I am overwrought and titillated to announce that my 3 1/2 year old gets the concept of PRETEND!
To some, that would not be amazing in anyway, but my son has Autism and struggles with things that revolve around social concepts, speech and language pragmatics, and emotional issues (among other things).
For years he has just looked at people who pretend like they are crazy, as in certifiable.
A friend once asked him to play pirates and to him it was like a foreign language.
When his gymnastics teacher said to pretend a plastic cone was an ice cream cone and to fill it up and the pretend to lick it he looked at him and the other kids who were doing it like they had lost their minds!
But all that has changed! He GETS it! Last week he made a road out of blocks and had a car drive on it. He was pushing his car around and said there was a stop sign and it needed to stop.
And today, we had playdough "birthday cake" with a "candle" (plastic playdough knife) in it and had to sing Happy Birthday and blow out the candle 4 times; once for each person in our house. Each time we finished one family member he yelled that it was the next person's birthday. We sang Happy Birthday so much that when I put my 1 year old down for bed tonight he was actually singing all of the words; no small feat.
At bath time he was pouring "syrup" (bath water) on his "bamcakes" (that's how he says pancakes and it was really a washcloth).
Just one more massive milestone in this Autism challenge done. Check it off.
