Harbl the cat... only a very different man... TLDR

1) Welcome back Harbl! I know, it's Nick. But Harbl is the only brony I know, so you're unique.

2) Family first. Glad you found that. It is a man's job in a marriage to sacrifice (yes, women sacrifice too). That's what it's about. That is what being a man means. To sacrifice for family.

3) While I am a father so I understand worry, I can only imagine what it is like to raise a child with a crippling disability. You have my sympathies and support.

4) I'm glad the pot has helped, truly. But I hope you realize it is a crutch and that your goal should be to get off it eventually. I don't know when an appropriate "eventually" will be for you, but it must come at some point.

5) "(I can't stand how much the Tories use Michelle Rempel as the "woke, busty, blonde, conservative chick" - honestly, I can't stand the way her handlers purposely frame her upper torso in all of her Facebook live videos... that alone was enough to break a recurring Facebook addiction)". I know right!
 
Welcome back, I'd like to apologize for my comments years ago, about you watching my little pony. I now see it that you do it more for your daughters. So like to say sorry. I don't have any children, because personally I think it would set me off mentally over the edge. So I don't fully understand.

While I'm with Doug. Pot is a huge crutch and doesn't get to the root of the problem. If you haven't I think you should seek professional help. Using one substance to forget something, will just lead into more issues. While I never dabbed into the MMJ much, I did use alcohol alot, till the point I hit rock bottom. Ive been seeing Billy here using alcohol much more, and his posts are showing it. Why I notice it much. Because I was like him at one time. Can't force someone, but it's just a thought.

But I know how you feel. Years ago, I got it all off my chest. Who I am, and why I am. And it felt great. Some friends/families didn't accept it, but guess they were really not my friends or family.

So don't want to see someone ruin their family over a substance abuse. Just take care of what matters first.
 
Hi Harbl. Send jwirecom109 a message and have him send you an account reset, or what ever gets done in the background to get back into your account.

You're in the right province for help with autistic kids. Alberta is under a court order to provide help through various programs. You and your wife have a LOT of work to do yourselves on top of it. I won't kid you there. You are going to see multiple doctors. You'll have assessments done, ect to get an idea of the severity of her autism. Once you have a formal diagnosis, you're going to set her up with an FSCD (family services for children with disabilities) worker. They are going to set her up with IBI (intensive behavior intervention) therapy. It's probably called something else by now. A therapist will come to your home several times a week for x number of hours and work with your daughter. There's no "one size fits all" therapy program. They will do things like place her in a corner on a chair with a table in front of her so she can't escape and do various learning and speech activities with her. They may or may not ask you and your wife to participate. One thing to remember as well. Your family doctor can be a good resource for signing forms and such. They won't be a specialist with autistic kids, but if they know your family, he/she might be able to save you time waiting to see some specialist just to get a form filled out. Your family doctor can sign that stuff and have it recognized just like any other doctor as long as they're comfortable with doing it. Just know this. It's very important that you guys do your part to help out with what is going to be a long process. NO MATTER WHAT, support your wife in this. Go to appointments. Do your share of the paperwork. Praise her for doing her part even if she doesn't praise you for doing yours. You think you're stressed ? I guarantee she is just as stressed, if not more. Sometimes she will have a breakdown and be brought to tears. Sometimes it'll be you. Sometimes it will be both of you. NEVER forget that you're a team, and you are both fighting the same battles.

When she gets to school age, you will need to contact the school before hand and work with them to decide what program is the best fit for her. Keep an eye on it, and don't be afraid to be a little pushy. You are in for a lifetime of being her advocate. If you're being stonewalled by a school bureaucrat, you will have to get pushy. An example of that is when they were ignoring their legal obligation to do an assessment on my oldest son. They will say that it's going to take a long time...they're underfunded....blah blah blah. Offer to get them all the help they need to get things done. I understand Mrs School Principal. I can get you all the help and funding you need. Please give me the name of your immediate supervisor downtown and the name of my school trustee. I'll file a formal human rights complaint with the Alberta Human Rights Board citing that you are not making reasonable accommodations for a disabled person , and I'm sure they will be more than glad to help you out. They will try to play it cool, but believe me. You just, in no uncertain terms, informed them that they are pounding on the head of a nuke and they had better get their shit together.....and they know it. The old saying "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" is the absolute perfect description of how things work when you're raising autistic children. Do not turn the other cheek. ALWAYS remain polite and professional, but sometimes, you will HAVE to be merciless in order to get things done. It's sad, and it's also reality.

Another time, this dipshit powertipping hag of a bus driver didn't want to have to drive down our street. She tried playing the safety card, saying she couldn't turn around in our cul-du-sac (pure BS) and she wasn't allowed to back up the bus to turn around. Instead, after 5 years of picking our kids up at the house, they wanted my wife to walk out with the kids every single day and stand out on the main road that divides our subdivision from the next one over. This went back and forth for a while until I finally had it out with some supervisor at the bus company. She said that they would have a safety inspector come down...their word was final....blah blah blah. I said GREAT ! Let's get this over with so we can get down to talking about how you're "failing to make reasonable accommodations for disabled people ! OH MOTHERF-----. A quote right off the front page of the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal web page !!! This guy knows his kid's rights !!! DAMN !!! Never had another problem with the idiots after that (thank you to Foxer for reminding me of that gem).

Raising a kid with autism is all about finding resources for them....and they aren't easy to find. We never had a damned bit of luck with the Autism Society. I can't stress this enough. NETWORK WITH OTHER PARENTS. They may know of a program you didn't, and vica versa. Ask your FSCD worker about what's available in your area. One thing that really helped 2 of our kids was a program called Chatter. It really helped them with speech and language as well as how to interact and converse with others. That will be something she can get into further down the road though. You're at the beginning. KNOW THIS !!! Your daughter WILL learn and improve with time and effort. Also, you do not have to live to be 120. When she's 18 she will receive government funding. Depending on how she matures, and what level she reaches, she my live in a full care group home, and assisted living setup, or who knows...she may become a functioning adult. I still have hope that my oldest boy will live on his own someday. The younger two, my daughter, and my adopted son, will be dependent adults all of their lives. My wife and I have made piece with the idea because that's reality.

I touched on this earlier, but I'll touch on it again. You and your wife need to support each other. Sometimes frustration will win out, and she may lash out at you. Don't turn it in to a full blown brawl. She's only human, and sometimes she will need to vent....and that's ok. People may stare at your daughter if she's having a melt down. So what. I remember once in Costco, my daughter was having a melt down and some guy made a smart ass comment. Holy shit. I thought my wife was going to kill him...and I was going to let her while I kept an eye on the kids. LOL. Personally, I just ignore society's idiots.

Although it's important to bring your daughter out with you to different places like stores and restaurants, don't think you have to all the time. Send your wife out shopping by herself....or at least encourage her to. Tell her to take as long as she wants because you'll be at home looking after things. The best thing we ever decided was that we weren't going to let our kids get away with bad behavior just because they are autistic. Yes, it took a LOT of work, but our kids are now well mannered and very polite. We can take them anywhere now without the worry of them acting like out of control animals. They WILL learn...it just takes longer and requires more effort. I cant count the times when my daughter started having a melt down in a restaurant and I had to take her, sometimes kicking and screaming, out to the car while my wife and son finished their meal. Sometimes it only took her a few minutes to calm down, and sometimes it took hours. Meh....whatever kid...but you will NOT be allowed to act like that in a restaurant or any other public place and get away with it. Sometimes you will take her somewhere, and she will just lose her mind for no apparent reason. My daughter used to lose her shit if we even drove by a Shoppers Drug Mart....the lumber aisle at Home Depot was another one.....and the noise from the cash registers in a Walmart would drive her bat shit crazy. In time, taking her time and time again, eventually, she grew out of it. Autistic kids are hyper sensitive to some things. Sometimes the everyday sounds, lights, smells, whatever, that you and I just tune out.....to an autistic child, it's like the volume button on EVERYTHING is set at max, and they do not have the ability to tune it out any more than you have the ability stop your heart or fly around the room by flapping your arms. It's not in their makeup. With time, effort, and patience, they can be desensitized but usually not completely...but enough that they can get through it.

Now that the kids are older and quite independent (get themselves ready for school, make their own lunches, ect) I've taken on a different job. I'm now working 2 weeks on, two weeks off in remote mining camps. I'm currently typing this to you from the Diavik diamond mine here in the territories. I was worried about how my wife would handle it, but she seems fine with it. I should mention that she's not out working a regular job right now. My pay is enough that she doesn't have to, and quite frankly, I don't want her to as long as she's the main person looking after the kids. If the stress ever does get to be too much for her, I'll pull the pin and get an in town job again. For now, it's working for us.

I'll be glad to give you advice, so feel free to ask. It might take me a while to reply depending on where I am. Sometimes the internet goes out here for a day or two, and at the best of times it's slow as hell.

Just remember....you're not raising an alien who is never going to progress. She may never be a rocket scientist, but if you keep working with her, and never give up, she will steadily (all be it slower than other kids) progress....and the more she progresses, the easier your life gets. Lots of work in the early stages pays dividends later on. Never EVER give up...and above all else....support your wife in every way possible.
 
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I talked to a buddy with a special needs daughter. He told me this. Again he's a vet, and also has 4 children.

Let him know to reach out to social development to look into resbit care and or request additional hours of resbit care.
Also there are some Facebook groups of parents with special needs children.
They are a great peer support network
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RobertMcC said:
I talked to a buddy with a special needs daughter. He told me this. Again he's a vet, and also has 4 children.
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Yes. That will be done through their FSCD worker. FSCD will provide funding, but you still have to find someone to actually do the resbit care. I think they provide something like $14/hr for x number of hours per month. They don't watch it too closely though. If you can only find someone for $18 or $20 bucks and hour, then just put down that they were there for a few more hours than they were. You pay the resbit worker, and FSCD reimburses you. They know it's nearly impossible to find someone qualified for $14 or whatever it is, but that's what they're allowed to give out. They know damned well that people fudge things a bit to make stuff work. At least it gives mom and dad a chance to go out to dinner once in a while without the kids. The challenge is finding someone you trust with your kids, in your home. For years, we were never out together for more than 2 or 3 hours at a time. When you've had to keep an eye on the kids for every hour of every day for years, it's hare to just cut loose and let it go.
 
Welcome back Harbl. People talk about support networks and it seemed always amazed when I say some of the best advice, and support I have ever heard is on this forum. As a fellow medical cannabis user, don't go to heavy on the stuff, you will begin to rely on it too much and it may cause a more non-functional problem. Work the meditation more and fall back to the pot when you have too. Best wishes to you and your family.
 
Welcome back Harbl, my younger brother has fairly severe autism(he does require full time care), and my parents often wonder the same thing you do - who's going to look after him when they're gone. Wish I had some answers to put you at ease but I do not. I've seen it my whole childhood, it's not easy to go through.
While you refocus on your family, I implore you to maintain some social/friend time, there's some support and relaxation. I saw it in my parents for decades, neglecting yourself too much doesn't help anyone, don't burn out. I've seen my parents go through a lot of what BSD is saying, except support on PEI is near non-existent, or was at least a decade ago. It seemed to amount to a publicly funded in school daycare for special needs. I hope I am wrong in remembering this, the people involved were at least excellent care givers.
You're definitely in the best province to provide the best for your children from the sounds of it.
 
Welcome back buddy. Nice to see you here again - wondered what had happened with the C7 discussion and investing, etc.

Keep the faith. I'm the worst kind of Christian who falls back on religion only when everything is going wrong, but that's when you need it most.
 
It's really good to see you around again Harbl, we've missed you.
I'm sorry that you've had to get to such a low point to be able to come back, but I'm glad you have, as GonZo said it is a pretty good support network here.

I have nothing to say that will help with your dealings with your daughters, other than to say that what I do know of you suggests that you're doing your best to be as good a dad as possible. The fact that you've announced your shortcomings and have tried to change them puts you so far ahead of so many people it isn't funny.

As for developing a tolerance, switch strains for a while, it'll help.
Going on a drug-holiday for a bit also helps, but it'll take more than a couple days.
Or, a couple day break will only be marginally helpful.

For Mrs Harbl, just be loving and patient. It'll be hard, but there's not much you can do to help depression itself, that has to be her job. Do what you can to eliminate the in-law anxiety.

Please, both of you, be very careful using pot to deal with mental health, it can be quite dangerous and make it much worse. I'm not saying in all cases, but it can exacerbate things, and can become addictive in its own right, searching from some relief from depression.

My heart goes out to you bud, there may not be a lot we can do here, but we can listen.
And rib you about being a Brony ;D
 
I have a five year old daughter now.....I’m up to season 7....

Two of my nephews are autistic, and several cousin’s kids. One of them is now in his early 20’s and is now living only semi-assisted and holding a job. He wasn’t even expected to learn how to talk in the beginning. I can only echo the statements of others in that early investment and sweat equity pays off. Get signed up for as many programs and as much assistance as you can. Every bit helps, and look after yourself once in a while. My wife was sick for two years, it left us both pretty mentally drained. The little breaks add up and make a difference in the end.

Good to see you again.
 
Welcome back. It’s the person not the username we care about.

Anything to help, just let us know, and we’ll get something thrown together until you find better. (Horribly butchered ST quote, but oh well).
 
Good to have you back. Take time to celebrate the small victories every time you can. Longest journeys start with single steps, sometimes baby steps.
 
FWIW Harbl my son is a high functioning Autistic. He just turned 18 last month. For him the key was early diagnosis and enrolment in what was called the ABA program through the ST. Amant center. These are Manitoba based programs but Alberta will have similar. They provided an in house tutor 7.5 hours a day 5 days a week until he went to school. We were then able to get him into the school age ABA program. The school hired an EA and let the ABA teach her how to work with him.

I remember when the program first started. He was tantruming over a dozen times a day. His speech was delayed and his frustration level over being unable to communicate beyond grunts and gestures was high. This was the root cause of the tantrums. As his language skills and coping skills increased his tantruming disappeared. That was a huge burden lifted off our shoulders. Just one of the first of many small victories.

BSD gave you great advice. Get out there and advocate for your children. Everything I’ve seen and read says that if you delay the critical help your child needs then you will miss the window where the help can do the most good. When my son was diagnosed he was two. Doctors told us there was nothing that could be done. We have a weekly play session for kids like him and a monthly get together for parents. They also said, oh by the way I hope you have a good support network because you are going to need it. Had we followed that advice we would have destroyed any potential future our son had. We had been told about the ABA by another family we knew that had an autistic child.

My son has a good chance of leading what most would call a normal life. It may take him a bit longer to acquire life skills than his peers, but he will get there. He still faces challenges, but don’t we all?
 
Welcome back “h” I have never seen a my little poney without thinking of some of your crazy posts lols

My 2 year old daughter is a fan when she isn’t being a precious terror .

All that and transitioning out of the mob eh ?

Ya been through a lot nice to hear from you
 
Hey man , they're just things people and family are forever where I stand is that it’s on us to preserve things to pass on to the next generation
 
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If you're not bankrupt, you're not broke. I know, because I've been there. But if you feel you're broke and are desperately trying to free up some cash, selling off surplus guns and ammo is a good start. Are you still hoarding precious metals and crypto? Do you still have real estate to your name? Are you not well versed in investing?

Instead of self-medicating and self-diagnosing, have you considered seeking help from a professional? If you're doing so for your child, why not for yourself?
 
Harbl, having a dependent adult son (early onset schizophrenia, he is also a brony, has the tat's to prove it), we understand the fear of what will happen to them after we pass. There is a lawyer in Calgary, Gordon and Anne Vanderleek who are very familiar with estate planning for parents of children with disabilities. One word, RDSP. My mother has been very generous and my wife has been great at saving all the cash gifts #1 son has received since birth (he's 34 now). It's starting to grow into a rather substantial stash. My niece has agreed to be his trustee once we're no longer able. So there are steps you can take to give yourselves some peace of mind.

It crushes me to put myself in his shoes, it is a life of extreme isolation and loneliness. He's a strapping 6'2 blonde blue-eyed hunk that the hunnies go wild over,...until they talk to him and can't make sense of what he's saying. I think that would be worse than being simply ignored. Sure, I escape into drink at times, but my skills at dealing with our situation continue to improve. So it does get better friend, my aha moment came when I decided to accept the hand we were dealt. I mean,..truly accept and embrace. I was horrible in the beginning, so fearful and ignorant of what was happening, I would stay out late drinking and fill every moment doing something other than supporting my spouse. I was scared. It sounds like you are coming to terms and developing some coping skills. Take care and like BSD says, don't be afraid of being the squeaky wheel. Learn the lingo of the healthcare professionals so you can better communicate with them. It does get better, just hang in there pal.
 
Sorry everyone, I had to delete my previous posts, namely because I was skirting around an extremely hard truth and most of what I said wasn't accurate (that and my wife told me to delete them).

After a huge THC vape session, meditating, and praying, God revealed to me that truth.

I have to make the hardest decision of my life in the coming weeks and I have to prepare for it.

I may not be a specialist in the fields of child psychology and neurology, but I am confident I am one of the best Software Engineers in Calgary, and as such, I am able to understand and troubleshoot extraordinarily complex systems outside of the domain of Software Engineering.

In my training as an engineer, I never learnt how mobile GIS platforms worked, nor military C4ISR systems, nor electrical grid power pool billing, hotel booking systems, construction management and fixture scoping management, or contracts for financial and physical commodities trading... oh and blockchain technology. I'm fully confident in saying I can demonstrate expertise in all of these fields close to or exceding an expert level.

Each of those fields, some seemingly benign or mundane, are of a comparable complexity to the somatic, pneumatic and psychological systems of each human being - of which I have spent the past 10 months obsessing over with greater vigor than I have any of those other areas in an effort to find the answer to curing my daughter.

I'm taking a stress leave from work. Before I left, I told my boss, "You know I have a 'monster truck' of a mind." He agreed.

Most men can't find what that answer is. I can. I have. It took me 10 months or redlining to do it.

The hardest decision is figuring out how I will sacrifice everything I have worked for these past 20 years to manifest it.

I am absolutely prepared to give it all up to heal my family.

"For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" - Mark 8:36

The soul is the mind...
 
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NickYYC said:
The hardest decision is figuring out how I will sacrifice everything I have worked for these past 20 years to manifest it.

I am absolutely prepared to give it all up to heal my family.
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That's not hard brother, once you realize "everything" is your family and not what you're about to sacrifice. Good luck, good journey, and best wishes to your family.
 
The biggest thing you need to sacrifice is your time. It all boils down to that.
 
R&R Rancher said:
The biggest thing you need to sacrifice is your time. It all boils down to that.
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Agreed.

Harb…..I hate to tell you this, but there some pretty big brains already working on the autism issue and have been for a few decades now. A family acquaintance of ours is one of the leading autism researchers in the world and he's now working right here in Edmonton. He has more IQ points in his little finger than most of us could ever dream of having in our whole being. He doesn't work directly with kids in a therapy sense. He's in the research end of things. Brilliant man.

I'm not saying you couldn't make great contributions to helping (not necessarily curing) people with autism using your talents. As I'm sure you've already learned, autism is a genetic thing. Unless you plan on becoming a genetic engineer, you're not going to "cure" it. I'm going to be really blunt here, so I hope you're not offended. I think you're trying to hide from dealing with your daughter directly and your personal escape is telling yourself that you're going to work on a cure rather than working WITH her. I've seen other parents of autistic kids doing similar things....hiding in their work. Trust me on this. If you focus your energy on working WITH her, you'll yield far better results than trying to find an actual cure. She is going to need a lot of direct work and patience on your part. You are going to have to take her places, work on her speech, work with her on general life skills. Teaching her things like getting dressed and person hygiene are going to take a lot more effort than your average kid. The mistake I think you're about to make is you're going to try and bury yourself in work and leave all the other stuff up to your wife. I can't put into mere words how much I think that will be a huge mistake that you'll live to regret.
 
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blacksmithden said:
Agreed.

Harb…..I hate to tell you this, but there some pretty big brains already working on the autism issue and have been for a few decades now. A family acquaintance of ours is one of the leading autism researchers in the world and he's now working right here in Edmonton. He has more IQ points in his little finger than most of us could ever dream of having in our whole being. He doesn't work directly with kids in a therapy sense. He's in the research end of things. Brilliant man.

I'm not saying you couldn't make great contributions to helping (not necessarily curing) people with autism using your talents. As I'm sure you've already learned, autism is a genetic thing. Unless you plan on becoming a genetic engineer, you're not going to "cure" it. I'm going to be really blunt here, so I hope you're not offended. I think you're trying to hide from dealing with your daughter directly and your personal escape is telling yourself that you're going to work on a cure rather than working WITH her. I've seen other parents of autistic kids doing similar things....hiding in their work. Trust me on this. If you focus your energy on working WITH her, you'll yield far better results than trying to find an actual cure. She is going to need a lot of direct work and patience on your part. You are going to have to take her places, work on her speech, work with her on general life skills. Teaching her things like getting dressed and person hygiene are going to take a lot more effort than your average kid. The mistake I think you're about to make is you're going to try and bury yourself in work and leave it all the other stuff up to your wife. I can't put into mere words how much I think that will be a huge mistake that you'll live to regret.
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Genetic engineering is not that dissimilar from software engineering. If anything, given the size and scope of the human genome, I'd say genetic engineering is quite amateurish in comparison to some of the systems I've worked on. That said, where I'm coming from was from burying myself in my work to become the best at what I was doing to contemplating completely abandoning my career to heal my child. Fortunately for me, there's massive overlap in the competencies in a genetic engineer and a software engineer.

What you're describing is more or less what I'm contemplating doing.

I'm leaning very heavily towards selling all my possessions and expending most of my wealth specifically so that I can focus on healing and teaching my daughters.

You see, the thing is there is no general "cure" for autism (that being, by Western medicine's standards, there's nothing that can be prescribed for it), but there is a unique way to cure each autistic child.

The key is to form a physical, mental, and spiritual bond with and enable genetic expression and neurogenesis of the brain to develop capabilities within the child to overcome the inherent "defects" in genetic expression that manifest as what we know as autism.

The thing is, it's bullshit that everything is genetic. Some things are, most things are not.

The vast majority of illness is manifest through unresolved trauma in one of the 3 elements of each human being: the mind, body, and spirit.

Cancer, diabetes, Alzheimers, heart disease and stroke - and yes, autism.

The problem with Western medicine is it's reliance on scientific empiricism through study of the physical properties of the body. However the mind and spirit don't operate under the rules of the physical world.

All science at it's core is the sampling of states of of matter and energy within linear units of time. The thing is, the mind, and with it, human consciousness demonstrably does not function within the boundaries of the time scale we rely on for scientific experimentation. Try some psychedelics like cannabis and develop a meditation practice and you'll know exactly what I'm talking about.

This is why so many illnesses, including the one's that are in the top 10 list of causes of death within the West (most specifically, Canada and the US) "have no cure."

Western medicine is great at healing mass physical trauma, but completely neglects mental and spiritual trauma. I am certain integrating treatment modalities for all 3 is key to remedying the worst symptoms of autism... challenge is, it all comes at a cost... mine may well be everything I've worked for the past 20 years.
 
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NickYYC said:
After a huge THC vape session, meditating, and praying, God revealed to me that truth.

In my training as an engineer, I never learnt how mobile GIS platforms worked, nor military C4ISR systems, nor electrical grid power pool billing, hotel booking systems, construction management and fixture scoping management, or contracts for financial and physical commodities trading... oh and blockchain technology. I'm fully confident in saying I can demonstrate expertise in all of these fields close to or exceding an expert level.
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NickYYC said:
Genetic engineering is not that dissimilar from software engineering. If anything, given the size and scope of the human genome, I'd say genetic engineering is quite amateurish in comparison to some of the systems I've worked on. That said, where I'm coming from was from burying myself in my work to become the best at what I was doing to contemplating completely abandoning my career to heal my child. Fortunately for me, there's massive overlap in the competencies in a genetic engineer and a software engineer.

The vast majority of illness is manifest through unresolved trauma in one of the 3 elements of each human being: the mind, body, and spirit.

Cancer, diabetes, Alzheimers, heart disease and stroke - and yes, autism.

The problem with Western medicine is it's reliance on scientific empiricism through study of the physical properties of the body. However the mind and spirit don't operate under the rules of the physical world.
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Wow. Good luck. Unsubscribed.
 
This isn’t the US where you read horror stories of people going 6 figures in debt to try and get help for their autistic children. There is financial aid available and if you advocate hard enough, trained workers who can do more good in those early years than you can. Quitting your job and selling off most of your worldly possessions will bite you later. You still need to provide a home for your family. Balance is needed.
 
It's difficult to say this without sounding like a complete a-hole.. but it's what I would say to the very best of my friends, even if it meant risking our friendship...

You gotta lay off the THC, man. Before you liquidate everything you own in the belief that you can fix something experts all over the world are working on, you need to clear your head. THC is a mind altering drug; Harbl the Cat was a much more intelligent sounding person than NickYYC. You sound like an old hippy now. I'm honestly concerned for your well being.
 
blacksmithden said:
I wish you all the luck in the world sir. After raising 3 kids with autism, I think you're going to need it.
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I'm pretty sure I know how to both RAISE and RECOVER my autistic girl. Like I said, I've been redlining my formidable engineering intellect harder on this than I have anything in my professional career - and I've done some pretty hardcore stuff as an engineer.

I was at my daughter's school yesterday meeting the teachers and I was taken a back by a few key points. Namely the limitations of their abilities to connect with and train my daughter and of the bleak outlook of the prescribed education path set out for her.

Basically, to throw her into the conventional academic system, with (by my expectations) limited support for her significant disability.

In my heart, I know that's a recipe for failure for her.

The recipe for success for her is in my (and my wife's) presence during the prime waking hours and expansion of techniques we have been using over the past 2 years that have garnered results.

2 years ago, she was a zombie child.

She couldn't socialize, couldn't verbalize, couldn't learn.

But my wife (primarily) moved heaven and earth focusing especially on her diet, and saw rapid improvement on many of her worst symptoms.

One of the major challenges we face is that 2 years ago when we were starting her in her special needs school, she cut and dry had all the symptoms of an autistic child, but there was a miscommunication between her main teacher and my wife to the affect that: "an autism diagnosis doesn't really matter." What she meant was: "In so far as services offered at the school are concerned, the autism diagnosis didn't matter."

She just had a GDD diagnoses, but everyone including her teachers, knew she was autistic. We thought that was enough, and didn't get the diagnosis in time.

So my wife and I went on a crusade to try every treatment modality possible to bring her out of it, and she went from being unable to go out 5 minutes in public without stimming to the point of unable to walk, violent headbanging, smearing her feces on her face, with the skin on the rest of her body melting from eczema, being in a disassociated stupor to being almost verbal, able to walk, run, and climb, interact with strangers and family members, almost potty trained (but still feces smearing occasionally), and semi-cognizant of her surroundings (but not to the point of not knowing to not run into traffic).

One of the ironies is because we didn't get the diagnosis 2 years ago and we've progressed ahead light years from where she was (but still nowhere near to the point of being neurotypical) -
we might not even be able to get her a formal autism diagnosis now (so said her teachers).

It pushed us to our limits, since, primarily, we went to an organic, vegan, no grain, no dairy, no processed, whole food diet (which with 4 kids isn't cheap - we spend about $5k/month on groceries). Not to mention the sheer amount of time it takes doing food prep.

Tack on a full time caregiver as well so my wife could still work part time, and I'd say around $100k of our annual budget goes just into that element alone.

I have to say, it's been truly miraculous the PHYSICAL turnaround in my daughter's condition - but the MENTAL and SPIRITUAL elements are the next step in either fully recovering her or in at least developing her to the point that she can be independent enough to not fail in the system designed for neurotypical children.

There is practically zero focus on either mental or spiritual health in either our healthcare or education systems, but both elements are vital for the health of everyone.

It doesn't matter what you do to take care of your body if you don't take care of your mind and spirit. The mind and spirit guide the subconscious faculties, which themselves have cognitive and computational powers far beyond the conscious faculties - whose primary focus is to simply analyze, contextualize and prioritize sensory input, then keep it in volatile memory for other neurological faculties (both conscious and subconscious) to process either for emotional or memory regulation (i.e. - learn).

The biggest problem is our society is purposely designed to leverage the crystallized intellect as opposed to fluid intellect. That's why Engineering was considered a reputable trade in the past - because Engineers were supposed to have substantial crystallized intellect through their training. We were supposed to remember facts and figures and know how to repeatedly apply them in generally similar circumstances. That worked building a bridge, road, or well-site.

In contract, Architecture, relies much more on fluid intellect and the ability to imagine new, novel concepts. Most architects don't get paid very well (compared to Engineers), because (for now) our society doesn't value the architect's ability to produce novel concepts and ideas and instead values the Engineers ability to regurgitate established facts to solve specific problems.

What gives me the confidence to recover my daughter from her autistic symptoms is that Software Engineers like me are able to create automation bots that make those kinds of engineers redundant - and that process requires a synergy of both crystallized and fluid intellect.

A good software engineer has to have the ability to mentally regress almost into a child like state and view the world as it is: a chaotic whirlwind of infinite potential, and then to apply learnt development techniques to structure a completely new and novel order out of that same chaos.

That actually is the process of learning. It's quite a bit more nuanced than that, but I think that's sufficient of a generalization to make the point. (Fun side fact: almost EVERY software engineer in Silicon Valley microdoses either cannabis or psilocybin. So do most billionaires.)

Every autistic child is different, but I'm pretty I know the sub-processes that my daughter either lacks or that is dysfunctional and I know how to solve it. I'm actually a software tester and my job is to find bugs in software. Our cognitive functions are just like software.

That's what I categorize within the domain of the mind and spirit, what the Bible calls the psyche (soul) and the pneuma (breath), and just as ALL software has bugs, our internal psychological software has bugs as well. With autistic kids, it's just a matter of finding and fixing them.

Thing is, it's often the case in software engineering, and I think equally so within the human psyche that finding bugs can be easy, fixing can be VERY hard (or vice versa).

Anyways, I'm really just writing this because I know for me, one undesirable feature of my internal psychological software is my tendency to hyper analyze to the point I get lost in the details. What is uncharacteristic about me as an Engineer is that creative writing is one outlet that helps me clear those forms of thought paralysis (you should see my handwritten journals over the past 2 years).

Speaking also helps me as well, and if you're interested, I have been making a lot of videos on this topic over the past 8 months on my YouTube channel, which started off documenting my shooting escapades, but once I had identified shooting as becoming a harmful addiction, I re-purposed to focus (more) on autism recovery.

If you want to go deeper down the rabbit hole of my mind, please check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCe9Au6A-QA5n8YzYA0ao8qw/videos

This video was my breaking point back during Christmas. The context of it was that I was "medicating" the pain of the impact of my daughter's autism (and more specifically, the pain it had on my wife) by shooting and buying guns... I'm at the point now, I think I'm ready to give up on shooting.

A few grams of bud are a lot cheaper than a new rifle and cases of surplus ammo...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huf5N3j0NIY

Oh, I'm also pretty proud of the fact that with hypnosis and cannabis, I've get myself in the best physical shape of my life. I was a real fat-body before.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBkR7pb9o3w

And of course, one of the 4 times I hit the range this year. I think I placed 5th/40 overall despite my screwups. I guess I should have been carrying more ammo or done more pushups.

In truth, I don't think I'll hit any matches next year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcZSebMFiss

I also was interviewed in CCFR's show Canada Down Range last year. I haven't seen it, but the guy in the OD 5.11 Tactec - that was me. I liked kitting up, wearing as much gear as possible, and doing pushups so I don't feel guilty about abandoning my wife and kids to "relax" shooting.
 
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...once I had identified shooting as becoming a harmful addiction...
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That might not be the only one at play here.

I wish you luck, and I wish you well. I'm sure you will do all you can to help your daughter - just don't forget to step back and not only enjoy watching her grow, but continue to enjoy life with your entire family.
 
DanN said:
That might not be the only one at play here.
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Well the last time I checked in with my doctor, she told me my dosing was pretty typical of most patients, only she recommended I do more "off" days, which I'm on right now.

The thing about cannabis is that for recreational users, it's about inducing enough of a high to disassociate from reality.

As a medical user, I use it just enough to alleviate the symptoms of my illnesses: depression, anxiety, and insomnia.

To be honest, this attitude is why I'm not voting conservative (if I vote at all). Conservatives for years have held to this dogmatic belief that cannabis is this evil substance that rots your brain.

Certainly it has the potential (as do practically any pharmaceutical, as well as legal drugs, like alcohol and caffeine, but also environmental toxins, particularly news and social media), but dosed properly and with an informed mind, it is absolute miracle medicine.

The problem is all the propaganda on the War on Drugs basically lead to an intellectual black hole concerning something that should have been obvious.

Societies for hundreds of years before science was even invented knew cannabis was effective medicine, but with all our modern intellect and gadgetry we couldn't figure out something that pre-science societies figured out with ease.

You know when we talk about guns, "our side" likes to play up the idea that better mental health care is needed or that mental health is the cause of all gun violence; meanwhile, so many on "our side" hold to irrationally dogmatic and ill-informed beliefs about what is essentially a medical health panacea.

Medicinal cannabis saved my wife, my life, and my marriage.

When we first thought about using it, I was completely against the idea. I was a good "conservative."

Now I realize just how wrong "our side" has been, and how the consequence of that has been immeasurable human suffering.

If "our side" was wrong about that, what else have we been wrong about?

I wish you luck, and I wish you well. I'm sure you will do all you can to help your daughter - just don't forget to step back and not only enjoy watching her grow, but continue to enjoy life with your entire family.
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Life isn't about enjoyment. I have very little enjoyment in my life.

I have purpose and meaning.

When enjoyment comes my way, I'm grateful for it.

But purpose and meaning, though not as enjoyable, vastly beat enjoyment.
 
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