I find parenting my two children such a delicate balance since my son has Autism and my daughter does not. Sometimes it can seem like the whole family world revolves around the child with Autism, and I really try to make sure that my neurotypical daughter is not getting the short end of the stick. My son is involved with the Challenger bowling program where in the summer and winter he goes and bowls every Saturday at the local lanes. My daughter often asks to take a turn and expresses that she would like to play, but the league is only for special needs children. I knew about a sibling support group that hosted bowling nights for the brothers and sisters of kids with Autism, but my daughter was too young to attend. Now that she is a "big girl" (whopping age of 4) I inquired and they welcomed her to attend with open arms. The program is called PASS - parents and sibling support - and it is sponsored by POAC and FCSNJ
Belle went tonight for the first time and was treated to Valentine's day cupcakes and a goody bag. During bowling they also brought out Pizza and Soda for the kids to enjoy. The siblings all bowled together and one of the lanes was set up for the autistic siblings over to the side - this event was focused on the sibling. My husband came with Alex and bowled with him over on his lane while Belle bowled with the rest of the little & big brothers and sisters. When we got to the lane and got her silly shoes on we first had to go in hunt of a low weight ball that was pink - only pink for her. Finally we found an 8 pounder and she was ready to bowl. She rolled the first frame and it was incredibly slow going. The lanes were kind enough to let us use a metal ball ramp that she could push the ball down and it would gain enough momentum to actually knock down the pins (plus we had bumpers). With the ramp she was able to get a couple of spares and even a strike in the 10th frame followed up by knocking down 9 pins. Her score was a 97! Newsflash - that is better bowling than I can do! She even figured out how to angle and adjust the ramp roller over to the right or left to better increase her odds of hitting pins. Yeah, she rocked the ramp roller!
She really had a lot of fun, is sufficiently tired out (though coming down from a sugar crash) and we look forward to attending the next sibling bowling event which will be in April.
Check her out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mj0kzejl8Tk
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