Lila has started making an unbelievable amount of progress lately – she’s doing something new almost each and every single day! I wanted to write down some of my general thoughts on this because (oddly enough) this has caused mixed feelings on my part. You would think it would be all JOY, that I’d be ecstatic! Well… I am (for the most part). But I also remember all too well where we’ve just come from…

As an infant Lila would scream and scream for HOURS on end. Reflux, GI issues, ear infections, projectile vomiting. It was honestly like she was not compatible with our world from the get-go. It was very difficult for her (and for us) just to make it through the day.

Three months after she turned 1, we started therapy with SoonerStart. When we began, she wanted nothing to do with either Bill or I, it was like we didn’t exist. She would wander throughout the house, performing the same patterned rituals over and over and over. She didn’t play with any toy as intended, she would just flip whatever-it-was over and over and over….

I could see it in her face, and it terrified me to my core. If you’re an autism parent you know the look. I thought we’d lost her. I just couldn’t get through to her, couldn’t reach her anymore.

So…. here we are. We have the little girl we fought so hard for. She’s made so much progress, I’m so proud of her! Yet my profound happiness is tinged with fear. I’ve seen certain skills become transient, not necessarily permanent. What if she regresses? What if we lose her again?

I have never been a part of something so profound to witness – watching the therapy that we have poured into her for the past year start to manifest itself out of nowhere. Concepts and ideas once so far-fetched are now clicking left and right. Our primary therapist (Janet) has always said that we would see tremendous growth between two and three years old. It looks like she was right…as always. Forever grateful to the woman who has worked side-by-side with Bill and me on a daily basis to get Lila to where she is now.

Continually marching forward – with no idea what the future holds. Working as hard as possible to help her be the best Lila she can be, with the utmost respect given to who she is as an individual at her core. I’m so excited about everything that’s been happening – our Little Lady is such a rock-star, she never ceases to amaze me. Someday, that beautiful little girl will laugh when I tell her how worried we once were.