Hi Pod, it's James Guttman, the host of HiPod I'm Dad, and the writer behind HiblogIm Dad.com. Thank you for joining us here wherever you found us. I appreciate it. Um, it has been a week of trust. Talking about trust, talking about how it affects my life, raising a nonverbal son at 14 years old. And I've for years talked about how trust is the most important thing I ever had to teach this kid. Because it goes back to every single thing that we do. It goes back to uh why he listens to me. It goes back to me kind of believing in him. And it definitely cuts both ways. If you guys remember, uh, hopefully, last week I talked about this and I wrote about it. I had a really rough morning with him. And that morning was really built on the fact that 90% of our time together is spent with me marveling at this boy, amazed at what he's learned and how he's grown. And every once in a while, something will happen that will knock me back down a few pegs where I go, oh, I forgot. There are certain things he doesn't get, or certain things he will forget or not remember to do. And it could be depressing, it could be worrisome. And that was what I went through last week. But there are, on the flip side, many times where I'm shocked at the things that he can learn and things that he can do. Now it started out early, right? Everyone who sees me and Lucas today, and I talk about him and I post these videos and these pictures and things like that, people know the relationship we have. But when Lucas was first born, and when he was young and experiencing signs of kind of extreme delays, it scared the hell out of me. It started when he was tiny. He didn't do tummy time correctly, you know, and I had just had his sister a little uh a little less than three years before that. So I knew what tummy time was supposed to look like. It was so cute. She would hold up her hands like a push-up, and her her big head would kind of flop around, and she would make these sounds, these baby sounds of struggle, and it was like, I don't know, it's like a little bodybuilder. It was really like, ah uh and I'd laugh and we'd video it and we loved it. And Lucas, Lucas didn't do that. Lucas didn't put his hands down, Lucas couldn't lift his head up. Making it worse is he would turn his head and he would end up with a face full of carpet. Now I'm concerned he's gonna kill himself. So every day I'm flipping his face over and I'm trying to save him. And I'd say to him, like, Lucas, I'm saving your life every day. And from that point on, it was delays, delays, delays. We got them right off the bat. He didn't sit up like everyone else did, he didn't crawl like everyone else did, he didn't walk like everyone else did. Everything was on a deferred timeline, which in many ways kind of threw off my belief of when he would talk. My thought was all right, he's a little late in walking, he's a little late in crawling, he's a little late in sitting up. He'll be a little late with his words. He um he never had words. And we waited so long for it to happen. And if you had told me then that he would ever understand things, I wouldn't even know how. Because I genuinely felt, especially when he was little, that I was never going to be able to build this bridge to him. I would love him, I would show him love, he would be my guy, he'd be my little bundle of Lucas, but I don't know. I gave up on it. He's not gonna know who I am, he's not gonna know these different things. And we had issues where people would come into the house. There was a speech teacher. I've talked about her ad nauseum. She maybe did like a month or two worth of lessons and she was awful. But she would point out, she's like, he doesn't even look up when you come in the room. It was like, Lady, are you new at this? It was like the worst thing to say to a young parent. And it concerned me. I was worried all the time about it. But I discovered something, right? And this is something that was important to me then, something that's important to other parents in that position. I didn't have to teach him certain things. Certain concepts, he just knew. And when I say concepts, I mean concepts. I'm not even talking about, you know, trigger words or keywords, which we've had that, right? Where I go, Luke, do you want to eat? You know, and I do that with my hands and the whole thing. The first, one of the first things, and I realized that this week because I forget, you know, like I remember a lot. I have a weird memory where I retain a lot of past stories and information in my brain, but there's certain things I don't remember. And I went back and I'm looking at old videos and old pictures, and I found this video that I posted on my personal uh page. If you guys want to check it out on Instagram, hi James Gutman. Every Wednesday I try to post a video, and I posted a video of when Lucas understood what bedtime meant. And he would run and hide. It was the cutest thing. He would hide behind the TV. If he had nowhere to run to, he would just put his hand up in front of his face so he couldn't see you. And he was tiny. He was at an age where he wasn't understanding anything. And he understood what bedtime meant. And when I say bedtime, I mean you didn't even have to say bedtime. You didn't even have to say, let's go upstairs. All you had to do was put your hand out and say, Come on, Lucas, let's go. And he knew based on the time, based on what we did that it was time for bed, and he would run and hide. And I would laugh so hard. I thought it was the cutest, funniest thing because here was this kid that in my brain was in a different world than me. I didn't know what he was doing. Even after I started going into his world, and I've written about that the first time where I sat down next to him and I played with his toys the way he was playing with them, instead of correcting him, and we kind of bonded over it. I still felt like he was in his world, and it was my job to go into his world because he wasn't going to figure out how to come into mine. And here he was doing it. Here he was understanding, here he was interacting, and I was so proud of him. And watching that video, I mean it just fills my heart because I remember, and if you hear me laughing, and I'm laughing in the video, I'm loving it, because it was adorable. So that was it. It wasn't like I didn't have to say go to sleep. I didn't have to say it was the concept, it was the idea of what bedtime meant. And what was it? I don't know. Was it the repetition? Was it bringing him up, getting him ready, reading him stories? I've read both of my kids' stories before bed every night, when he was little, when my daughter was little, even to this day. We don't do it every night, but some days Lucas will let me sit next to him and read him one of these stories that I've read him since he was a baby. And he loves it. Uh he lets me do it. And I appreciate that. And that's one of the fringe benefits, guys. I know a lot of times people, especially if you have a kid like mine, non-verbal, 14 years old, they like to harp on what the negatives are. And look, I'm not here to pretend there's no negatives. In fact, the whole idea behind autism appreciation is acknowledging the negatives that come with raising a child who is nonverbal or has severe autism. I don't pretend they don't exist. The fact that they exist and you can still see the positivity in raising a kid like mine is what makes it so beautiful. The idea that the things I do for Lucas are abundant and there's a lot. But the joy he brings into my life just by being him, just by letting me view how he sees the world is beautiful. And that to me is what autism appreciation is. The fact that you can appreciate something that most people only see the hardships of is what makes it so special. And that's what I have with Lucas. I see the beauty of it. So I don't pretend that there are no negative things to it, but there are positives, right? My son lets me read him stories. My son will sit with me and you know, I'll watch TV and he'll sit next to me. He doesn't want to leave my side. He gives me hugs, he gives me kisses, he sits on my lap. It's nice, man. And that's the only son I've ever known, right? Anyone who sees it and they go, Oh, like I don't have your son, right? I don't know. Like you're thinking a lot of people who don't have a kid like Lucas see him and they think, oh, this poor dad is missing out on what I have with my son. And I'm thinking, you're missing out on what I have with my son, right? So I love this kid and I'm happy with him and all that we've done. But building that bridge in the beginning, I don't know what did it. And that's what's important about trust, right? We always talk about trust, having Lucas trust me and how important it is. And I've talked about this and and how he has to trust that I'm actually cooking his food when I tell him I will. The fact that he has to trust that I understand what he wants and he does, and it makes it so much easier. If he comes into the room and he wants to eat, there was a time where I couldn't shoo him away because he would freak out thinking he wasn't gonna get what he wants, but now he knows he gets it, you know, turning around and being like, Lucas, just go. I got you, I'll make you food. And he knows and he leaves, and it makes me happy. But there's the trust that I have in him that he's picking up concepts, that he's picking things up from me, right? I don't know at what point my daughter, who is neurotypical, 17 years old, I don't know at what point she understood what the word is meant. I don't know at what point she understood what certain concepts meant. In fact, I'll tell you, I'll tell you a quick story, and this one cracks me up. There's a word that I use from professional wrestling called work. Everybody that I know knows this word. Work is pretty much like a scam, right? Like if if a company says we're having a 50% off sale, but they raise the prices double right beforehand, that's a work. They're working you. And when Olivia was little, I never used this phrase really around her. She wanted a babysitter. She was, you should go out, get a babysitter. You just want to work the babysitter. And she looked at me with this look of like offended disgust. And she goes, I'm not gonna work the babysitter. And I remember laughing out loud, thinking, how does she know what that means? I don't know, man. She picks it up, she understood, she got the context of it. And it was the same thing with Lucas. That whole idea of sending him to bed, it's time to go to bed. He ran around and he hid behind the tele. He was the cutest thing, but he wasn't following instructions. He was reacting to the meaning of what was happening. It shows that there was anticipation, it showed his preference, it showed an understanding that I didn't know he had. And at the time I wasn't in denial. I knew that there were certain things that he couldn't pick up. In fact, I was assuming that most of the things I was saying weren't even landing. I was just saying it. I was just talking out loud, and to this day I still do it. We'll be in the car and I'll talk to him. Hey, Lucas, look at that store, and then the place is closed, and that's the bank we used to go to. Does he care? I don't know. Is he picking some of it up? Yeah. Do I know what? No. And that's kind of one of the beautiful things about my son and the autism appreciation is the fact that moments like that can surprise you. And I've written, you know, and I wrote on Monday. Again, this podcast today is kind of it's a part of Monday, just expanding on Monday's uh post a little bit. But that first day where we were in his room and he was getting ready for school, and I kind of just mumbled under my breath. I'm like, all right, look, let's go. Wash your hands, we'll get you ready. I just said it. I didn't enunciate it. I didn't turn around. We're gonna wash hands. I didn't do like a whole pantomime thing. Told him we're gonna wash his hands just as an aside. And he went into the bathroom and he stood there and he waited for me. And I was amazed. I'm like, oh my god. All right, cool, cool. Let's do it. And that's why it's so important to talk and talk and talk. Show them what's needed. Any kid you have, you know, we do it with kids who are verbal, nonverbal kids pick it up too. You can never assume anything, and I never assumed what he did or didn't know. And because of that, I feel like we've grown. He's grown as a human being. He understands things more, he's more likely to kind of get it. So today we talk, we go over all these things, and it's always been natural, right? It's not about drills, it's about tone, it's about repetition, it's about familiarity, you know. So yeah, man, kids can trust their parents, and that's great. But I learned to trust him. I trust that he's always trying. And that's why when I have those hard mornings like I had last week, I wasn't mad at him. I didn't freak out, I didn't yell at him. There was no lectures about big boys do this and what do you do? Nah, man. I know he's trying his best because he's shown me every step of the way. Now, does he slip? Yeah. Are those slips sometimes gigantic in nature? Yeah. Will they rock me to my core? Yeah. But just like he trusts me, I trust him. And I trust that what he can understand, he will understand. What he can retain, he will retain. And it's important for me to keep doing that and keep working on it. I mean, there's no lesson I can offer you guys other than to talk to your kids. I don't know what's going to land today. I don't know what's going to land tomorrow. Most of the things I tell him might never stick, but intermixed in all of that are things that he'll get, concepts he'll understand. I just don't know what they are. So I never stop. And I'm cool with it. I'm cool about not knowing what the timeline is going to be. I'm okay with, you know, not feeling like I'm wasting my time. Talking to my son is never wasting my time. I'm building a bond with him. I'm showing him he can trust me. And I'm putting enough words out there that we could see maybe he could surprise me. Maybe there's a concept that's ready to be understood that I haven't even thought about yet. The only way to find out is to put it out there. And that's what I do. And that's why I love him. That's why we trust each other. That's why he knows I have his back, and that's why I know he's gonna do the best he can. No matter what that means. I'm lucky. I'm really lucky to have these kids. Both of them. I think anyone listening to this knows that being a parent is hard. But I don't know. I wouldn't trade it for anything. That does it for me. See you guys next week. Be well. Bye bye.