I always wanted to be a Geography teacher!  Even since I was really young, and I set all my goals around achieving this dream. My husband and I set up home in Somerset in the UK in 2009 to pursue my first teaching job. But unwittingly I was compelled to redesign many of the departmental resources as I felt these did not meet the learning needs of some of the individuals I taught. From this I caught the bug, and in 2010 an opportunity came up, sending me into teaching roles within the special needs sector. This is where I discovered the wonderful world of practical hands on learning, specialist communication and therapeutic support strategies for children and young adults with learning disabilities.

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I have met and worked very closely with a huge number of individuals over the years, with wide ranges of conditions and learning needs. The thoughts of these beautiful and special individuals will never leave me, and they still shape my thinking every day.

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My son Laurence was born in the summer of 2013, after a very unremarkable pregnancy, where I followed all my midwife's advice and took all my vitamins and attended all my appointments and classes, just as I should.

Laurence was born with a malformation of his left eye called an "ectopic pupil". This  severely restricts his vision on his left side.  It is a incredibly rare condition and it took us over a year and 4 different hospitals to get a diagnosis. But from the age of 4 weeks old, Laurence and I began a daily regime of painful medicated eye drops across the day to force his pupil to open and occlusion therapy (patching) to gain vision into his left eye.

Nobody was really sure how Laurence's vision would develop and how he would meet visual challenges as he got older. The patching his given Laurence a good quality of sight in his eye, but there are still outstanding issues with his gross motor skills and coordination. We are still very much on this vision journey, 5 years later. Still patching (but no other meds!) and awaiting an appointment with a Visual Processing Specialist next month.

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Aside from the visual concerns, Laurence appeared to be developing well, until in 2016, when he reached around 2 1/2 years old. His speaking was "a bit slow" in developing and he was very passive and didn't want to sit with other children at nursery. After exploring lots of avenues around hearing problems Laurence was referred to a paediatrician who believed that Laurence had Autism.

 

I have to confess when I heard those words I felt like the bottom had just dropped out of my world. How could this possibly be? How on earth did I miss this? 

It took me, what feels like, a long time to adjust to this new identity as an Autism mum and it was very difficult to go to work everyday with learners with disabilities and then come back home and find the motivation to support and be everything that Laurence needed of me too. And then every day at work not to picture Laurence sat in the classroom there in front of me in the future. I would hold him close to me sobbing, wishing with every fibre of my being that I could take it away.

Due to other changes and events not of his making, Laurence then suffered very bad regression where he stopped speaking and eating almost entirely. Everything he can do now has been built up from this point.

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Autism is a part of our lives everyday, in more ways then I can count. I know now that Autism has shaped Laurence into who he is. He would not love his passions the way he does or have his spark and obscure sense of humour without it. But he is his own person, and so much more than his Autism too.

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By the middle of 2017 we were in the centre of fighting for an EHCP, a school place, and funding to support Laurence to begin at our chosen school, and it was clear that our war was not going to be over in time for September. It was then that we began home schooling Laurence. I was very nervous about it, but I wish I hadn't been now as I could move at his pace and work in ways and with topics that suited him and his interests.

Laurence finally started school by the end of 2017 but still attends part time, due to extreme fatigue and I supplement his learning at home. I made the decision to leave my job and to focus all my love and energy on Laurence. On his needs and on his learning. I have no regrets about my decision. Both he and I have grown so much in this journey. He is my world and deserves to have the best of me.

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I want this site really to be about sharing knowledge and good practice. About good ideas and what works well for us, I'm not going to pretend I know everything, or always get everything right. But in our often overwhelming world, where our little ones are our greatest challenge and our biggest joy, I just want to offer my help where I can.

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Fern x