James Guttman: 0:00

I want apple juice. Lucas wants apple juice. I know I heard him say that. Can I have apple juice? Yeah, you can have apple juice. Can I have soda? Yes, you can have soda. Can I press that button? No, you can't press that button. Why? Because that's going to play the theme song. I'm not ready to start the pot.

James Guttman: 0:30

Hi Pod, I am Dad. He's not just Hi Dad, he's my dad. James Gutman, folks, it's Gutman, it's Hi Pod, i'm dad.

James Guttman: 0:47

Welcome back to another edition of the podcast. It is nearing the end of february. It is february the 21st if you're listening to this, the day it goes Hi PodImDad. com every friday . All the podcasts. Maybe you found me on spotify or any of the streaming services as well. We are everywhere, so I thank you for taking the time to check it out. It is the final countdown until my son turns 14, which is happening next month and is insane.

James Guttman: 1:17

And, as you guys know, I've been writing about Lucas for, at this point now, god, since February of 2017. So, as I said before, at this point now, god, since February of 2017. So, as I said before, we just passed the eight-year anniversary of HiBlogImDad. com. It's writing about my boy and kind of his journey with autism, and I got to be honest with you guys. A lot of the terminology sometimes that we use does sometimes it feels a little cringy to say it Like I don't know if it's necessarily a journey with autism. I mean it is in some ways, and that's one of the beautiful things about getting to write about it is that it's a journey in the sense that you learn things as you go and you evolve. Your thinking changes, the way you approach things changes and it takes certain steps to make that happen. And this past week on HiBlogImDad. com plug, I wrote about that in one aspect.

James Guttman: 2:09

The one I wrote about on Monday was about driving. Right, so my daughter is ready to drive, which is nuts. It's absolutely crazy. She's my baby. I don't know how they let babies drive, but they let them do it. I don't, it's like, think she's going to drive. I remember having to strap her car seat in before they would let me drive away from the hospital and now she drives me to the store. It's weird, but doing this one of the things that really got me was I started thinking about my son's birthday and I realized like, oh, if he was neurotypical or if he was verbal. I would be probably having him step on the gas at this point and getting things ready, and it was one of those moments. That shows me about the journey, as I said before, and how things change right.

James Guttman: 2:59

When Lucas was little, when Lucas was two or three and the other kids were doing things around his age that he wasn't doing, it used to kill me. You know. You would think about it. Why isn't my kid telling me a knock-knock joke? Why isn't my kid singing the songs with the other kids? And you wonder about it and you think about it and you go through it. But now, as a teenager, I rarely think about what other kids are doing versus what he's doing, because that's just not who he is. You know, I've had time through the years to adjust my thinking as to what he should be doing, what's appropriate for him, what he's capable of, and it's not so much about what he's not doing, it's just about who he is as a person.

James Guttman: 3:38

I wrote a blog a long time ago. It's called If I had an Autism Magic Wand, and I don't really plug a lot of the old ones, but to this day it remains one of my favorite ones, because sometimes I'll write about Lucas and realize that I think something as I'm writing it, something that I hadn't really put together yet, and I had written about how there would have been a time where, if I could wave a magic wand and not let my son be nonverbal or have autism, I would have done it when he was little. You know, I used to beg God, you know, please help my boy. But then as my boy grew and I realized that you know what it would be easier for him if he had words. It would be easier for him if he was neurotypical. But this is who he is, him if he had words. It would be easier for him if he was neurotypical. But this is who he is and, by and large, it's not the end of the world. This is his personality. It's who he is and there's good points to it and there's negatives to it. There's different parts to it, as any type of personality exists. But you stop focusing on what your child's not doing and you think about who they are. And I realized that if I waved this magic wand right, if somebody came to me and it was like, hey, wave this wand, your son won't have autism, he'll be verbal In that moment I would have a completely different kid and I don't want a completely different kid. I love my kid. I love this personality that he has, right and selfishly. I probably wouldn't necessarily wave it.

James Guttman: 5:05

Now there is an add-on because some of the comments and if you go, one of the things you'll learn if you've ever written content for the internet is that when you post it online, people read what you wrote In the post and sometimes they don't read the article itself. So people will read the headline and have a comment I've told stories about, especially in the wrestling days. I would write articles and articles and someone would read the headline and guess at what it meant. I'll never forget. I veer you off topic real quick, but this is one of my favorites to give you an idea of how deeply people read content online.

James Guttman: 5:41

In 2000, I don't know two, three Shawn Michaels had come back to the WWE. Shawn Michaels was a wrestler from years gone by and he used to play this character where he was arrogant and he was kind of like this ladies' man gimmick and when he came back he was now older, humble, just a different kind of person. So I wrote an article comparing him to when Archie Bunker went from All in the Family to Archie Bunker's Place and the point was that the shows were different because it wasn't really Archie Bunker anymore. It was a different version of him and it kind of rubs people differently. It's not, he's too evolved. It wasn't who we wanted and who we expected. So the article was about how that happened with Shawn Michaels, how he became a different character, and I called it Shawn Michaels as Archie Bunker I think that was the name of the article, right. And somebody responded and this is on.

James Guttman: 6:36

I don't remember if it was social media it might have even been before social media or if it was just on the website or an email. I forgot what it was. But I got a message from somebody going on and on about how awful it was that I wrote this article and how Shawn Michaels is a good person and just because he's from Texas doesn't make him a racist. How could you write about how he's a racist from Texas? He's not racist, he's a good man. And I'm like what the hell? And it wasn't until I got to the end of the thing that I realized that this person just read that I said Shawn Michaels as Archie Bunker and decided that's what the article was about and responded.

James Guttman: 7:10

And because of that and because I've been doing this for so long at this point, I've learned that you have to kind of be a little clearer in your explanations. And when I wrote that Autism Magic Wand article I did I had a dad who went on there and was like, if I could take away my son's autism tomorrow, I'll do it 100%, right away. And I'm thinking to myself like you really have to read it Because it's I'm not, I'm not kidding myself, and that's one of the issues that sometimes comes up with the autism appreciation posts and my positive outlook on autism parenting. Um, in no way, shape or form am I saying that I want my son to have limitations in his life. I don't want my son to not be able to speak words. I don't want my son to not be able to, you know, tie his. Don't want my son to not be able to, you know, tie his own shoe, which I use that as my example anytime.

James Guttman: 8:04

Anybody needs to understand what you mean by life skills and things like that. There's things that he can't do. I want him to do all those things, but I want him to learn how to do those things. I would want him to naturally progress, but I would never just put a big sweeping change on everything and just make him a different person. And that's first of all, the whole point is moot, because no one's going to hand you a magic wand, right? That doesn't happen. Magic wands don't exist. So the whole idea was just to really just explain that over time you start to realize, hey, this is who my kid is. And you go from those early days of begging like if only he was different, if only this would be different. I don't want him to be different, I want him to learn, I want him to change.

James Guttman: 8:47

And that mindset changes how you view everything. And that's what happened with him driving. I had never even thought about him driving. It didn't cause me aches and pains and upset me and oh, he'll never drive. I don't really. I have to genuinely think about that in order to realize that it's even happening. It's not like the old days where it's like he's not playing baseball, I don't. I guess he's not driving, all right, cool. But even that, dude, I had people. You know they'll respond and they'll be like driving isn't important, it's who you are and it's like all. All right, you didn't read the article. I'm with you, I'm totally okay with it. Um, so that's what I read about on monday this whole idea of the mindset changing.

James Guttman: 9:26

But one of the ways that my mindset did change and I wrote about it on wednesday and it's a topic that I've discussed before and I put out there and I you know, and some of these things, we have topics that repeat through the years, but I try to find different spins on it or sometimes, sometimes I just want to reinforce what I'm saying. But the most important thing I ever did was realize that bonding with my son and getting to that point where I'm not praying for him to be different and I'm not hoping for him to change is by understanding who he is. And the most important thing, it's a piece of advice I don't give anybody out there. If you're a special needs parent, if you're learning these things, when Lucas was little, I used to go out of my way to try to help him understand how to play with toys, right. So if the kid's flipping a book or if he's like staring right into a light, you come on. No, but it's not how you play with that. You do this, you do that, but as they get older that becomes what they do, and my son's the same way and I don't want to correct him. I don't correct his playing. I don't try Every once in a while. If I think he doesn't know how it works, I'll show him. But I'll never stop him from having fun to show him the quote unquote right way to have fun. I think that's something that you put away after the first few months of dealing with things. But the most important part, even beyond that, is understanding what he's doing. I want to know what he's doing.

James Guttman: 10:46

When he was little he would do that glare thing and I've written about it. I don't know if people really get it, but Lucas would walk by a window or a mirror and all of a sudden he would start walking I don't know sideways. It's hard to explain. He would go forward, he would tilt his head and stare at something in the mirror and he would just walk slowly staring and then hop and clap and scream with excitement and I couldn't figure it out until I realized he's looking at the glare. He's looking at glares and windows, glares and mirrors. He enjoys it and I got it.

James Guttman: 11:19

I understood that and I do the same thing with his videos when he pauses and unpauses these videos, which seems random and it seems like, oh, he just likes chaos. And he doesn't just like chaos. My son likes certain things. So if there's a sound in a Sesame Street video, someone makes a noise or there's a note or a tune, he pauses and unpauses it so he can see that note and hear that. I can't tell you how much he appreciates it, which is insane, right. That's the kind of thing that, especially when he was little and I didn't think he was really noticing that we were there or paying attention to what we were doing, I never would have thought he would care. But then to come over and watch him hey, what are you doing, buddy? You watching that video and I watch it with him and then when he pauses and unpauses it and the note comes on or whatever happens, whatever, he's pausing and unpausing on the video for that moment and he gets excited and he claps and he cheers. If I do that with him or in some cases, what I'll do is I'll do it almost even before him. So I'll watch it with him and just as he presses the button it's about to go on I cheer first. I'm not copying him, I'm not just and I gotta tell you, man, my son appreciates it First time it ever happened.

James Guttman: 12:36

I talked a million times about the car under the red chair that we had in the living room, where he would put this little toy car under the red chair and slowly pull it out by the string, staring at the mirror as he did to see if it popped out. And I came over and I asked if I could do it too. I came over, I go hey, I do, and I pat my chest and I took the string and I did it and I cheered and I got excited and my son smiled at me and he gave me the biggest hug ever and I swear to this day, man, even just remembering it, it was sort of pivotal moment in my life. I remember everything about it. It's one of those such a bizarre thing, the things that just stick with us beat by beat. I remember that whole thing and it's changed my relationship with Lucas today. We still do this today. He still knows to come to me. He still knows that I get it and I understand we joke about it and we laugh about it.

James Guttman: 13:25

I did one I wrote about this too, about a year ago or so so, where he was watching a video and it was Twinkle, twinkle Little Star. It was a nursery rhyme song that everybody knows and what happened was he kept pausing it right before they would get to the big crescendo of the chorus and he would pause it. And he would pause it and I'm like no, buddy, no, and we were joking about him. I'm taking his finger. I'm like no, play it. Oh, I love this song. I love this song. I'm taking his hand away and I'm like, ah, and I'm like twinkle, twinkle, little star, and I'm pushing his hand away and I'm like, ah, and I'm building up to him, like that. And he looked at me and he let out a smirk and he went. I still remember because he doesn't do that.

James Guttman: 14:15

Lucas is not one for kind of like you know, subtle humor, and I thought it was one of the funniest things, and it's moments like that that made me realize I've found the places to bond with my son and if it sounds like I'm kind of blown away and amazed by it, it's because I really thought that there was never going to be a way to do that. None, when Lucas was two, three years old, he wouldn't even notice if he walked into the room. I had people mention it to me. I wrote about the horrible speech therapist that he had that told us to throw away his toys, but she was one of the first ones that really kind of turned that knife in our side. She would say things that were just like painful for a parent to hear and it wasn't until years later that I realized, oh, you don't have to deal with that. At the time I'm like, oh, this must be with autism. Parenting it's not. It's. People are jerks.

James Guttman: 15:00

And I remember I came into the house and he was playing in the living room and she goes oh, he didn't even look up when you came in, he didn't even look at you. Huh, did you notice that? Does he do that? He doesn't even care. He doesn't even care. I'm like all right, lady, I get it. My kid does not look up for me. He doesn't seem to care if I'm in the room. He doesn't care if I leave. He doesn't want to show me anything, he doesn't want to play with me and he killed me and I made it my mission.

James Guttman: 15:21

I said I'm not going to let this or wants to do other things. I'm going to have a good relationship with Lucas, and because of that I've worked so hard to this day, as my boy is about to turn 14 and be able to know that I gave him all of my love and I gave him all of my attention and I did everything I could. I've never written him off, I've never kind of pushed him to the side. I want to understand him, not just simply accept him or be aware of him. I want to appreciate him, and that's what we do here. So thank you, guys, for giving me the opportunity and the outlet to do that.

James Guttman: 15:59

Thank you for reading what I write. Thank you for putting it all out there. I am so excited about so much coming up. As you guys know, the book it's coming soon. I probably could. I mean I'm going to talk to them. Maybe the next week or two we'll start really giving you guys some details on this thing, because it's going to be a big year and I'm very excited to share the stories about Lucas and about my life and about my family and in my book and on the blog and here on the podcast. I couldn't do any of this without you and it means the world to me. So thank you so much for your support. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for following the blog HiBlogImDad. com, the podcast HiPodImDad. com. Follow me on social media. Hi, james Gutman, that's H-I. Hi, james Gutman. I'm on Instagram, I'm on Blue Sky, I'm on Facebook. We got highblog bloggers everywhere, so please follow along, stick around. Thank you for your support. Until next Friday. Be well, bye, bye. Thank you.