We Are Home

Here is my mom with Griffin, I didn't mean to cut my dad out of the picture, and as you can see there was lots of happiness going on when they were together. Our trip was fantastic and way too short. Griffin was a trooper and adjusted quite well to all the transitions and changes from day to day. Nearly every day we would either be changing households or location always moving about and going places and Griffin just kept his happy-go-lucky positive attitude. He showed a lot of affection toward everyone in the family much to my surprise. He even showed some affection toward the flight attendant, Leslie, who was ever so helpful on our flight from Minneapolis to Anchorage on Northwest Airlines. Griffin had a pretty bad meltdown when we were boarding the aircraft at Minneapolis. I found that once I let the passengers in the near vicinity that my son had autism they were so very kind, understanding, and helpful. There were actually a few men onboard who helped by holding Griffin and Abby (Griffin's service dog) while I got situated. Griffin had a hard time on the flight I think partly due to the fact that he had a pretty high temperature and didn't feel well. Eventually, he went to sleep after crying and screaming for about an hour, I guess that he just wore himself out. I will be posting more photos on my next post In the meantime, I just wanted to let everyone know what has been going on since my last post.
There was so many reasons to decide to move to N.C. or S.C. because I want us to be near my family but I found out that the services in either state are not even comparable to what is available to Griffin here in Alaska. I was told by the woman at the TEACCH office that both states are not very good for services, not just for the TEACCH program but for all other services, especially N.C. because it is mandated and it has an influx of people moving there thinking that there is going to be great services and ultimately are disappointed because the system cannot support the amount of people. She told me that it would be best for us to stay in Alaska at least until he is ready to be mainstreamed into regular ed. So, I guess that for now we won't be moving to the lower 48. This is sad news for me and my family because I had so wanted to move to be closer to them and have lots of love and support.
For the time being we will stay here and Griffin will continue with his services at his school, which are excellent, and his private O.T. (twice a week) and his private speech therapy. We will continue to receive free diapers through Medicaid and full coverage of medical services too. It is a good thing for him and I am very grateful that we live in a state that takes autism seriously and makes life so much easier and less complicated for us.
I will be posting again soon to continue telling you about our wonderful trip and adding more photos.