Recently, Lukas started asking more questions. We ended our program in May 2002. The last 8 months of our program only consisted of two tutors and most of it was community outings and play dates. We haven’t had any tutors since.

Our recent conversation went like this:

The scene: I was working on the computer. Lukas was playing Legos. He remembered something that a tutor said to him once and he told me… and then suddenly…

Lukas, “mom?”

Me: “yeah?”

Lukas, “Did you know the tutors?”

Me: “huh?”

Lukas, “I mean , did you know the tutors before they came here?”

Me, “huh?”

Lukas, “I mean… how did they get here? Did you know them and then they came here?”

Me (finally clueing into what Lukas was driving out.. He wanted to know how the tutors came into our lives and where they came from) : “yeah. I met them and decided to hire them first.”

Lukas, “oh.”

He then went off to play Galidore on the computer.

In some ways, I am relieved that we always referred to our ABA therapists as “tutors”. While the title didn’t help with their credibility with the school district, it has helped in terms of helping Lukas slowly understand what his life was like. The term therapists tends to give a connotation of having a disease or mental condition. Tutor implies a weakness in a subject area. Since we are slowly approaching the subject with Lukas, we have started with the idea that he was a late talker and needed extra help learning to speak like some children need extra help learning to read. Since two of his 1^st grade buddies were pulled from class for “reading recovery”, we used this as an example of how we all have weak areas and need extra help. I think that Lukas has accepted the idea that he needed tutors but he was still wondering how and why they came.

Hopefully, over the next three years or so, we will slowly explain various aspects of ABA and his disorder to him.