Solving World Problems by Taking Turns!

Before describing that mission that Aditya has undertaken.... here are some other updates. (There have been so many... it is hard to keep up!)

1. Still going to school about 4 hours a day.  Still totally tuned in to the "learning".  Not socializing with other girls and especially with the rumbuxous boys, most likely as he is still without the tools to do it (e.g. reading and processing body language and facial expressions)
2. Has started eating breakfast in his playroom alongwith Baba.  This move is designed to reduce the power-struggle that was happening with both kids getting up at the same time and eating breakfast, but only one of them (sister) getting ready to go to school (as brother goes a little later).  Only 3 days later, the mornings seem like the easiest time of the day.  Aditya, by the way, is also a LOT more interested in talking and playing, if he is in the room.  This means that he is eating less, and shows no signs of being hungry.  4 days ago,  he would constantly complain of being hungry and it would seem he had been waiting for a day before the breakfast was finally served!  Not a surprise.  Basically, we think it is the control that he needed, not the food.

3. Our focus in the playroom has shifted mainly to delighting in the company of each other.... no matter what the activity.  Interestingly,  point 2 above is also helping with this.  This is to say.... we are now actively celebrating each other's company for the company that it is.  It is secondary what it is that we are doing.  Really... this is the underlying principle of the Son Rise program... so it's nice we are finally doing it:-)   Be it playing cricket (YES!),  playing ungame, or eating breakfast!  Outside the playroom, Baba once went on a bicycle ride with Aditya,  which both loved.
4. Aditya is now very interested in cricket.  We play it inside the playroom, and Aditya is getting stronger with holding his bat and swinging it.  He also loves to bowl yorkers like his favorite yellow haired Lasith Malinga (see the picture above).
5. Also very interested in one-touch, and several other flavors of soccer.  This includes a hilarious form of soccer which we came up with in which we place objects in the middle of the room and try to avoid knocking them down while also trying to score goals.  It is also fine to go and place objects in front of your opponent's  goal!  This is being a huge help to lighten things up.... as opposed to feeling high-strung over winning and losing which he still sometimes does.
6. Baba and Aditya WRESTLED with each other for fun!  A huge step!
7. Making movies and writing songs, and sometimes both.  The movies are shot on a pretend camera.  They usually involve his favorite fictional character Officer James.  (A separate post coming soon on OFFICER JAMES, who is a well known figure like "Spider Man" around our house.)


Coming to the title of this post... we have seen some rigidity around the use of pounds vs kilograms.  In his own words,  it is a world problem that people in America and people in Europe/India use different measurements.  People need to respect other people, for which they should take turns using kilos and pounds!  This morning we played a game around this.
First he made me show the "shocked" expression on my face as he had changed the setting on the weighing scale from pounds to kgs!  A few more times, and a few more variations, and he was loving it.  At this point I proposed I imagine my wife would go and get our car's speedometer and odometer changed without my knowledge to use kilo meters, and how that will land me in trouble on the freeway (as I was driving at 60km but thinking I was driving at 60 miles per hour).  Later, we also discussed how it is also a world problem that cars in different countries have the steering wheel on the left or the right.  Some alternatives were proposed, including a center drive and a drive-from-the-top-of-the-car.  At this point Aditya was in hysterics... as opposed to serious and rigid... and that brought a huge smile to my face too!

I have no friends in school (and I want to make friends)!

Aditya has been going to school almost everyday, and seems to really enjoy listening to whatever is taught in the class.  (Since I have personally volunteered in his class a couple of times now,  I can see this when he comes home and tells Mom about what happened.)

On the other hand,  he is probably not enjoying not being able to "relate" to any of the other kids.  From what I have seen in class/ on the playground, he is very accepting of another child(ren) in his space... but he is not reaching out to, or "inviting" them.

What's really cool is... one day he said: "I don't have any friends in school.  I feel like making friends, but I don't know how".  Strictly speaking I am paraphrasing what his Mom told me, but whatever words he chose, THIS IS yet another HUGE step,   we think.

He does not have the tools (i.e. the social skills such as reading and understanding body language of a super-fast talking 6 year old) to make a friend... and this is something we frankly do expect right now (although we also firmly believe it is a matter of time when he "gets" how to do this).

But he actually WANTS to have a 6 year old friend now!  He was at first believed not to "love" the company of any human being.  Once in his Son Rise program,  he was loving his "grown up" volunteer friends, but avoiding other kids.  A little more recently, he only began to "tolerate" kids around him.  

And now,  here he is... longing that he had someone in his class he could call a friend.

We are elated, and yet another time.... re-energized... about "hanging out" with Aditya in his Son Rise playroom, where he will play with us to "get" the super-cool and mysterious craft also known in the neuro-typical world as "making friends".