The Hands of Time...Window for Autism Recovery

I often wondered and worried why my 3 year old became fascinated with clocks. Everywhere we went, he would ask people if they knew what time it was, whether or not they were wearing a watch or what time does this start and that end. The moment we would walk into new psychologist's office, he could point out 8 clocks without 5 seconds going by. As parents, we often wondered why is he stimming on time?

For a good year and a half, he only wanted clocks for presents, gifts, rewards, etc. By the age of 4, he could tell time down to the exact minute. Surely he was destined to be a clock-maker as his collection of all different types of watches, clocks and time machines grew.

As time passed on, he waned slowly away from his fixation with these measurement marvels. My wife and I are still trying to figure out what has caused him to "let go" of the time machines. We ask ourselves, is it because he has mastered the art of telling time or because he is reacting positively to our ASD recovery efforts or just grew out of a phase? We know he is gifted in so many ways, but we wonder if he has been trying to tell us something.

Today, I told him we could draw a clock and paste it on the Internet. He was very happy that he was actually encouraged to make his own picture of a clock.

The picture was drawn at age 5.

As I gave my son a bath tonight, the answer to the question of why is my son so into clocks came to me. He's been telling us all along that his window for recovery is currently open and there is no time to waste. Although we began recovery efforts at 28 months old, over time, I became content and stale. I needed a message of hope that his recovery is happening. Comparing where he is now (waning from clockville) to where he was two years ago (stimming on time); I think he is no longer worried that the hands of time will beat autism. With renewed energy, focus and faith, I know we will beat autism before our time is up.

The message of this blog is to remind us that "the hands of time" is always ticking on the window for autism recovery.