The pomp and ceramony of words.

So for me, a day set aside to honor the "mother" is just pointless to me. Everyday is mother's day for me. Everyday I am honored. My children are healthy and strong. I even have grandchildren. I am happy. I am lucky to have such healthy children...yes even Tikaani.

All of my children  are unique in some fashions. My eldest loved animals, I remember when he was a toddler he would carry around a turtle-seal made of drift wood with him where ever he went. Qaniit my only daughter was diligent and hard working. She loved to sow and weave with me, she became a seamstress. Rahmet was my only waterbender. He became a shaman and was the most spiritual of my children. And every day I heard from them "I love you mama, we love you mama."  It warmed my heart to hear those words. I was lucky so lucky. 

Yet. Tikaani never really said those words to me. Unless he was prompted. "Tikaani, tell Auntie that you love her." "I love you Auntie" He would say it in monotone looking at his toys. To some mothers, it was heart breaking. My child never told me that he loves me. Yet even though I was originally upset when Tikaani never spoke those words I didn't let it get to me. However...I did wonder if Tikaani understood what love even was, and if he really comprehend the idea of unconditional love. I want to hear those words, I  wanted to be acknowledged.

It was at that point I realized that being rather egotistical. Tikaani didn't need to actually say those words to show me that he loved me. I discovered in many ways that Tikaani loved me. Not with words but with gestures and actions. And like a typical "Normal" I was too focus on the unnecessary pomp of words than the 'realness' of actions. 

Tikaani would leave me his favorite toys when he was a little boy, around 5 or 6. He would leave them in by  the pantry. He would put them on my bed. I thought he was just being neglectful, but he would smile when I found them and make his happy noise "eeeeee!" When he got older he gave the toys to me directly. Suddenly I realized what he was doing. He was sharing his toys with me. He never does this with any of his cousins...but he would with me. 

He would not only share his toys, but his food. He would put his sushi or rice on my plate. I scolded him at first, but when I saw him put his last piece of sashimi on my plate (and let me tell you, this kid has to be part seal, he loves fresh sashimi like no body's business) and got up. I wonder if he was sharing his food or that he wasn't hungry anymore. I saw more of the former because he would share with his cousins and  they praised him when he does. 

When I taught Tikaani basic hand signs to get him to communicate, he would make the gesture 'yes' and 'Auntie' a lot. I spent the day wondering what "Yes Auntie" meant. What was he affirming? He would then used "Good Auntie" later. He would come up to me and sign "Good Auntie, yes". I was bit baffled. Then he combined the signs with a hug. Finally I got when he was trying to say.

"I love you Auntie" 

I started realize that words meant nothing too him. He didn't need to actually say those words(I love you). They don't have much weight to him. Tikaani knew what love was, he just preferred to show it. Some days he would grab my face and make me look him in the eye. He will hold it for a moment before letting me go and then run off to play. I didn't understand it. I understood he was doing what I did when I needed to get him to look at me. He would do it too. I thought it was mimicry, but for him it was just to get my attention so he could sign "Good Auntie Yes". After these few instances when he would either hug me or grab my face to look me in the eye. I started to sign back. "Good Boy Yes". I thought about actually teaching him how to sign for "I love you" 

"I love you Auntie..."

"I love you too baby."

So for the next year and half Maka and I began to add to his sign vocabulary. He knew "Yes, Please, Auntie, Maka, Amana, Stop, No, Done, Hungry, Thirsty, Play, More, Happy, Sick, Mad, Sad, Toilet and Go Home." Yet after a month of teaching him "I love you" he just prefer to sign "Good Auntie Yes". I responded with "I love you" Thinking that he would catch on finally and use that,  but he didn't. Now Maka theorize that we're undoing what we've taught him. We taught him  that "Good Auntie Yes" means "I love you" it was also easier for him to wave his index and middle fingers together(good) touch his chest (Auntie) and wave his palm (yes). Than it was to do the sign for I love you (thumb and pinkie out while tapping his chest). Still despite how he was use to doing it the other way, I was teaching him to use I love you. When he was 7 and still non verbal. He started to use the sign "I love you" after grabbing my face or hugging me. I was elated that he caught on. However he would only sign that after he hugged me. Whilst he used "Good Auntie Yes" in intervals through the day and not just after he got my attention. 

I just taught him to use that sign after a hug or face-grab. Not how to say "I love you". I was getting egotistical again. I wanted him to tell me he loved me in my way. Not in his fashion.

When he started to actually use speech at age 9. I was again elated. Real progress, now he can communicate without just using hand language. I made sure to teach him a million words and help him say them. He wasn't fully verbal (and I don't think he would ever be) but he would say "Hungry, time to eat" when ever he wanted some food. Or "Water, water cup" if he was thirsty. He would string together weird sentences ("Fish apple apple jam, Fish apple jam") or just do what he use to do and repeat people. Maka: "Hanai, do you know where my ax is?" Tikaani: "Hanai do you know where my ax is." As he turned eleven, his speech got better and was still using words and signs to get his point cross. He stopped signing "Good Auntie Yes" when he hugged me. He just say "Auntie ok!" and hug me before taking off. I was still signing I love and saying it to him. He started to repeat mean and say "I love you" back when he hugged me. I was so happy. Finally we're getting somewhere. 

Yet, he prefer using actions than words. Sure now at age 16 he can say I love you with some prompting and sometimes without, but like sign before. It had no weight to him. We're so dependent on spoken words that we miss the weight behind them. Tikaani just didn't want to hear "I love you baby" or "I love you Tikaani" He wanted to feel it. I stopped caring whether I heard the words or not. They way he would grab my face to look at me. Or the way he would give me the biggest smile and laugh when I wrestle with him.  One day I told him I loved him, he gave me a response that wasn't silence or "eeee". 

"I know." And then he would laugh and run off.

He always knew I loved him. I always knew that he loved me. I didn't need pomp or ritual of a sentence he didn't quiet understand. For Tikaani, Actions trump words 100%. 

Happy mother's day to all the moms out in the Aut-Blogosphere. 

A bit frustrated.

I still want to continue to review With the Light, but the problem right now is I don't have the money to get the mangas off Amazon. So I need the help of media ninjas to help me find an Online Manga collection and or torrent of the Manga. Or someone could buy it for me and I could pay them back once I get money. IDK 

I personally would prefer finding it off a manga collection online. 

Art Spam and thoughts on Bullying

Drakkani: Male, Age: 20, Clan(Dia): Stormwake. 

Notes taken by Dr. Jakob Tate.

Drakkhani legs are perfectly designed to grip and hold onto rock ledges. They are also strong enough or mortally wound humans.

Dr Jakob Tate (Xenoanthropologist) 

Satyr doodles



I read Amanda's post response to a fellow autistic blogger's post about disappearing off the hub because of cyberbullying. Now I'll straight up say that I believe bullying is nothing to laugh at and neither is trolling. Yet as someone who has skin thick enough to rival an elephant I can't help but lift my eyebrow in scrutiny.

Bullying is serious, but from what I have seen on the Internet. Bullying is also someone what subjective. There is a joke among some LJ communities stating. "Trolling to some people, is just someone disagreeing with you." Which is really true in many communities. If someone passionately disagrees with you (as we've seen with the cure/no cure binary) one is labeled as a troll and thusly his opinion is dismissed. This honestly makes me really really skeptical when people crying 'TROLL' because after being around /b/ (Internet Hell) for sometime (read forever). I tend to have very picky POV on what constitutes as trolling. Unless someone spammed your blog with dead baby pics and goatsee and lemon-party images. Then it's probably not as bad as you dramatized. I have had /b/ troll me. I completely friend locked my LJ and later my Gmail was spammed bombed. Did I write a huge post stating all this?

Fuck no. I don't see a reason in giving the dickheads any satisfaction that they got to me. I left DeviantART(I've been there fore six years btw) because of trolling. I didn't write a huge flouncy post bawwwing about the trolls, I just left. Problem is from what I see, some people like the attention. They like being the victim. Now I am not saying that SBWG and Kowalski are attention-whores. I am sure that their situation is really different. I am just reporting what I have seen in the last 9 years I've been cyberdiving surfing on the Interwebs. People love being the victim. Moms with autsitic children are the perfect example. Aspergers do the same thing. I have seem people wave their arms about online proclaiming. "LOOK AT ME! I AM BEING HARASSED!!!" You might as well just put a target on your ass.

Trolling is serious but, jumping up and down claiming that some wanker is bugging you is just as bad IMO. I don't acknowledge serious trolls. I don't masturbate to the attention of being a victim. That is why I am self-advocate. I am sick of being the victim.

Cross disability thoughts: Seeking out connections

Multiple Perspectives was Wednesday on the twenty-eighth. Our ASAN chapter was invited to talk about self-advocacy, employment and education. It was interesting to talk to the ADA about viewpoint as self-advocating autists (and yes I nearly went into overload). Yet something reached me as sat and had lunch with several people from different disability groups. Something that I've talked about but never really discussed, especially for Blogging against Disabilism day.

What about cross-disability politics and even cross-disability ableism? We're naive to think that every disabled person is going to empathize with someone different disability. That a person with a mobility impairment is going to understand the stress of someone who is deaf and someone with borderline personality disorder is going to understand someone with dwarfism. It's not possible. It's human to find disconnect with different sub-groups with in a minority. I've seen the ableism even with in HFA/LFA dichotomy. I've talked about before. I've seen ableism from autists against those with psychoses. Especially against those that for anti-psychiatry. They too feed into the stigma and stereotypes. In the same breath I've seen people with mild psychoses judge those with severe intellectual impaired people. I've seen people with visible physical disabilities make harsh statements against those with mental impairments of all kinds.

I could go on and on and on, yet despite talking in an oroboric cycle I feel that I won't make my point clear. My point in a succinct fashion is that normal typical people are not the only people that are ableist. Ableism permeates within the disabled community much like ink within a pool of water. It's not a just a typical/normal/abled person issue it's a human issue. I know, I know I am preaching to the choir, but I feel I need to call this out.

The human aspect of not finding a connection and repelling against those with a different disability. Is something we shouldn't fixate on. Human nature is human nature. What we should do is find connections that are their. Someone with a wheelchair or a mobility impairment; should understand the frustration that a little person feels when they can't reach or obtain something without help. A deaf adult could empathize with a nonverbal autist struggling to communicate with his family. The connections are their, we just have to seek them out.

I've seen the connections in action. I've seen a man with hydrocephalus discuss neuro-diversity. Something I thought was an autist only phenomenon. I've seen TASH and other groups rise up against AutSpks. My best friend with borderline supports my autism rights activism. My schizophrenic best friend, fist bumps me when I tell him about the new laws to help mentally impaired kids. These connections are vital, and something we should strive to maintain. We should advocate for each other and find the necessary common ground to fight against ableism in typical society. Only if we stand together could we make major difference. Yet we need to address the ableism within and solve that as well. We need to stop the ideaism that one disability is better than another and that certain disability groups shouldn't exist.

Disability right are human rights. And there is ableism within disability groups.