a, takea year to do this kind of low
stress option, um, but he'sbored, so we're, we're like how
do we?
how do we take up his time onmondays and fridays?
And we found a school that hasthese individual classes that
are one-on-one.
Teacher taught not where youcan go in, and they have things
(34:06):
like theater, art and cinema,and so my Brady now is a huge
movie buff.
You go to a movie with this kidand you will hear details that
he saw in that movie that youwould never imagine in your life
.
And then journalism.
He picked out journalismbecause we've been watching the
(34:26):
TV show Smallville with ClarkKent and the reporters are in
there, and so we're trying allof these different avenues where
you know, we know movies is hisnumber one thing, but there's
all these little offshoots thathe could really take a grasp on,
that utilize his gifts ofwriting and creativity and
(34:49):
performance art and those kindsof things.
So I think that's amazing andthe drummer is the most
important, by the way.
So I'm on the worship team atmy church and as a backup
vocalist and the drummer is themost important.
So you can tell your son that.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Well, he absolutely will eat that up.
Yes, he's all about being thenumber one and wanting to feel
important.
So I'm just really proud of himand you know, I just want to
quickly say that.
You know we had mentioned aboutme having neurological
differences and I was told thatI would not graduate high school
(35:26):
and I got a master's degreebecause I taught myself how to
learn by reading into a taperecorder and listening to it,
writing it down and thenmemorizing it, and it would take
me hours to do what maybesomebody could do in an hour for
me to get barely a C.
But you know, I figured it outand that's, you know, people
(35:48):
with autism.
I think that we are also givingthis big tool belt of all kinds
of other things the resiliencyand the determination and that's
what I see in your son in thisbook.
It's just a beautiful story,yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Yeah, he's, he he's very brave, I think.
You know he's extremelycourageous and he tries new
things and as has found somethat he doesn't like as much and
and some that he does.
But you know, I think, assomebody that was kind of raised
(36:25):
like you go get a businessdegree and because that's like
the smart thing to do, becauseyou can do a lot of things with
it and that sort of thing, and Idon't regret that at all, I
don't regret my first 30 yearsin the career.
Career were when I was giving,you know, educational sessions
(36:46):
to the employees, or it wasn'tin.
Believe me, I was not theperson like making somebody a
million dollars in the stockmarket or anything like that.
So it was, it was in theone-on-one that I would have
with employees or givingpresentations or writing
materials to help themunderstand things better.
And so you know, it is kind ofinteresting to think now that
(37:07):
I've just done this complete 180and loving it so much and
feeling like I'm right where Ineed to be, and I just want
Brady to start that way.
You know, I don't want him togo 30 years of you know
processing widgets or whateverdoing spreadsheets when that's
not his math and science or nothis thing, and so we've just got
(37:28):
to find those creative outletsand a way for him to really
build a life around doing those,because if he's doing that,
he's going to feel good abouthimself, he's going to be
successful, and it's not aboutmoney or anything else, but he's
going to feel fulfilled, andthat's where we want him to be.
Speaker 1 (37:51):
Yeah, you know, I read that story about him
swimming in that was it a lakeor whatever it was?
And then the dead, the fish,bones, and he's swimming and I'm
just like I was feeling it.
I mean, I just was, my skin wascrawling even thinking about
(38:11):
him doing that on the spectrum.
Are you kidding?
I mean that was you want totalk about determination?
I mean, in every story with himit seemed like at first it was
a little difficult and it waskind of like you know, you
weren't really sure if he wasgoing to get to the other side
of it, but he found it withinhimself to get to the other side
(38:31):
of it, even the first time hegot in the pool, you know, when
he just kept going.
So I don't know, you know, andI saw him continually make goals
for himself in the book and himreaching for them, and that was
just so amazing.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Right, right, it's interesting.
So right now, he's never been asports kid really.
He's always loved to swim andhe did cross country and track
at his old school because it wasa small school and any kid
could participate and those areindividual sports.
But he's never been into likebasketball or football or
(39:07):
anything like that.
And he's told us now I thinkthat he's in eighth grade that
kids go out on the basketballcourt and he's horrible.
He will be the first.
I'm not, you know, divulginganything that he wouldn't allow
me to divulge.
He's horrible at basketball andfootball, horrible at
basketball and football, but hewants to learn it and he goes.
(39:27):
Mom, I don't want to be awesomeat it, I just want to be middle
of the pack.
I don't want to be awfulanymore.
And so we've got.
There's actually a group herethat focuses on special needs
fitness and starting in a coupleweeks.
(39:56):
We've got a trainer that's goingto come twice a week and just
give him, like you know, theselessons on.
You know, throw a ball and getit to where you want it to go,
and dribble a ball withoutlosing control of it, and have
that work all in with hisphysical therapy as well and
building core and things likethat.
But you know if he's going toexpress interest in it.
We're going to try to figureout a way to help him.
See, I?
Speaker 1 (40:10):
just love that, and we do that with ours too.
One of the things that you sayis I get so caught in.
Well, actually you wrote thisin a kerrybakercom blog your
blog.
Yes, so I was reading those asas well, and you said that you
get so caught up in the haveto's that I overlook the get
(40:32):
to's of parenting, that yourchild and god, that god
carefully and thoughtfullycreated to be yours, and I
somewhat will relate with that,in that we have so many
appointments, there are so manythings that we have to do, and
when I was reading through yourbook, you know all the meetings,
(40:52):
the school meetings, thedoctor's appointments, the pills
that we on our end have to takeeverywhere we go to make sure
we have everything, all thefidgets, the bag full of all the
kids' things, and we have tomake sure so much so that they
are okay that we oftentimesdon't get to enjoy it.
(41:13):
And I kind of laughed because Ihad this visual of you with the
DVD player in the car as youwere taking, you know, the kids
to the cavern field trip, Ithink it was.
But I do that now.
I mean I've got my hand on thewheel, the DVD player back there
is not working or somethinghappens and I'm like this,
(41:36):
trying to figure it out for them.
Speaker 2 (41:38):
So yeah, I totally get goodness, I think it is.
(42:04):
It's just kind of ingrained inus as parents that we try to get
as much done as possible, butyou know, we've we've got to
stop missing the cool thingsthat that come along with
parenting a kid like this, andand and.
That's true for all parents too.
I think we all get caught up inthe hustle and bustle, whether
(42:28):
it's kids that are in sports orin therapies, you know and kind
of miss out on the relationshipbuilding piece of it, and I'm
guilty of that too.
So it's always good to liketake a step back and just enjoy.
I went to a concert with Bradyyesterday and I just kind of
looked over at him and he justhad this smile on his face the
(42:49):
whole time listening to it andso I found myself kind of just
looking at him almost more thanthe stage, and there was a lot
going on on the stage.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
Oh, I do that too.
Yeah, I do that too.
Yeah, I mean, I call it mythird childhood because I had,
you know, mine, of course, andthen my older two, who I adopted
years ago, and now I have thesethree littles.
So I call it my third childhoodbecause I just love living
(43:17):
through them.
It's just so fun.
There was something else, youknow, I gosh, there was so much
in your book that I resonatedwith.
But the other day I asked mydaughter to clean her room,
which turned into a full-outyelling, screaming, you know,
and it got to this where I'mtelling her well, you can't do
(43:39):
this if you don't get this done,which everything I was doing or
saying was escalating thesituation.
And you talk about poker faceand say attention was a reward
for good behavior, not aresponse to bad behavior.
And I have this picture of youin my head, with your son in one
(44:02):
part of your house and you inthe other, and you wanting so
badly to get to him, and youknew that you couldn't get go to
him because he needed to figureit out and calm down.
You know, I do ignore herbehaviors at times and anything
that I say or do just escalatesthat behavior.
(44:23):
So it works.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, we just had that happen,
actually two nights ago, withsomething where he kind of lost
it and went in his room and shutthe door and he was sitting up
against his door and of courseI'm pushing on the door, going
come on, Brady, it's time fordinner, you know.
And he's like I just need to bealone, mom, I just need to be
alone.
Come on, Brady, it's time fordinner, you know.
(44:47):
And he's like I just need to bealone, mom, I just need to be
alone.
And I kind of went okay, I knowthat, miss out on a show or to
you know, and just make that hisdecision.
So when, if he is, you know,not complying with something
(45:28):
that he really needs to be doing, to just say, ok, well then I
guess we can't go to the movie,but that's okay, we'll go again
another day and do it with thepoker face, without any emotion
or screaming or, you know,gritting our teeth, which is
super hard, but you know thatreally put the ball back in his
court to make the decision.
He wasn't responding to me andit was a new concept for me that
my negative attention was evensomething that he was trying to
draw out in me, like he wastaking something from my
(45:51):
negative attention and and thatwasn't.
That wasn't helping us in theend goal for any anything.
So once I removed that thatit's kind of like a tug of war.
You know, once I dropped my endof the rope, he doesn't have
anything to tug on anymore.
Speaker 1 (46:11):
Well, I love that he can let you know what he wants,
like when he told you that hewanted his chicken nuggets room
temperature or something likethat.
You know, I think that that'sso amazing, because I constantly
.
I think that that's one of thebiggest things is communication
and teaching our kids how toself-advocate.
Speaker 2 (46:38):
He has language that had to develop and the story of
him telling me that his chickennuggets were burning hot to him,
even though they seemed likethey were room temperature to me
.
That was after years of speechtherapy and all the things that
he needed to be able tocommunicate that across.
(47:00):
Of course, now he's a teenagerand he throws that back at me.
You know he didn't want toparticipate in a school show and
he's like Mom, I'mself-advocating by saying I
don't want to do it.
Oh my gosh, oh, wow.
But you know we're fortunatethat he has the language and
(47:21):
that he has.
You know the comfort level,especially with us and people
that he's close to, to do that.
You know, unfortunately, thesame way, that the social stuff
is hard with the peers, just ona regular even keel level.
I think that you know thatshows itself in the bullying
(47:41):
situation with our kids as well,though.
So he's gotten really good atself-advocating with us, but if
he's in a situation with a peerwho is not being kind and he
doesn't really realize that,then that is still a real
struggle for him.
At his old school there was aboy who decided it was funny to
(48:05):
start saying that things thatwere weird were autistic, like
oh, that's so autistic.
And making up a song on theplayground about autism.
And I wound up.
You know.
I spoke to the administration.
They swore up and down theywould get it fixed and it still
(48:26):
continued to happen.
So I pulled him out, which wasvery traumatic for him, and we
were talking about it one dayand he goes mom, I don't think
he was talking, I don't think hewas making fun of me.
I said Brady, you're the onlykid in the class that the whole
class knows has autism and hewasn't catching that.
You know this was a directattack on you and he actually
(48:51):
had a friend step up for him anddefend him.
But you know, so thatself-advocacy I think he's in
kind of the early stages of that, where he's able to start
sticking up for himself with usas parents and testing those
boundaries with us as parentsand advocating for with teachers
for things that he needs.
(49:12):
But, um, that peer-to-peerself-advocacy is something that
um is a lot harder to come bythat I have my one daughter.
Speaker 1 (49:22):
She.
She self-advocates abouteverybody and everything and she
tells everybody what theyshould be doing or what she
wants, all day long.
But then I have one that,unfortunately, because his
disabilities are so great thathe gets teased and he actually
(49:42):
says to me but they're my friend, and so because they're just
talking to him, so it's tryingto get him to understand no,
sweetie, they're not treatingyou very well right now.
So you know, but that'sdifficult too is because he
wants somebody to really likehim and he does go to a
(50:03):
different school now too and hehas some friends, so he's very
excited about that.
And, yeah, I mean it's just soimportant.
I feel I mean gosh bullies.
It breaks my heart.
I can remember one time wherethis my one son, he was playing
basketball and he was so littleand he was trying so hard and
(50:25):
these bigger kids came out andthey were just making so—they
were just teasing him so badlyand of course I went in and
advocated and I'm just like stopit.
But he was younger, but notsaying something and trying to
step back and trying to givethem the tools to be able to do
that by themselves.
(50:45):
Oh, that's that's hard.
Speaker 2 (50:48):
That's hard as a bomb it is.
It was hard for me not toapproach the kid at his old
school and have some words withhim.
But you know those experiences,though as hard as they are, and
what we've told Brady is thatyou know you're is making fun of
(51:09):
autism, of something that's acore of who you are.
It's not all of who you are,but it is a part of you.
Then they're not your friendand they are not just saying
something in general that justhappens to relate to something
about you.
They are attacking you and youknow it goes back to when he was
(51:36):
in, I think, his second grade.
There was a boy who wasphysically bullying him and we
practiced at home.
We'll call the kid Jimmy, butwe would practice at home and I
would touch Brady's arm or grabhis arm and he would have to
yell stop it, jimmy.
And I was like that's not loudenough, brady, if I grab your
arm.
You know, the cool thing isBrady and Jimmy wound up being
(52:05):
friends a couple years later andJimmy that school handled it so
great.
They got the boys together andthey made friends.
And that kid actually talkedabout feeling bad about the fact
that he was picking up.
Brady later in life.
So but you know, the physicalstuff is almost easier to
(52:26):
address than some of theseundermining you know kind of
behind the scenes mental thingsthat people do, especially once
they hit middle school, which isjust a tough time for everybody
.
But we're working on that.
Speaker 1 (52:45):
You know, two of the things that you really talk
about is your son's inability toconnect with other kids and how
bad that he or I don't like theword bad how differently he has
acted in public.
Sometimes that makes you justwant to explain to everyone in
the room, and I've gone intosituations like that too with my
(53:07):
kids, where I just want them tohave a shirt that says I have
autism.
Please be kind, you know,because lots of times I can
sense everybody's staring and Ijust want everybody to
understand.
You know, hey, and I have gonein and apologized before and
said I am sorry, you know he hasautism and we're still learning
(53:31):
.
So yeah but the connection,especially with one of my kids.
He is always on the outsidewhile the other kids are playing
and it's trying to teach himhow to join and that fight or
flight, I mean it's trying toteach him how to join, and that
fight or flight I mean it's areal thing.
And because he gets sooverstimulated, just because of
(53:52):
that alone he goes into either arun or he goes into flailing,
you know.
And so now it was so difficult,difficult to keep him in the
classroom and he's gifted, sothat was difficult, so we
decided to homeschool him.
He's home now.
Speaker 2 (54:12):
And we've figured out that the schooling decision is
something you almost have tomake every year because the
needs are changing and hischallenges are changing.
From an academic standpoint, hecan do all the work.
He's a smart kid and he can doall the work, but can he listen
to a teacher who's just talkingat him for an hour and take
(54:36):
notes that are gonna help himremember stuff for a test?
Maybe not, you know.
And so you know, thehomeschooling thing that we're
doing now that's a hybrid isgreat in some ways, and that
he's able to self-study and he'sable to get through it just
fine, to get to the point wheremom's not as much help as she
(54:57):
used to be in elementary school.
But he wants to be challenged,he wants to have, you know, that
teacher relationship and hewants to have, he wants more.
And so you know, I think theschooling thing is going to be
(55:18):
just a, and every year we needto look at it.
We're doing that right now forninth grade, because he's high
school next year and what'sgoing to be the best environment
for him socially andacademically.
So, and you know, I guess we'veproven with our track record of
the different schools that he'sbeen in that we're willing to
make a change if it's not theright fit.
Speaker 1 (55:39):
Oh yeah, so it's all about change.
Speaking of autism and peoplenot liking change.
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:47):
Yeah, that kind of goes.
I mean, I just expect changeevery single day, so I have
learned to just go with change.
Now one of the things is thatyou talked about with your
husband, which was reallyamazing when you found out that
or you were thinking that hemight have autism.
(56:07):
Your husband said, okay, sowhat do we do now?
I mean, what a great responseto that.
So what would you say toparents who are hearing the word
autism or whatever it is,whatever invisible disability it
is?
What would you say to them whenthey're hearing it for the
(56:29):
first time?
This is the end of part one ofCarrie Baker's interview.
You can find her atcarriebakercom.
Please check out her bookFinding Kind Discovering Hope
and Purpose While Loving Kidswith Invisible Differences.
You can check out the Kindcommunity, her blog tools, learn
about kind kids and kindfamilies at kindfamiliescom.
(56:54):
Part two continues this amazinginterview with Carrie.
If you or know of anyone whomight have autism, tune in next
week and we will continue togive you some insight.
Every person with autism isdifferent, but we are all
beautifully and wonderfully made.
We are very grateful at RealTalk with Tina and Anne that you
tuned in today.
(57:14):
Please give us a shout out atrealtalktinaannecom.
You can message Anne or Tina byhitting the microphone at the
bottom of the screen.
We will message you back.
You can email us directly orreach us on Facebook, our
Facebook page Real Talk withTina Ann.
Thank you again for listening.
(57:39):
Remember there is purpose inthe pain and hope in the journey
.
We will see you next time forpart two.
Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne.
I am Anne, and today we have avery special guest.
Carrie Baker is an author,speaker, podcaster and founder
of Kind Families.
Kind Families supports kidswith invisible neurological
differences, and the KindCommunity is for parents,
caregivers, friends andadvocates of kids whose brains
(00:31):
work differently than theirpeers but have no outwardly
visible disability.
I want to tell you, carrie, howexcited I am to have you on, as
I have three kids withinvisible neurological
differences, and I also do.
I know it is.
Yeah, it is very difficultnavigating the world with
(00:53):
invisible differences, and so Iappreciate what you are doing.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Well, thank you so much, Anne.
I'm just thrilled to be herespeaking with you, and I know we
have lots to talk about, so youknow you don't do anything
halfway, do you?
I've been accused of thatbefore.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
yes, yeah, I mean, I read every word of your book and
you are amazing.
I so love that you took whatyou and your son have gone
through and started an entiremovement, basically to help
others who are going through it.
So can you talk more about whyyou wrote the book?
(01:31):
Finding Kind and DiscoveringHope and Purpose While Loving
Kids with NeurologicalDisabilities?
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah, absolutely Well .
I've often said that I'm inkind of version 2.0 of my life,
because up until a couple ofyears ago, I was a financial
advisor.
I was a certified financialplanner.
I helped people with their 401kplans, companies with their
401k plans.
So this is a whole new path forme really, but it was one that
(02:00):
started to really start to growas a seed in my heart when my
son, brady, was diagnosed withautism when he was three years
old, and that was something thatwas not in my plan, in my life
plan.
Honestly, I did not know onething about autism when it came
into our lives and becameapparent that that is what my
(02:23):
son had, and so it was along-term shift of perspective
for me.
For the first few years, really, I was just trying to bob and
weave and do as much as we couldfor Brady and thinking we could
you know, quote unquote fix thethings that he was struggling
with and over a much longerperiod of time, through a lot of
(02:46):
different ways, through meetingother families who were going
through something similar,through a faith that grew in my
heart through the process andunderstanding that Brady was
made exactly the way he wassupposed to be made with all the
gifts and talents and all thechallenges that come along with
them, just as all of us are.
And so in the last few years Ireally started feeling pulled
(03:11):
away from the financial servicesworld and pulled toward this
kind community and I did feellike the invisible nature of
autism and ADHD, which my sonwas also diagnosed with, and a
lot of other neurological soupingredients that I like to call
it.
It presented some differentchallenges.
(03:33):
I mean, I'm super grateful forall the things he can do, that
he has got, all the abilities hedoes have, but because he looks
like every other kid on thestreet, it did present some
challenges for him and for mepersonally, because there were
unexpected behaviors, there wereunexpected reactions, there was
(03:56):
an inability to relate to otherchildren the way that other
children were trying to relateto him and trying to grasp that
and figure out ways to help him.
It took us down a differentpath than I ever thought I would
go down.
(04:17):
Now I have been accused of beingone of the most social people
on the planet.
So having a son who had areally hard time relating to
other kids and really justwanted to be as far away from
them as possible in any kind ofsocial situation was a new
experience for me and the morecomfortable I got with who he is
(04:38):
, all the things he came, allthe gifts and talents he had, I
realized I was having theseconversations with other moms
who were kind of just at thebeginning of their journeys and
they were going through the samestruggles that I was going
through initially and I washaving coffees all the time.
I was having conversationsafter church and at one point I
(04:58):
remember my husband said youknow, maybe you should figure
out a way to address more thanone person at a time with some
of the things we're talkingabout.
And another friend of mine atchurch had listened to all of
the stories that I had talkedabout in a Bible study group and
she said, carrie, you ought towrite a book.
And I'd never even thought ofthat.
(05:19):
But the more comfortable I gotin who I am as Brady's mom Brady
is, as this amazing, kind kid Ifelt like there were other
parents like you that wouldbenefit from hearing the story.
That number one they're notalone through something that
(05:46):
other families have gone through.
And I certainly don't have allthe answers and didn't try to
pretend to in any of thecommunications and writing that
I do, but it's a way for me totell other parents you're not
alone.
Your kid was made exactly theway he or she was supposed to be
made and our job as parents isto celebrate who they are and
then help them with thechallenges that they do have in
(06:07):
navigating a world that justreally isn't set up for them.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
So that way, oh, yeah , I mean you've touched on so
much and we're gonna break allof that down.
Uh, with your book.
You say that it's a story ofacceptance and joy in the face
of a life plan which you justsort of touched on, and it took
(06:31):
an unexpected detour.
You know, when we're young andwe're growing up, here we are,
we're dreaming about what ourfuture is going to be like.
You know, even into our 20s, Ithink, we're thinking about you
know what's going to happen, andsometimes life kind of takes
over and it takes us in adifferent direction.
(06:52):
And I know that I have fivekids and I never planned on that
, Never and I have three withautism, ADHD and some other
invisible differences, and it isvery life-changing.
I adopted all of my kids andthey, yeah, I mean I never
(07:14):
expected all the twists andturns that our life has taken.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
And that's so true and I think that was part of
that wasn't part of.
It was the biggest part of mecoming to acceptance is me
finally letting go of that, thatvision and that dream, because
I was clinging to it for dearlife for a couple of years.
And that's why I mean we gosh,we worked so hard because I was
just like if I just work hardenough, if I just run hard
(07:42):
enough, if I get him to theright therapist like all this
will go away and my little planwill just fall right back into
place again.
you know, Right, right, right.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
And you do think that you think I mean, we started
the therapies, we got to thedoctors.
You know we did all of that.
We thought that, you know,special needs preschool was the
answer for one of our kiddos.
That that would be.
You know, special needspreschool was the answer for one
of our kiddos.
That that would be.
You know, he would be.
He hardly spoke, he had just afew words.
(08:11):
When I got him at almost fouryears old and I really thought
that if we got him, you know,just completely consumed with
all these people and tools andeverything, that he would soon
be able to speak in fullsentences and paragraphs.
You know, and it well he doesnow.
(08:31):
But it took a long time to gethim there and you just don't
realize how much hard work it'sgoing to be along the way.
And it's been a journey.
You know, I was an assistantdirector for kids with autism at
a school and with my threekiddos, I mean, every single kid
(08:54):
on the spectrum is different.
So there's no, you can't likeread a book and say, okay, this
is the plan of how we're goingto reach A, b and C, and you
know there's no really planbecause every kid is so
different.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
Right, it's funny, you know.
I mentioned that my husband waslike how could we reach more
people?
Well, initially, when we werefirst going through it, that's
what we were looking for.
We were like there needs to bean autism concierge.
You know, like somebody who.
You know, it's like somebodywho, who you?
know, looks at your kid and thensays, okay, based on him, you
need to do A, b, c, d and E, andthat isn't out there.
(09:33):
So maybe you know, when we getthrough this and when we figure
it out, that'll be our business.
(09:59):
We'll, we'll just make that ourbusiness.
You know, oh, my goodness, hownaive we were in thinking all of
that, and it became more of anoutreach not to say this is what
you do, but this is how youstill find joy in the be
challenges that are going toface us, that are going to
surprise us, and we're going tokeep making mistakes, like we
did early on.
But at the base of everythingwe do, it's got to be an
understanding of what hisidentity is based in and that he
(10:21):
was put on this planet to bringjoy, and to everybody else as
well.
And we've got to help him dothat and not try to fit him into
a box that was never made forhim in the first place.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Oh, I love that you come up with so many great
nuggets.
Your book is full of them.
I just kept writing stuff down.
I mean I'm serious and I don'tfeel that way about a lot of the
books that I read on autism andthings like that, but you
nailed it, thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
I feel like so much of what came to me is an
inspiration of faith and it's amessage that I really believe
God wants other families to hear.
And so when I, you know, Ireally kind of give all that
glory to God, because thosethings were not part of my
(11:16):
vernacular until I had this kidthat he gave me and the cool
thing is, gave me.
And the cool thing is and thisisn't going to be the same for
every parent out there but I wasso focused on my original plan
that I didn't realize that I hada whole other purpose out there
(11:37):
.
So it wasn't just to be evenabout Brady, it was about me.
And you know, I'd always wantedto be in finance and I thought
that's what I'd do for the restof my life and suddenly that
just didn't mean anything to meanymore and this became my heart
.
I do say in some speakingengagements I've had that my
hard thing became my heart thing, and that's how you can really
(12:01):
see where your purpose isguiding you.
You can really see where yourpurpose is guiding you that
sometimes these challenges thatwe go through are just opening
doors that you need to walkthrough for the next thing that
you're meant to be doing, and soit's been a journey for all of
us and it is, yeah, for everysingle person in our household
(12:24):
and any person that enters intoour world.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
I mean, it affects everybody In a good way, though
I'm not going to say in becausethey are such blessings.
And what was the journey foryour son at the very beginning?
Because you talk about how hardit was.
(12:47):
You've talked about it here alittle bit and in the book.
But what was so difficult inthe beginning?
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Well, so initially I had no clue that Brady was
anything but a little peculiar,because I didn't know anything
about autism.
I did not understand it at all.
And so he I remember taking himto his two year well check
appointment and the doctor saidwell, he walked on time and he
talked on time, so autism is offthe table.
(13:15):
And I was kind of like autism,I didn't know, that was on the
table, you know, and so it waskind of startling and so, but it
also gave me this false senseof comfort.
Well, the doctor said he wasfine.
So all of these little peculiarthings are just me not knowing
that much about kids.
I didn't have Brady until I wasalmost 40.
(13:36):
So, and my friends had all hadtheir kids much earlier, so I
wasn't really around a lot oflittle kids.
I didn't know what was typicaland what was not but, I did know
.
You know, I I did have this kindof gut feeling.
Every time we went to a playdate, he would just run away
from the other kids, he wouldrun out into traffic.
He cried every single day whenI brought him to school.
(13:58):
Things that you know pottytraining and other things that
were just pieces of cake for myfriends, you know, were not
pieces of cake for us, you knowhe would these meltdowns in
public places over things that Icouldn't figure out.
(14:20):
One of the things that was mostconcerning to us is he would
have what we called sad momentsand he would be sitting on a
couch watching the Wiggles.
He was very, very, veryinterested in the Wiggles.
They were his main passion whenhe was two and he would be
jumping on the couch and dancingalong to the song and then, all
(14:41):
of a sudden, tears would juststart falling out of his eyes
and I could not figure out whattriggered it and I couldn't make
him happy.
I couldn't.
There was nothing I could do.
The only thing that I could dois let him have some alone time,
and then he'd walk out 10minutes later and say I'm okay,
mommy.
And so there were things likethat that were really concerning
(15:05):
me.
But I honestly don't know if Iwould have figured it out if I
hadn't picked up a magazine thathappened to be on my desk one
day when I was really sittinghome.
I had just dropped him off atschool, I'd had a conversation
with one of his preschoolteachers about some of the
challenges he was having there.
He wouldn't sit in circle time,they told me.
(15:26):
When they asked him a question,instead of answering he would
just repeat the question back tothem.
And so I was just kind of, youknow, ruminating on all this
stuff back at my desk and Ipicked up this magazine and
there happened to be an articlein there written by a woman
whose son was diagnosed withautism, but not until much later
(15:47):
in life, and he had suffered alot in his youth and his
adolescence, and it was a reallyhard story to read.
But as I am reading thedescription of this boy as a
child, it dawned on me that itsounded just like Brady.
He didn't want to be with otherkids.
(16:08):
He ran away constantly.
He would have these meltdownsthat were kind of unexplainable
and we couldn't console him ofunexplainable and untreat you
know.
We couldn't console him, and sothere was a quiz in the bottom
of that article for somethingwhich at the time was called
Think Asperger's and now it'scalled the Social Challenges
(16:29):
Questionnaire.
But the same organization stillhas that questionnaire out
there and it's used as ascreening tool for autism.
And I went through that onlinequiz and I answered 15 out of 15
questions yes.
And it came up that my sonneeded to be evaluated for
autism spectrum disorder and itjust floored me.
But you know it for him, youknow we, just as we started
(16:54):
diving into what are the, whatare the next steps, and we saw,
you know, we heard 40 hours aweek of therapy and speech and
OT and PT and all these things.
And you know, not knowing that,all of these things were
play-based activities for him,and one thing that he always
thrived on was the one-on-oneattention from an adult.
(17:15):
I mean with peers.
He really struggled, but manadults loved him.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
They still do.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
He could talk like as a three-year-old.
He could talk like he was a65-year-old English professor or
something, and so adults lovedhim I have one of those.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
You have one of those I do.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
So you know, when we started getting into the rhythm
with him, he loved it.
He had this one-on-oneattention from all of these
different therapists who werewonderful, and we used to joke
that they were all women.
Of course, at the time.
There are a couple of men thatactually help out now, but at
the time they were all women andwe called them all of.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Brady's ladies you know, like the Beyonce song.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
You know Brady's ladies.
But so for a long time hedidn't really even understand
that this wasn't how every otherkid on the planet, you know,
functioned.
He didn't have a sibling, hewas an only child, and so in his
mind it started when he wasthree years old.
All kids did this In his mindit started when he was three
years old.
All kids did this, but when hewas in kindergarten and first
(18:22):
grade, he had an aide in theclassroom and I remember him
asking me one time well, why doI have an aide and nobody else
has?
an aide in the class and I justtold him.
I said well, brady, you knowthere are certain things that
you're really really good atthat other kids need help with,
like reading.
He's a super quick early readerand some kids have a really
(18:44):
hard time reading, and so youknow it's that's the way it is
with you and being around otherkids.
You know you struggle with thatpiece of it and so we're trying
to help you with that.
But and then he let that go andit wasn't until he was in
second grade when we decided,because the school was really
not being accommodating to Bradyand the things that we thought
(19:07):
he needed, we made a move to aspecial school for kids with
learning challenges not justautism, but dyslexia, adhd
across the board and we decidedthat it was going to be
important for Brady to know whyhe was there and there were
going to be other kids talkingabout their diagnoses.
It was a school that went fromfirst grade to 12th grade, so he
(19:30):
was going to have interactionwith all different ages.
So that's when we made thedecision to tell him about
autism and ADHD.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
And how did he respond when you told him?
Speaker 2 (19:43):
So, as you made the comment that I don't go halfway
on anything, I had the wholepresentation prepared.
I had a video with this puppetwho referred to Perry the
platypus from Phineas and FerbTV show, which he loved, and I
had all the famous people whohad Phineas and Ferb TV show,
which he loved and I had.
I had all the famous people whohad autism and ADHD and all this
stuff and he just kind of tookit in and um, I I think I
(20:09):
actually wrote about this in thebook and I'm waiting for this
big, you know special momentbetween us and he just said.
The one thing he said was um.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
And he just said.
The one thing he said was willI get better, mommy?
Speaker 2 (20:21):
And I said honey, there's nothing to get better
from.
This is the way your brainfunctions, and it's not wrong,
it's just different.
And so and then he said, okay,can I have screen time now?
And he ran off and it didn'tregister that he had actually
(20:50):
understood our conversationuntil a teacher at the school
called me after school and shesaid I just have to tell you
what Brady said in class today.
They were talking about anxietyand they were asking the kids
to share, like what kinds ofthings do you think would cause
anxiety in a person?
And so kids were saying, youknow, like flying or talking in
front of people or something,and Brady raised his hand and
said it would cause anxiety ifyou knew you were different and
you didn't know why.
(21:12):
Oh, that's so beautiful, and soit was.
That was my confirmation thattelling him was the right thing
(21:34):
to do first of all, and arminghim with as much information
about how his brain works aspossible and that he was, there
was a relief associated with itfor him.
Now it doesn't mean that hedoesn't have moments since then
where he said, mom, I hate mybrain.
You know when he's having ahard time or when he's kind of
coming out of one of these sadmoments and he'll say, mom, I
hate my brain.
And that is when I have to sayhoney, you can't hate your brain
(21:58):
, because your brain is what'sproducing all of these other
wonderful things too.
So you know it's been a journeyfor him as well, and you know
he doesn't.
We have told him that he isable to tell anybody he wants to
tell about his autism and ADHD.
(22:18):
We don't want him to think thathe has to keep it a secret.
We did encourage him that.
You know, some people might notunderstand autism the same way
I didn't understand autism whenhe was first diagnosed.
So you might want to wait untilthere's somebody that you care
about and that you know, youknow cares about you, but you
are welcome to share it howeveryou like, and there have been
(22:39):
situations where he's wanted tokeep it to himself and others
where he's, you know, been veryforthcoming with it.
Right, but that's his decisionto make at this point Now with
the book.
You know I had been writing fora long time and when I first
started writing it was all aboutthe hard stuff.
You know time and when I firststarted writing, it was all
(23:03):
about the hard stuff.
You know, it was all aboutthose tough moments and the
meltdowns and figuring it out.
But as he started to grow andwe started to see all these
amazing things that he was doing, I realized that I needed to
shift that in the book to, yes,a conversation that's going to
connect, I hope, with a lot ofmoms and other families about,
you know, having figuring out achild has autism and invisible
(23:27):
neurological differences andsome of the adjustments that we
had to make in our lives becauseof that, but that I wanted this
whole section also to be aboutall the awesome things that
Brady has done.
Whole section also to be aboutall the awesome things that
Brady has done.
And so when I was able to putall of that together and he read
(23:49):
the book, he was, oh, he wasall in.
So, even the hard stuff you knowhe made me, he made a comment
to me.
He's like mom, now I get itbetter.
I understand, you know what youwere going through and that it
was hard for you and why.
But he wants other kids to lookat our story and say, look,
(24:10):
this is just a differentbrainwiring and it doesn't limit
him in any way as to the thingshe could do any way as to the
things he could do.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
So One of my favorite things about your book is that
you started with his words, yeah, and that you end with words to
him from you yeah.
I thought that that was sobeautiful.
I loved what he said.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
It was so him, anne, if you met him.
His foreword, that was justkind of an idea we had talking
around the dinner table onenight and, to be perfectly
honest, I'm a bit of a controlfreak with stuff like this, so I
wasn't sure what the result wasgoing to be, so I was kind of
like well, why?
Don't you write something, andthen we'll take a look at it and
(25:00):
we'll see what it is.
And he brought that in in onedraft and it was exactly the way
it was.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
So you didn't change anything.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Well, we did a few grammatical edits, but other
than that, that is purely hisvoice.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
So beautifully written.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
And you know he is a kid with a gift, first of all
for writing.
He's written about 150 ADHD andto relate it just perfectly to
his personality, so for thosewho haven't read it yet, he
talks about Star Wars and Lordof the Rings, those two book
series, or movie and book seriesthat are very near and dear to
his heart, and he was able torelate his own experience, you
know, to those things.
And he also has a deep faith,which I didn't know was possible
(26:07):
and which I really doubted Iguess was possible, with
somebody whose brain really wasthriving in the black and white
and not in the gray.
You know, and I think and Ihope and I pray that what he
wrote in there, that he'sfearfully and wonderfully made
(26:30):
and he is and it really getsthat from an inner knowledge
that he is and inner knowledgethat he is.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
And so, yeah, my kids have an understanding of God
and my one son, who's eight, hehas such a deep relationship
with Jesus and it's so great tosee Because, yeah, people on the
(26:59):
spectrum can be so black andwhite, like you said, and if it
doesn't fit in, you know, youjust can't accept it.
But you know, in a lot ofChrist and everything about the
Bible, you know it's about theunseen and so you know you need
that tangible thing to kind ofprove what you're being told.
(27:20):
And I love the fact that theyare just taking it for its word.
It's so amazing, you know.
I want to touch on something inthe times in my life where God
has found me and changed me themost was in the unexpected, and
(27:41):
I call them mile markers, wherewe, you know, hit this mark in
the road and we are never thesame again.
There's no going back to thatplace and trying to rewind and
become that person again.
You just can't, and I would notbe where I am today if it were
not for those mile markers.
(28:02):
And those mile markers got meto exactly where God wanted me
to be and you actually, at onepoint in the book, like in the
news of having an autismdiagnosis to an earthquake, and
I can relate to that.
When my son, my now 11-year-old,it was about five years ago, I
(28:26):
think I've had him for eightyears and I knew that there was
something.
I mean I knew he had autism.
I mean we figured autism, adhd,I mean hyperactivity,
everything.
I mean he had A to Z, it seemedlike.
But when they asked me to do agenetic test because they
(28:50):
thought that there was somethingelse, so we did a genetic test
and here he has DeGeorgesyndrome, which is a deleted
chromosome.
Oh wow, and because he looks sotypical I mean there's some
small things like he has alittle fold in one of his ears
(29:12):
and there's like really smallthings but if you look at him
you would think no.
But they called me and said hehas DeGeorge syndrome and you
know out of everything that allmy kids have been diagnosed with
.
That hit me and I had toresearch it and we had to do all
(29:34):
these things.
We had to go to the DeGeorgeCenter Clinic in Columbus, ohio
and all these things to try toget more information and try to
help him be his best.
But you know, what it comesdown to is when we get dealt the
unknown that's when it becomesthe scariest.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Well, that's when we have to trust too, and I think
that's one of the reasons thatit took me so long is because I
didn't have that relationshipwith God when we started on this
journey.
I put it all on me.
I put 100% of the weight of hisdiagnosis and treatment and
(30:19):
everything else on.
If I do enough, there'll be agood outcome.
We'll just be able to get rightback on the original path that
I was supposed to be on.
You know, and not understandingthat it you never.
Just, like you said, I love themile marker reference that you
know, once you get there, youcan't turn around and, like I
(30:41):
was talking about with theearthquake it was.
You know, once that earthshakes underneath you, those
plates don't go back to wherethey started.
Grasp on how good God can be inthose hard times, that I will
(31:07):
approach those challenging timesin my life with a different
perspective than I did early on,because I will be able to look
back and see exactly how he tookthis hard thing that I didn't
ask for, I didn't want initially, you know, and then turned it
into this beautiful gift and butit is a.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
it took me a lot longer than I would have liked
for it to take, so you know someof us, you know we just take a
little bit longer, and I thinkthat that's part of it.
You know, it's all part of thejourney.
One of the things that you talkabout, which you kind of
mentioned, was, you know, thatwe were made on purpose for a
(31:52):
purpose, and the things thathappened to us as well are there
on purpose for a purpose, and Ilove that.
Everyone has a purpose.
And at the beginning, your sontalks about this and honing in
on what they are good at, youknow, finding what they're good
at.
And my kids are so unique andthey touch this world in so many
(32:16):
beautiful ways.
And one of my boys that Italked about earlier, he has so
many invisible challenges and hegoes to a special needs school,
but I'll tell you that he isone of the most kind and loving
kids and it's finding thosethings that they're good at, you
(32:37):
know.
So they feel really good aboutthemselves.
And we figured out that he isso good at drums.
We didn't know that he would,but we exposed them to
everything and he went to a drumclass and here he is doing
fantastic and he actually saidto me drumming makes me feel
(33:02):
important and so go ahead.
No, I mean he just struggles inso much it just literally I
mean it melted my heart and Idid kind of like cry a little
bit because I was just sothrilled that he felt important
(33:23):
yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Yes, and you know it's.
We have been trying.
For instance, right now he's myson is in a hybrid homeschool
situation, so he's off schoolMondays and Fridays, and we had
to do that, you know,unfortunately because of a
bullying issue that happened athis prior school, and so we're.
You know we were kind ofthinking, okay, okay, he's in
(33:45):
eighth grade, let's take a, takea year to do this kind of low
stress option, um, but he'sbored, so we're, we're like how
do we?
how do we take up his time onmondays and fridays?
And we found a school that hasthese individual classes that
are one-on-one.
Teacher taught not where youcan go in, and they have things
(34:06):
like theater, art and cinema,and so my Brady now is a huge
movie buff.
You go to a movie with this kidand you will hear details that
he saw in that movie that youwould never imagine in your life
.
And then journalism.
He picked out journalismbecause we've been watching the
(34:26):
TV show Smallville with ClarkKent and the reporters are in
there, and so we're trying allof these different avenues where
you know, we know movies is hisnumber one thing, but there's
all these little offshoots thathe could really take a grasp on,
that utilize his gifts ofwriting and creativity and
(34:49):
performance art and those kindsof things.
So I think that's amazing andthe drummer is the most
important, by the way.
So I'm on the worship team atmy church and as a backup
vocalist and the drummer is themost important.
So you can tell your son that.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Well, he absolutely will eat that up.
Yes, he's all about being thenumber one and wanting to feel
important.
So I'm just really proud of himand you know, I just want to
quickly say that.
You know we had mentioned aboutme having neurological
differences and I was told thatI would not graduate high school
(35:26):
and I got a master's degreebecause I taught myself how to
learn by reading into a taperecorder and listening to it,
writing it down and thenmemorizing it, and it would take
me hours to do what maybesomebody could do in an hour for
me to get barely a C.
But you know, I figured it outand that's, you know, people
(35:48):
with autism.
I think that we are also givingthis big tool belt of all kinds
of other things the resiliencyand the determination and that's
what I see in your son in thisbook.
It's just a beautiful story,yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Yeah, he's, he he's very brave, I think.
You know he's extremelycourageous and he tries new
things and as has found somethat he doesn't like as much and
and some that he does.
But you know, I think, assomebody that was kind of raised
(36:25):
like you go get a businessdegree and because that's like
the smart thing to do, becauseyou can do a lot of things with
it and that sort of thing, and Idon't regret that at all, I
don't regret my first 30 yearsin the career.
Career were when I was giving,you know, educational sessions
(36:46):
to the employees, or it wasn'tin.
Believe me, I was not theperson like making somebody a
million dollars in the stockmarket or anything like that.
So it was, it was in theone-on-one that I would have
with employees or givingpresentations or writing
materials to help themunderstand things better.
And so you know, it is kind ofinteresting to think now that
(37:07):
I've just done this complete 180and loving it so much and
feeling like I'm right where Ineed to be, and I just want
Brady to start that way.
You know, I don't want him togo 30 years of you know
processing widgets or whateverdoing spreadsheets when that's
not his math and science or nothis thing, and so we've just got
(37:28):
to find those creative outletsand a way for him to really
build a life around doing those,because if he's doing that,
he's going to feel good abouthimself, he's going to be
successful, and it's not aboutmoney or anything else, but he's
going to feel fulfilled, andthat's where we want him to be.
Speaker 1 (37:51):
Yeah, you know, I read that story about him
swimming in that was it a lakeor whatever it was?
And then the dead, the fish,bones, and he's swimming and I'm
just like I was feeling it.
I mean, I just was, my skin wascrawling even thinking about
(38:11):
him doing that on the spectrum.
Are you kidding?
I mean that was you want totalk about determination?
I mean, in every story with himit seemed like at first it was
a little difficult and it waskind of like you know, you
weren't really sure if he wasgoing to get to the other side
of it, but he found it withinhimself to get to the other side
(38:31):
of it, even the first time hegot in the pool, you know, when
he just kept going.
So I don't know, you know, andI saw him continually make goals
for himself in the book and himreaching for them, and that was
just so amazing.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Right, right, it's interesting.
So right now, he's never been asports kid really.
He's always loved to swim andhe did cross country and track
at his old school because it wasa small school and any kid
could participate and those areindividual sports.
But he's never been into likebasketball or football or
(39:07):
anything like that.
And he's told us now I thinkthat he's in eighth grade that
kids go out on the basketballcourt and he's horrible.
He will be the first.
I'm not, you know, divulginganything that he wouldn't allow
me to divulge.
He's horrible at basketball andfootball, horrible at
basketball and football, but hewants to learn it and he goes.
(39:27):
Mom, I don't want to be awesomeat it, I just want to be middle
of the pack.
I don't want to be awfulanymore.
And so we've got.
There's actually a group herethat focuses on special needs
fitness and starting in a coupleweeks.
(39:56):
We've got a trainer that's goingto come twice a week and just
give him, like you know, theselessons on.
You know, throw a ball and getit to where you want it to go,
and dribble a ball withoutlosing control of it, and have
that work all in with hisphysical therapy as well and
building core and things likethat.
But you know if he's going toexpress interest in it.
We're going to try to figureout a way to help him.
See, I?
Speaker 1 (40:10):
just love that, and we do that with ours too.
One of the things that you sayis I get so caught in.
Well, actually you wrote thisin a kerrybakercom blog your
blog.
Yes, so I was reading those asas well, and you said that you
get so caught up in the haveto's that I overlook the get
(40:32):
to's of parenting, that yourchild and god, that god
carefully and thoughtfullycreated to be yours, and I
somewhat will relate with that,in that we have so many
appointments, there are so manythings that we have to do, and
when I was reading through yourbook, you know all the meetings,
(40:52):
the school meetings, thedoctor's appointments, the pills
that we on our end have to takeeverywhere we go to make sure
we have everything, all thefidgets, the bag full of all the
kids' things, and we have tomake sure so much so that they
are okay that we oftentimesdon't get to enjoy it.
(41:13):
And I kind of laughed because Ihad this visual of you with the
DVD player in the car as youwere taking, you know, the kids
to the cavern field trip, Ithink it was.
But I do that now.
I mean I've got my hand on thewheel, the DVD player back there
is not working or somethinghappens and I'm like this,
(41:36):
trying to figure it out for them.
Speaker 2 (41:38):
So yeah, I totally get goodness, I think it is.
(42:04):
It's just kind of ingrained inus as parents that we try to get
as much done as possible, butyou know, we've we've got to
stop missing the cool thingsthat that come along with
parenting a kid like this, andand and.
That's true for all parents too.
I think we all get caught up inthe hustle and bustle, whether
(42:28):
it's kids that are in sports orin therapies, you know and kind
of miss out on the relationshipbuilding piece of it, and I'm
guilty of that too.
So it's always good to liketake a step back and just enjoy.
I went to a concert with Bradyyesterday and I just kind of
looked over at him and he justhad this smile on his face the
(42:49):
whole time listening to it andso I found myself kind of just
looking at him almost more thanthe stage, and there was a lot
going on on the stage.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
Oh, I do that too.
Yeah, I do that too.
Yeah, I mean, I call it mythird childhood because I had,
you know, mine, of course, andthen my older two, who I adopted
years ago, and now I have thesethree littles.
So I call it my third childhoodbecause I just love living
(43:17):
through them.
It's just so fun.
There was something else, youknow, I gosh, there was so much
in your book that I resonatedwith.
But the other day I asked mydaughter to clean her room,
which turned into a full-outyelling, screaming, you know,
and it got to this where I'mtelling her well, you can't do
(43:39):
this if you don't get this done,which everything I was doing or
saying was escalating thesituation.
And you talk about poker faceand say attention was a reward
for good behavior, not aresponse to bad behavior.
And I have this picture of youin my head, with your son in one
(44:02):
part of your house and you inthe other, and you wanting so
badly to get to him, and youknew that you couldn't get go to
him because he needed to figureit out and calm down.
You know, I do ignore herbehaviors at times and anything
that I say or do just escalatesthat behavior.
(44:23):
So it works.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, we just had that happen,
actually two nights ago, withsomething where he kind of lost
it and went in his room and shutthe door and he was sitting up
against his door and of courseI'm pushing on the door, going
come on, Brady, it's time fordinner, you know.
And he's like I just need to bealone, mom, I just need to be
alone.
Come on, Brady, it's time fordinner, you know.
(44:47):
And he's like I just need to bealone, mom, I just need to be
alone.
And I kind of went okay, I knowthat, miss out on a show or to
you know, and just make that hisdecision.
So when, if he is, you know,not complying with something
(45:28):
that he really needs to be doing, to just say, ok, well then I
guess we can't go to the movie,but that's okay, we'll go again
another day and do it with thepoker face, without any emotion
or screaming or, you know,gritting our teeth, which is
super hard, but you know thatreally put the ball back in his
court to make the decision.
He wasn't responding to me andit was a new concept for me that
my negative attention was evensomething that he was trying to
draw out in me, like he wastaking something from my
(45:51):
negative attention and and thatwasn't.
That wasn't helping us in theend goal for any anything.
So once I removed that thatit's kind of like a tug of war.
You know, once I dropped my endof the rope, he doesn't have
anything to tug on anymore.
Speaker 1 (46:11):
Well, I love that he can let you know what he wants,
like when he told you that hewanted his chicken nuggets room
temperature or something likethat.
You know, I think that that'sso amazing, because I constantly
.
I think that that's one of thebiggest things is communication
and teaching our kids how toself-advocate.
Speaker 2 (46:38):
He has language that had to develop and the story of
him telling me that his chickennuggets were burning hot to him,
even though they seemed likethey were room temperature to me
.
That was after years of speechtherapy and all the things that
he needed to be able tocommunicate that across.
(47:00):
Of course, now he's a teenagerand he throws that back at me.
You know he didn't want toparticipate in a school show and
he's like Mom, I'mself-advocating by saying I
don't want to do it.
Oh my gosh, oh, wow.
But you know we're fortunatethat he has the language and
(47:21):
that he has.
You know the comfort level,especially with us and people
that he's close to, to do that.
You know, unfortunately, thesame way, that the social stuff
is hard with the peers, just ona regular even keel level.
I think that you know thatshows itself in the bullying
(47:41):
situation with our kids as well,though.
So he's gotten really good atself-advocating with us, but if
he's in a situation with a peerwho is not being kind and he
doesn't really realize that,then that is still a real
struggle for him.
At his old school there was aboy who decided it was funny to
(48:05):
start saying that things thatwere weird were autistic, like
oh, that's so autistic.
And making up a song on theplayground about autism.
And I wound up.
You know.
I spoke to the administration.
They swore up and down theywould get it fixed and it still
(48:26):
continued to happen.
So I pulled him out, which wasvery traumatic for him, and we
were talking about it one dayand he goes mom, I don't think
he was talking, I don't think hewas making fun of me.
I said Brady, you're the onlykid in the class that the whole
class knows has autism and hewasn't catching that.
You know this was a directattack on you and he actually
(48:51):
had a friend step up for him anddefend him.
But you know, so thatself-advocacy I think he's in
kind of the early stages of that, where he's able to start
sticking up for himself with usas parents and testing those
boundaries with us as parentsand advocating for with teachers
for things that he needs.
(49:12):
But, um, that peer-to-peerself-advocacy is something that
um is a lot harder to come bythat I have my one daughter.
Speaker 1 (49:22):
She.
She self-advocates abouteverybody and everything and she
tells everybody what theyshould be doing or what she
wants, all day long.
But then I have one that,unfortunately, because his
disabilities are so great thathe gets teased and he actually
(49:42):
says to me but they're my friend, and so because they're just
talking to him, so it's tryingto get him to understand no,
sweetie, they're not treatingyou very well right now.
So you know, but that'sdifficult too is because he
wants somebody to really likehim and he does go to a
(50:03):
different school now too and hehas some friends, so he's very
excited about that.
And, yeah, I mean it's just soimportant.
I feel I mean gosh bullies.
It breaks my heart.
I can remember one time wherethis my one son, he was playing
basketball and he was so littleand he was trying so hard and
(50:25):
these bigger kids came out andthey were just making so—they
were just teasing him so badlyand of course I went in and
advocated and I'm just like stopit.
But he was younger, but notsaying something and trying to
step back and trying to givethem the tools to be able to do
that by themselves.
(50:45):
Oh, that's that's hard.
Speaker 2 (50:48):
That's hard as a bomb it is.
It was hard for me not toapproach the kid at his old
school and have some words withhim.
But you know those experiences,though as hard as they are, and
what we've told Brady is thatyou know you're is making fun of
(51:09):
autism, of something that's acore of who you are.
It's not all of who you are,but it is a part of you.
Then they're not your friendand they are not just saying
something in general that justhappens to relate to something
about you.
They are attacking you and youknow it goes back to when he was
(51:36):
in, I think, his second grade.
There was a boy who wasphysically bullying him and we
practiced at home.
We'll call the kid Jimmy, butwe would practice at home and I
would touch Brady's arm or grabhis arm and he would have to
yell stop it, jimmy.
And I was like that's not loudenough, brady, if I grab your
arm.
You know, the cool thing isBrady and Jimmy wound up being
(52:05):
friends a couple years later andJimmy that school handled it so
great.
They got the boys together andthey made friends.
And that kid actually talkedabout feeling bad about the fact
that he was picking up.
Brady later in life.
So but you know, the physicalstuff is almost easier to
(52:26):
address than some of theseundermining you know kind of
behind the scenes mental thingsthat people do, especially once
they hit middle school, which isjust a tough time for everybody
.
But we're working on that.
Speaker 1 (52:45):
You know, two of the things that you really talk
about is your son's inability toconnect with other kids and how
bad that he or I don't like theword bad how differently he has
acted in public.
Sometimes that makes you justwant to explain to everyone in
the room, and I've gone intosituations like that too with my
(53:07):
kids, where I just want them tohave a shirt that says I have
autism.
Please be kind, you know,because lots of times I can
sense everybody's staring and Ijust want everybody to
understand.
You know, hey, and I have gonein and apologized before and
said I am sorry, you know he hasautism and we're still learning
(53:31):
.
So yeah but the connection,especially with one of my kids.
He is always on the outsidewhile the other kids are playing
and it's trying to teach himhow to join and that fight or
flight, I mean it's trying toteach him how to join, and that
fight or flight I mean it's areal thing.
And because he gets sooverstimulated, just because of
(53:52):
that alone he goes into either arun or he goes into flailing,
you know.
And so now it was so difficult,difficult to keep him in the
classroom and he's gifted, sothat was difficult, so we
decided to homeschool him.
He's home now.
Speaker 2 (54:12):
And we've figured out that the schooling decision is
something you almost have tomake every year because the
needs are changing and hischallenges are changing.
From an academic standpoint, hecan do all the work.
He's a smart kid and he can doall the work, but can he listen
to a teacher who's just talkingat him for an hour and take
(54:36):
notes that are gonna help himremember stuff for a test?
Maybe not, you know.
And so you know, thehomeschooling thing that we're
doing now that's a hybrid isgreat in some ways, and that
he's able to self-study and he'sable to get through it just
fine, to get to the point wheremom's not as much help as she
(54:57):
used to be in elementary school.
But he wants to be challenged,he wants to have, you know, that
teacher relationship and hewants to have, he wants more.
And so you know, I think theschooling thing is going to be
(55:18):
just a, and every year we needto look at it.
We're doing that right now forninth grade, because he's high
school next year and what'sgoing to be the best environment
for him socially andacademically.
So, and you know, I guess we'veproven with our track record of
the different schools that he'sbeen in that we're willing to
make a change if it's not theright fit.
Speaker 1 (55:39):
Oh yeah, so it's all about change.
Speaking of autism and peoplenot liking change.
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:47):
Yeah, that kind of goes.
I mean, I just expect changeevery single day, so I have
learned to just go with change.
Now one of the things is thatyou talked about with your
husband, which was reallyamazing when you found out that
or you were thinking that hemight have autism.
(56:07):
Your husband said, okay, sowhat do we do now?
I mean, what a great responseto that.
So what would you say toparents who are hearing the word
autism or whatever it is,whatever invisible disability it
is?
What would you say to them whenthey're hearing it for the
(56:29):
first time?
This is the end of part one ofCarrie Baker's interview.
You can find her atcarriebakercom.
Please check out her bookFinding Kind Discovering Hope
and Purpose While Loving Kidswith Invisible Differences.
You can check out the Kindcommunity, her blog tools, learn
about kind kids and kindfamilies at kindfamiliescom.
(56:54):
Part two continues this amazinginterview with Carrie.
If you or know of anyone whomight have autism, tune in next
week and we will continue togive you some insight.
Every person with autism isdifferent, but we are all
beautifully and wonderfully made.
We are very grateful at RealTalk with Tina and Anne that you
tuned in today.
(57:14):
Please give us a shout out atrealtalktinaannecom.
You can message Anne or Tina byhitting the microphone at the
bottom of the screen.
We will message you back.
You can email us directly orreach us on Facebook, our
Facebook page Real Talk withTina Ann.
Thank you again for listening.
(57:39):
Remember there is purpose inthe pain and hope in the journey
.
We will see you next time forpart two.
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