Are you sure you want to cast the first stone?

The responses to the newpaper on the article I posted floored me. I can’t begin to understand the judgment of the mother. It was suggested that her child wasn’t really disabled. People cried foul that any 4 year old would be on the bus at all- let alone a disabled one. One person even suggested that the mother sent the daughter to school so that she could rest.



My stance on this is very clear- no child should be forgotten. This exact situation is something I fear for Little Bug. When we first signed him up for school, he was slated to go on a bus that would take him to the school for emotionally disabled 18 to 21 year olds. When we called, there wasn’t an apology- just it’s a good thing you called, because we would have sent him to Park Ave.


The judgment of that mother and child infuriated me. Maybe people outside the special education system don’t understand that here they push busing of all kids. Little Bug lives 6 blocks away from his school and rides the bus. We had several meetings about it as Nick and I were concerned with his safety and the ability of the driver to care for him. The school felt that he should ride the bus to encourage independence and to assimilate with his peers.


I was surprised how off track people got with this story. Questioning whether apraxia is really a disability or not and the motives of the mother. Who gives a shit? What matters is that a child was left of the bus for hours. I don’t care whether that child was disabled or not and why they were on the bus- it shouldn’t have happened. This would be terrifying for any child and parent. This would make any parent demand the bus driver’s job and then some.

Bus Update

Little Bug has had a substitute bus driver since Tuesday. Monday was an awful day for the bus- screaming, yelling, hitting, biting, etc. Tuesday onward was a complete 180. He was willing to get on the bus on Tuesday. The bus driver had an aide who helped Little Bug to his seat.

Yesterday, he was jumping up and down with excitement about the bus! Now, to me, this says that the root problem was probably with the bus driver. She is nice and all, but she did speak loudly with an incredibly high sickeningly sweet voice. If she comes back, we are going to try to give her some suggestions about dealing with Little Bug.

One final note about the bus- he saw a school bus last night and said I love the bus. I like Ms. Carla (Ms. Carla is the substitute who was done something amazing.)

I know you're trying to tell me something!

Little Bug had a really hard time at school yesterday. It all started when he had to ride the bus. This week he has begun to ride it by himself both ways. Apparently, he cried the entire way there and also bit the bus driver when she attempted to buckle him in.

He also had a really hard time with transitions and his teacher has asked that we help make a better picture schedule for him as the one that they have simply isn't working.

When we asked him why he had a bad day, he sai, "On da bus.... lowyang."

We have asked the following questions and are no closer to the answer:
-Is there a person name Logan? NO
- Was someone laughing? NO (laughing is disturbing to him at times)
- Did someone touch you? No
- Did you sit with someone? No
- Was the bus driver nice? Yes...sad...lowyang

We have no idea what he is taking about. We both are somewhat frazzled as we can't figure out what the hell that word means and why it is so scary for him.

First Day of School!

Well, it's official- Little Bug is in school. This morning was a bit rocky. In general, he was pretty high strung and resistant to any diviation from routine. He cried about having chocolate milk and not white milk. The wrong kind of cereal sent him into a 15 minute fit. The shower this morning sounded like he was being murdered.

We thought that things were getting better because by 8:30, he was playing with his toys. Unfortunately, not. While he voluntarily put on his shoes and harness, waiting for the bus was another story. There was lots of stimming and ear covering; verbalizing and trying to fling himself on the ground.

When the bus showed up, she had us hand him through the door so she could strap him in. Big mistake. His screams could be heard over the bus and soon she was asking for help. He was hitting and pinching his face while flailing and making it near impossible to finish strapping him in. It took the two of us to get him in. The driver asked me to ride with him this morning to make for a better transition.

He seemed to be doing beter once we got to school and he recognized the buildings and the aides. Hopefully, the rest of the day goes better.

School Woes

Little Bug has reached a new low when it comes to school. Any mention of school, school bus, new friends, results in NO. We saw a school bus yesterday. He looked at me with tear filled eyes and said. “No bus, daddy. Pease no bus?”

Hopefully this is normal, although he seems to be taking it to an extreme. We took him shopping for shoes yesterday and I stupidly mentioned school. That tanked the whole damn thing. He screamed and cried and stimmed and lashed out at the boxes and his parents.

This weekend, to try to ease the transition, we made a paper chain to count down until school. We thought he might like to pick one of his favorite colors- red or blue- for the first day of school. When I asked him what color should be the first day of school, he looked at me and said, “BLACK”. He *hates* the color black and yet this was the color for the first day of school.

When watching Thomas the Tank Engine, we saw an episode were Thomas had to help the children get to school. He immediately covered his ears, turned off the TV and then put away Thomas.

We have tried taking him to the school in order to make him excited about it as well as talking about other people who go to school. No dice. He isn’t interested in school.

He has also begun to regress and his speech therapist is concerned. He is unable to answer yes or no questions correctly 80% of the time. He has begun to show much more echolalia in his speech.

I need to email the school and tell them that they have a storm brewing. They need to know that he is petrified. They should have some sort of supports on the bus and to get him off of the bus. We also should get a recap of his first day.

Your answers only lead to more questions

I have been trying to get Little Bug to tell me what he did during the day. When I get off the bus, I sit in the back seat and ask him about his day. I have found that he cannot tell us what he did in a day. Our conversations go like this:

B: Hey Bug! Did you have a good day?
L: Uhmm, no.
B: What happened today?
L: Rode Fains (trains)
B looks into rear view mirror to see Nick shake his head no, indicating that they didn’t ride trains. : Did you play outside?
L: No, inside
B looks into the mirror again to see Nick shaking his head yes, in fact they did play outside.

This goes on every day. This causes an insane amount of anxiety. We are going to send him off to school and yet not have any way to hear from him what happened. While I want to have faith and hope that the school will do the right thing by him, it breaks my heart that my son will not be able to tell me if something isn’t going well.

Little Bug had his first melt down about school this week. We can tell that he has been upset about something- which we assume is that lack of Birth To Three and the structure that they provide- as he has been flappy, jumpy, extremely quick to emotion and hurting himself more.

He was playing with a school bus on his road rug and Nick and I decided that we could use that time to talk to him about riding the school bus. We told him that he was going to get to ride a bus like that. His face was overtaken with a huge smile.
He looked at us and pointed to the bus, “Daddy Nick and Bake too!”

We told him that we weren’t going to be able to ride the bus, but he would ride it with his friends. He became panicked and threw himself on the ground, crying and hitting his head. He began to yell, “No BUS! NO BUS!” and then bit himself.

I wish we could make this easier for him. Nick and I have decided that we are going to have him ride the bus- even though the school is only 6 blocks away from our house. If he struggles with it or is truly unhappy, we can always withdraw him from it, however he needs to give it a shot.