I bet you figured out Ronan’s responses were the ones that are italicized.  I do love that he was consistent – not just with his request but with the use of lowercase letters.  I will type quick, informal notes to close friends and family in lowercase as well.  I also love that Ronan quickly corrected the word like all by himself.  I’m curious why he chose to type my instead of I though.  He’s correctly used I for many, many years with his signs, while typing and when he attempts to speak (it comes out /ah/ for I).    

it's 10:34. time to go back to bed. 

mom mylikeipad

sorry, bud. you can have it tomorrow. 

mom my like ipad

I was hoping Ronan would tell me something else that night, but he stayed laser focused on one thing - that ipad.  It took some convincing, but I eventually got him to return to his room and go to bed.  

The next night, Ronan again came to my room.   

Ronan, what do you want? It’s late again. It’s 10:29 pm.

mom my donuts 

you want a donut?

mom yes

Are you hungry?

hungry yes

Okay, thank you for telling me.

as yes

If one of my other kids came in that late at night asking for a donut, I wouldn't have been so accommodating.  But Ronan gets a free pass - and some yummy donuts (which are actually gluten-free donut holes from Katz).

We tiptoed downstairs because of how late it was.  Ronan watched me take four small donut holes out of the freezer, place them in a bowl and heat them up in the toaster oven.  Five minutes later, Ronan heard the toaster oven ding.  I looked at Ronan.  He looked at me.  So as to continue the typed conversation we'd started, I asked...

Are your donuts ready? 

mom ready

Okay 

hungry eat

It may not be very detailed, but Ronan's late-night messages were pretty clear.  Telegraphic speech, or telegraphic communication in this case, gave him the chance to tell me exactly what he wanted.  As tired as I was the next night, I was hoping Ronan would again come to my room and tell me something else.  He didn't.  Instead of another late night, Ronan was up the next morning at 5:48am.  He tends to sleep later than the rest of us do, so it was rather painful for me to be woken up that early.  Ronan was not interested in typing that morning, so we just started our breakfast routine, 3 hours ahead of his usual schedule.  By nightfall, Ronan was pretty exhausted.  I could only get one short request from him, and this one only after lots of prompting. 

mom play eat sleep

Ronan had been playing on the Switch before sitting on the couch with the siblings.  Since it was Friday night, the big kids had gathered in the den to watch a movie.  Movie night turns into raid the kitchen night, to include raiding both the snack cabinet and the refrigerator.  While they were having a grand time back on the couch, they forget to keep an eye on the kitchen.  Ronan went in after them looking for his donuts (the last of the donut holes).  He really wanted them.  But he knew he’d need help heating them up, so he found me in the office where I was catching up on some paperwork. 

I greeted him as he sat down on the piano bench.

“Hi, Rone.”

He didn’t want to type so he signed instead.  

hungry...hungry

"Oh, bud.  Of course.  Let's get some cereal."  

no...hungry

Ronan stood up, so I followed him.  He loves cereal, but he wanted something else.  Leading me into the kitchen, I saw that he, too, had joined the raid.  The freezer door was wide open. 

"OH!  The donuts?"

YES

It's fun to see the emotion in the simple signs Ronan uses.  His signed YES was just the happiest yes.  He had already started to get tired, but he really wanted to have that snack with the kids.  While I warmed up the donut holes, Ronan watched me.  The movie was blaring just behind us, but he concentrated so quietly on what I was doing.  Besides those late-night typing chats, it had been awhile since Ronan wanted to say something.  I love that he picked me to help him.  Had I shooed him away any of those times he came to me, we both would’ve lost out.  We’d have lost out on effective communication encounters.  And we would’ve missed moments that filled his belly with a few donut holes and ones that filled my heart with simple joy.   

Cathy Jameson is a Contributing Editor for Age of Autism.