WHERE HAS THE BOYD FAMILY BEEN?

Austin and the Principal and Vice Principal at Elementary Graduation

Austin and his typical peers side by side graduationg fifth grade

Austin, Mommy, and Beth at Treasure Coast 2012 Walk. My, how he has grown!

Alyssa said "SAY CHEESE", and this is the AUSTIN VERSION! He is such a joker!

I always like to start off with showing off my wonderful son, Austin. It is so hard to believe that he is officially a teenager, after turning 13 yesterday! Time has flown by!

The last time I wrote on here seems like a lifetime ago, and in some ways, I guess it was. Since his successes with inclusion were coming so fast and furious, and his home program kept moving along with him making amazing progress, I was able to take care of some other things in my life, while continuing to advocate for Austin as needed. In April of 2011, Mark and I ended our marriage of 23 years. Life changes, and sometimes we change with it. Enough said.

The kids and I worked very hard, and were blessed with a Habitat for Humanity home through the neighborhood stabilization program. We are incredibly proud of our home that we worked together and received! My daughter, Aubry and I even became construction workers for several weeks, with help from Ms. Magaly and my best friend in the entire world, Tammie Baker. We completed our 300 hours of community service and closed on the house on May 19, 2011.

I have continued working for Autism Speaks in Government Relations, and have been promoted to Manager of Grassroots Development. I have to admit, the last year has been rough as we have settled into our lives with the new circumstances of the kids having two homes, and Mark and I learning to co-parent as a divorced couple. The divorce is yet another reason for my absence from this blog. Some things are better left to be worked out in private.

Austin completed three years at his "MIRACLE PLACEMENT" that we had finally received for him within our school district. He went from working on ABC's and 123's to reading and writing and Math. It took all three years to get to a point that the school allowed him to sit for THE TEST, in our state it is called FCAT. I'm sure you know the one.

Test day came and I was a wreck, but he wasn't. On the first day of testing, I asked him how it was. He shrugged and said "Easy!" and "Fun!". Not exactly what I was expecting...I spoke to Austin's teacher, and with the accommodations in place, Austin took the ENTIRE FCAT in his allotted time. Not only did he take it, he finished it, and never had a SINGLE MELTDOWN! He showed everyone that he absolutely COULD TAKE THE TEST.

We waited, and his scores finally came back. To be honest, they didn't matter to me too much. He had already PASSED with flying colors, as he TOOK THE TEST. His scores showed that he had not made above a 1 on any area. I wasn't truly surprised. He was there to prove he could handle the test, unfortunately, only 3 of his 9 years in school had been focused on preparing him for the test.

The point of this is one that I have said before. We MUST PRESUME INTELLECT! Austin is not intellectually impaired, he has been educationally impaired, but that is about to end! Austin is on Hospital/Home bound placement, doing his 6th grade year at home. He will be working on HIS IEP GOALS, not sharing the time with the other nine children in his class. He will move at his own speed, and FINALLY be given the opportunity to try to catch up with all he has missed over these many years.

There is no reason to cast blame, because blame will never help Austin to reach his full potential at this point. I believe it is safe to say that there is PLENTY of blame to go around.

There, it was hard to finally get you from three years ago to now, but it was necessary in order to understand my next story to tell...It will be called "OPERATION AUSTIN". We will talk soon...