Autism Answer: How Our Kids Are Doing In School Is Not How Our Kids Are Doing

REMINDER: Our children's grades do not tell us how our children are doing. They tell us how our children's grades are doing. 

Sure, they are worth chatting about with our rugrats but good grades do not equal doing good, or vice versa. 

Often I hear parents ask each other: "How are the kids doing?" And far too often I hear a quick response that is some version of: "Great! She's in honor roll this year." or "Awesome! He's finally getting his school work in on time and bringing up his grades." or "Struggling. Her teachers tell me that she doesn't really apply herself or do the work." 

My hope is that we parents will remember to pay attention to how our kids feel about school and what they're actually learning, but we'll easily know that how they are is not about grades. Their grades do tell us a story about our children, they give us an idea of what they struggle with and care about and what their motivators are. But the grades aren't about HOW they're doing. Sure, most of us kind of "get" that but we're losing our grip on how true it is. 

When we run into old friends at the grocery store and they ask: "How are the kids doing?" I hope we'll easily respond with some version of: "Great! She's really into this new idea she has about writing the story for a video game." or "Awesome! He's been telling me all about why he wants to build Eco friendly buildings in busy American cities." or "Struggling. She feels confident about her ideas most days but struggles to like herself. We'll get there though. School is helping, she has a great group of friends and a supportive counselor." 

Some of our children go to school, so ignoring their grades or teacher reports would be silly. But their grades do not tell us how they're doing. 

Our children do. 

Hugs, smiles, and love!!
Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

Autism Answer: Why It's Easy For Me To Open My Borders

Things People Told My Mom Before She Adopted My Siblings: 

"This one is blind and deaf. He can't control his bowels and doesn't sleep and your whole family will have to deal with it. He's feral and won't ever be able to learn. You'll be keeping him until a bed is available at the institution. Are you sure you want to do this?"

"He's dangerous. You'll have to teach the family to protect themselves and to hide their weaknesses. He's small but he's mean. Are you sure you want to do this?"

"She's been abused so much there's nothing good left in her. She lies and takes advantage of anyone and everyone, don't believe it when she says she loves you. It's not her fault but it's not your problem either, and you have other children to protect. Are you sure you want to do this?"

I could go on and on and on. These people were well meaning but terrifically misguided.

My mom -- Lynette Louise aka The Brain Broad--has always exampled love, hard work, strong expectations and raising the bar. But never has she taught us to permanently close our hearts or our door. 

And when mom did cave into the pressure and judgements of others for a short time, attempting to keep dangers at bay and to find folks focused on protecting us, when she doubted her instincts and thought perhaps others were right, in those few years we were hurt. We were left feeling lost and afraid, acutely aware of the monsters in our midst but unable to easily identify them, and we were taken dangerous and cruel advantage of. 

It is with the greatest of gratitude that I appreciate and love my mom for having the strength and vision to choose love and open borders again.

I am the oldest daughter of eight kids, six were adopted. My mom has continuously invited people to live with us for temporary stints (she has a filmmaker from Uganda staying with her right now). My life and the lives of my siblings have been forever and infinitely made better because of this. 

Yes, there have been mountain sized challenges and scary moments, we have had to say "no" with strong love and a belief in each other now and then. Mom has had to offer love and help to people in a dangerous frame of mind while being smart and careful about it, without inviting them to live with in our home, though she still helped. There have been confusing times of deep introspection where we had to keep careful watch on the balance between kindness and blindness; knowing that, always, kindness is possible.

So, yes, like with all lives there have been times of inconvenience. 

But there have been no regrets. 

Love, gratitude, laughter, tears, support, worry, adventure: yes. 

Regrets: no.

We are best and beautiful when we don't let our fears control us. 

Keeping our eyes open to the true nature of beings is brilliant, it helps us to stay safe while we remain willing and able to see the value within. 

It helps us stay safe while we open the borders of our hearts and open our doors.

Open hearts and open doors is a gift my mom is always strong and kind enough to offer. 

I try to follow in her footsteps.
I invite you to join me!

Hugs, smiles, and love!!
Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook) 

Mostly my family, plus one more. Which, in truth, is fully my family!

Autism Answer: You're Pretty When You Percolate!

Author's Note: I was asked by some of my son's young friends to write the post you're about to read. "We love how we feel after we talk to you," they claimed, "but then we forget what you said when we're hanging with our friends. Could you write us one of your articles?" So, after spending a few hours feeling honored and speechless, I wrote this for them! And, as always happens when I write stuff down, I remembered it for me. I hope you enjoy some of the insights too! Hugs, smiles, and love!! ~Tsara

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You hear the clichés all the time. “Be yourself!” “Don’t worry about the judgments of others!” “Stand up for yourself and step in when you see others being bullied!” “Just be yourself!”

Sure, but what does that mean, really? 

Rather than try to answer those questions specifically, I would love to give you a suggestion that will help you be and do all of those things, even if it’s accidentally. 

When you aren’t around your peers, take some time to really discover who you like being. Are you giggly and positive, introspective and quiet, sarcastic and witty? Whichever it is, know that who you are and who you’re comfortable being, is exactly right for what you want from life. Because liking who you are is the greatest way to go after what you want, knowing that you deserve it. The next step is simple, and yet makes all of the difference. Step two is letting your personality percolate!!

Looking at the world from a place of percolating with your own personality—while cultivating an interest in the percolating personalities of others—means being so busy as yourself that there is much less room for worrying about the judgments of others, or for sitting in judgment of your family and friends. While your personality percolates it grows more and more bold and flavorful. It fills the room with its fantastic scent and draws others to you, filling them full of a desire to be around you. 

And as your personality percolates, you become prettier! Models and actresses will tell you this trick (though they may use different words) over and over. It’s not the most beautiful who get the work, but the ones who put personality in their face and body. The ones who look so full of confidence, mystery, sincerity--something--that it spills onto us as an audience and pulls us into their emotions.

My son and some of his friends at a photo shoot: Percolating with Personality!

A surprising—but wonderful!—effect this personality percolation has is a smaller chance of bullying incidents. According to international mental health expert, Lynette Louise aka The Brain Broad, a large number of the people you are surrounded by suffer from too many delta waves in their brain during the day, or too few theta waves when they try to fall asleep, and a myriad of other unbalanced brain issues that result in your peers (and possibly you?) battling anorexia, insomnia, anxiety and more. Also, a surprising number of teen girls have undiagnosed autism and are struggling with sensory troubles (feeling physical pain from certain types of touch, for example) communication issues (sometimes taking things too literally, or being blunt to the point of seeming rude) and other similar concerns. 

So, knowing that many of your peers are struggling with challenges that you can’t see, or even imagine, percolating with kindness and your own personality puts you in a place of comfort and caring that doesn’t leave much room for accidentally treating others cruelly. 

When you choose to talk with your friends, there will be less chance of cruel comparisons because you will feel no need to put others down in order to feel superior. And when you know well who you are, and are comfortable with it, an honest interest in others grows naturally. Instead of talking about how weird someone is behind their back, you will more likely want to talk with and learn about them. It’s much easier to make connections when you aren’t busy worrying about how to act or what to say. As your personality percolates, you will almost always know!

What is it that makes a person pretty? What she looks like plays a part of course, but what draws a person in is personality. What makes people want to be with you is personality. So discover who you are, and percolate. Unlike makeup and fashionable outfits, it never goes out of style. And it’s forever free!

“Knowing who you are is confidence, not cockiness. Cockiness is pushing it down everyone’s throat. Looks go; they fade. I don’t think looks matter.” ~Mila Kunis 

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I invite you to check out my book, Spinning in Circles and Learning from Myself: A Collection of Stories that Slowly Grow Up, where I share memories from my teen years alongside stories of my sons' teen years. My personality percolated over time and eventually found a flavor I am proud of! 

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

Me and my sons!

Autism Answer: The More You Win

"One person might not be able to change the thinking of an entire world in a moment, but moments can encourage a change in the thinking of people in the world. Make the most of your many moments." ~Me

A quick conversation with my son: 

Shay: When I play chess with somebody I feel bad always winning, so I'll just stalemate instead. 

Me: Ya, I've seen you do that a lot. 

Shay: I know a lot of people don't like to lose and I don't like it when they're not happy. 

Me: I still don't think it's a good habit, Shay. It's okay to win. The more you win the easier it'll be for you to help other people win. 

Shay: What?

Me: The more you win, the better you'll be at winning and the more you'll know about how to win, so you'll be better at helping other people learn to win. 

Shay: You're trying to give me a life lesson again, aren't you?

Me: Of course. 

Shay: It worked. 

You just never know which conversations are going to be the important ones. 

So, regardless of whether or not your kids can communicate clearly, keep having them!

Hugs, smiles, and love!!
Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook) 

 

My youngest sons playing chess.

Autism Answer: He's Got This

My youngest son and I.

While driving with my youngest son this morning to drop him off at high school (lordy, they're growing up!!) I started asking him about two of the classes he has this year that he was nervous about. 

"Don't," he interrupted. "Don't. When you talk about school I get this nervous burn in the pit of my stomach. I know that you care about my day and stuff but right now, just don't. I need your distracting conversation until I've been going to school a little longer and I'm not so nervous. Don't worry though, I got this."

Well. Okie dokie! So we listened to Jason Derulo and talked about his favorite flavor of Snapple instead.

We moms and dads and sisters and aunts and grandpas want so freaking badly to crawl inside of our loved one's heads and build "healthy, happy, confident" pathways and blanket forts. So, sometimes we (okay, I know I do this but I'm gonna assume some of y'all do it too) try talking and telling and attacking them with the tools and ideas and lessons we hope will build that healthy confident blanket fort in their hearts and heads. 

But our loved one's truly have to build their own unique healthy happy confident blanket forts. If we throw tools and blueprints at them without giving them time to figure out who they are and what style of healthy happy confident blanket fort suits them best, we'll just make a big messy pile of stuff. 

We need to stand back and show them that we believe in them. That we want (desperately!) to share our tools and materials, but that we're also excited to see what tools and materials they discover on their own. What shape and colors their healthy happy confident blanket fort will have. 

 A cool thing about these healthy happy confident blanket forts that we build in our hearts and heads is this: they are not made out of immovable cement or brick. We can change and rearrange and forever share our materials and ideas while we forever discover and invent more!

Of course, I didn't tell my son all of this. We were busy having fun talking about the way a Mango Madness flavored Snapple hits the spot after a hard day of Marching Band practice in the Texas heat. 

So now I know. Mango Madness, Jason Derulo, and Marching Band are in his healthy happy confident blanket fort. Good for him. I've got coffee, Dr. Hook, and writing in mine. 

We're different, and that's good.
He's got this!!

Hugs, smiles, and love!!!!
Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook) 

The song Declyn and I were rocking out to this morning!!
Straight outta his healthy happy confident blanket fort! 

Autism Answer: Peer Pressure~ Guest Post by Shay Shelton

NOTE: My son, Shay, wrote this piece two years ago. Today was the first day back to school and my youngest son, Declyn, told me outright,"I've decided to become a bully stopper this year. I've already heard people talk bad about this new kid, just because he dresses and talks different. Well, I'm going to peer pressure them to be thoughtful!" It reminded me of this homework assignment Shay had in eighth grade. Peer pressure is powerful indeed, and both of my youngest sons seem to understand that quite clearly! 

Peer Pressure

By: Shay Shelton

People often wonder;

Even when they're old.

Everywhere they go,

Reality may unfold .

Perhaps they will not like me?

Remember what they said?

Even if I don’t like it,

Suppose I try instead.

Suppose I stop and say no?

Under their sharp gaze,

Real friends would appreciate me,

Even through these rough days.

As our kids go back to school, let's remember the real issue of peer pressure. Let's remind them to be authentic even under "their sharp gaze" knowing that true friends (and they themselves can take time to learn this wonderful skill!) will generally appreciate them. 

And as my darling Declyn suggests, perhaps they can even take advantage of peer pressure now and then to peer pressure their friends to be friendly!!! 

Hugs, smiles, and love!!

Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

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This was an eighth grade homework assignment for Shay, and now it's a guest post... my boys are learning that when they put their heart into something it's never just "school stuff"!!

Autism Answer: Back to School Virus

My boys go back to school Monday. Also, we haven't been feeling well the last couple of days.

I think there's a connection.

Here's the thing. My sons get a lot of good stuff out of going to school, but it takes intention and purpose and a fair amount of doing things in ways that the administration isn't set up for. We can be challenging for teachers and counselors--though so far we've mostly also been liked by them. Mostly! Every school year we do a lot of explaining who we are, why we do the things we do, and how we best move forward. This explaining is for ourselves as well as others!

The summer holidays are filled to bursting with discovering, being, playing, almost never looking at clocks or schedules. Of course, as the boys get older they have jobs and projects that require scheduling to exist in some form or another, more and more. Even during the blissful holidays!

Which brings us back to school, and some of the biggest and best things my sons (and I!!) get out of it. A place to practice working on a schedule created by an entity other than ourselves. A place to encourage our unique talents to find their value within a crowd of others; other people and other agendas. A place to insist on being ourselves and discovering what that means while making room for other people to be themselves alongside us. Oh ya, and they learn math and science and french there too!! 

There's plenty of potential for important and awesome lessons at school!! But, man, it's a lot of work!!

So today we're dealing with a slight "here we go again, being ourselves while learning to make it work in a group without reinventing ourselves while being open to rethinking our thoughts when it matches what we want, not only so it'll match what other people want" virus. **NOTE: I'm not sure if that's the scientific term. tee hee! 

Symptoms may be but are not limited to : lethargy, junk food cravings, swimming brain and airheady-ness (aka lack of focus), and a strong desire to unplug all phones while hiding away from people.

We'll feel better by tomorrow, now that I've identified the problem. No wonder washing our hands and taking vitamin C wasn't working to fight this illness! What we needed was to remember that this is the work of life that--though challenging-- we're actually pretty good at!! 

But for tonight we'll take advantage of our low energy and sore bodies by sipping sparking apple cider in fancy wine glasses, snuggling on a pile of pillows, and watching a family movie!! 

Feel free to join us!!

Hugs, smiles, and love!!!
Autism Answers with Tsara Shelton (Facebook)

Back to School!
This Kind of Freedom,
on a Schedule.

Update:
I wrote this post for my Facebook Page a few days ago. I almost always write stuff there first, and then share it here. Anyway, we went to the school the other day and Shay (my sixteen year old) showed me around, pointing out his favorite classes and such. We had a blast, and now we're looking (almost) forward to school Monday!!! That back to school virus ain't so tough!!
Hugs!!!!