No Means No!

(April 2012)

Michael's main mode of communication is indicating yes or no.  We have tried many different methods for doing this. I've mentioned my favorite which are thumbs up-thumbs down, or close eyes for yes, eyes open for no.  We also have signs that we glued to fly swatters that say YES and NO.  For a time, you would hold the signs in different hands and Michael would look at the one that indicated his answer. Then after awhile, he would point with a pointer at the one that indicates his answer.

Lauri and I were playing around with Michael having him answer questions by pointing to the signs.  He was doing really well and we learned some interesting things like; he still doesn't like Macs or the Utes, and he says he remembers the accident (I hope this isn't true).  Soon we all grew tired of the questioning and decided to move onto something different.  Lauri wanted Mike to show off for me so she asked him to raise his arm high above his head (which he had been doing earlier for her).  As she was asking him to do it, instead of moving his arm up he was moving it down.  I tried to encourage him, "come on babe raise your arm".  He continued to move his arm down instead of up and then he was fumbling around his lap. I couldn't figure out what he was doing until I saw what he was trying to grab for.  Finally he found the handle to the NO sign and held it up to his mom.  With a satisfied smile on his face, Michael made sure he turned it just right for optimal mom reading (Boo Yeah!).  This made us laugh so hard, it was good to see that Michael hasn't lost his sense of humor and I bet it felt so good for him to have some say in his life.. We now make sure the signs are no where in sight when we are trying to force Mike to do something.