Hi. Unfortunately I can't do any follow up with this teen because I only see him periodically and the parents do not live here. He resides (mainly) with the grandparents (who don't speak english). The autistic young man (well I don't know how much he knows yet), because he can't communicate with his grandparents (I found this out the other day). I met up with the gandpa and I was saying (in Italian), how impressed I was by his grandson's verbal communication. The grandpa sadly said "yeah, he does speak sometimes but we can't communicate because I don't speak English". The younger man has only uttered some words in English but never in Italian, so what we have here is people living in the same house speaking two different languages and the older people will not learn English. It's too hard they say.

But when the weather gets warmer and everyone hangs out, I will do my best to teach them a few words in English. I've tried before and they get frustrated but I'll use the excuse "But you can communicate with your grandson more easily". This approach might work or it might fall on deaf ears but I'll give it a try.

When there is a language barrier EVERYTHING is much harder.

But I will tell you a funny timely story about something that happened to me yesterday on a city bus I was on.

I got on the bus only to encounter a mom trying to control her 2 year old daughter ( I found out the age of the child AFTER the meltdown).

Well, I have seen tantrums, and I have seen meltdowns but NO ONE on the bus was prepared for this one.

The child was making noises like she was possessed. People were turning this way and that trying to avoid watching but honestly, when she would burst out with screams, we literally jumped out of our seats. I kind of thought "well, she's a baby, she wants her way, she's screaming". Babies do this, I know this, and they say the terrible 2's are the terrible 2's for a reason, right? And since the kid was on the floor BEHIND the seat, we really couldn't see what was transpiring, only hearing the noise. The poor mom never raised her voice, never did anything but say "Mia, que pasa". which I gather is "Mia, what's wrong"?? in spanish (I speak a little spanish and thank god I did).

So the kid starts hurling her head agains the steel frames of the seat in front of her. Now this aroused everyone's attention because we all thought she would split her head open. Never saw such a rage in a two year old before.

So now my stop comes and I and several others get off the bus thinking "well, that's the end of that". We go to the bench where we all sit down waiting for the second bus to arrive. Thank god no one said anything about the child because all of a sudden we hear the gutteral noises and the screams, and we all look to the left and there was the poor mother trying to navigate a stroller, her handbag, and the kid and it was not happening. The kid broke away and the mother left her purse and stroller and ran after the kid.

I said out loud "we have to help this person". I ran over and grabbed her purse telling her what I was doing (in spanish). I grabbed the stroller and I said "Grab her and sit on the bench, we'll help you.

Well, you never saw us moms break into action to help another mom. I had my own push cart that I was holding. Some other mom took MY pushcart, I held the mom's purse and stroller, and the mom held the baby who was going nuts. Another mom ran over to the baby and tried everything to get her to quiet down because we were about to board another bus and unless this kid quieted down it wasn't happening. The poor mom was so sad she looked defeated. That's when I found out the kid was 2 and driving her crazy. I couldn't get any more information (just in case you are thinking "was this kid autistic).

I finally said "my my, what pretty sneakers, look at how they glisten, and all the moms were cooing and trying to be low-key with no excitement. In a short while the kid got so tired of screaming (she must have been doing this on bus after bus because the kid was knocked out from all her meltdown.

So here we were, 4 women, stroller, pushcart, purse, and kid and the second bus pulls up. There were men about the board the bus and I yelled "Back off, we are moms trying to help a mom with baby". The men looked at me and said "Okay lady, no problem". And we all board the bus.

We all took turns holding various stuff and the mom held the baby who was closing her eyes. I whispered very softly "she's asleep" and the mother looked relieved. That did not last because when she went to look at the toddler's face, she woke right up. I said "uh oh", and the mother said "uh oh", too.

So we rode like that for 10 minutes or so. Then the mother looked at me and said "we are getting off at the next stop, what can I do, I can't get off with the stroller, the purse and the kid". I said "don't worry, we'll get off with you, settle you down, and we'll re-board the bus"

Everyone heard me say this and we ALL GOT UP, GOT HER OFF, she buckled the kid in the stroller, we all got back on the bus (thank god the bus driver was a human being, and thank god no one took my seat.

We all sighed and said "holy cow", because we knew that mom had a hard road ahead.

But we moms stood together and helped another mom.

That's what it's all about.

And I have to tell you what happened exactly one minute after that mother got off and another mom of another 2 year old got on.

We had just gotten done with helping a mom with a screaming toddler and now a quiet sweet toddler boards the bus, sits next to her mom and starts waving at all of us and says 'hi". We all looked and you should have seen all of us moms. From one extreme to the other, this little adorable baby girl was determined to say hi to everyone on the bus, even the bus driver. She just waved and we all waved back and said hi, and we all burst out laughing. I asked the mother "is she always like this?" and the mother said "yeah, she's something special" We all smiled and said "you have no idea HOW special"

Sorry for such a long post but I had to share what happened yesterday.

Melody