Eni was born in 1987 and it was in 1990 that I first noticed something wrong with my child. He never talked. He made the baby noises and all but right after he got the MMR shots, he stopped every noise. His behavior changed, he was mute and pointed to things he wanted. I was devastated and my partner and I would have so many arguments on how to discipline him especially when he would have tantrums and throw things all over the house. My partner would want to spank and I would refuse. There was something much more happening to Eni we didn't know. I had just graduated from Pharmacy school in 1988 and it seriously affected my job as babysitters would decline to take him citing the other kid's safety and other crappy excuses. I would get calls at work to come and pick up my child in SCHOOL! Some of the schools could not even manage them in those days. I would constantly fight with the schools who would end up calling social services who in turn take my son away into foster care for extended periods citing that I am mentally frustrated and it could harm him.
I would spend thousands of dollars to hire lawyers to get my son back. I was fired at my first job in pharmacy after 6 months because I had to leave so many times to get my son. How does a Pharmacist leave in the middle of filling prescritions? You had to close up till the relief pharmacist arrives. One day, my boss said to me "I realize what you are going thru with your son....we all have families and families come first. Go take care of him. We'll call you if we need you".....That was 1990. They haven't called me till today in 2007. I was let go! I later kept my next pharmacy job for 16 years at CVS who acomodated me well. Meanwhile they were 12 hour days so that I could only work 3 days a week making 36 hours. I hired Ms Pat an old black woman to come and sit in my home with Eni after school.
I decided to go for a less stressful career and I registered in the Broadcasting Institute of Maryland as a News Major as well as Goucher College school of Public Relations for PR. People thought I was stupid taking up a double major. I would go to school every night while Ms Pat watched Eni and his brother Oyin. Broadcasting gave me the flexibility I needed and that explains all my freelance work on this blog. It was just to pay the bills and take care of my son. At one point, the social services did not take my son away any more, but they took his brothers. Eni would kick, bite and beat me and his siblings. The Baltimore County police accused the social services of completely ignoring "this woman's needs" and Officer Clay Benton and Darryl Kelly went to court screaming at the caseworkers in the courtroom in my pursuit of getting my younger sons back. The Judge was so confused. Judge Bollinger knew NOTHING about autism. Officer Benton was the father of an autistic boy Connor which nobody knew on that court day. Also present was Kimberly Curtis of the Autism society of America who testified for me. Her husband Kenny Curtis was a local celebrity and local Fox-45 kids TV personality who had an autistic kid too. Ken's now at XM Kids radio. After 15 years of hell, I got KJ and Oyin back. I went thru many parental classes and absurd case plans. The U.S system can so much destroy you, there are limited or no services in some states. Some states are better for older autistics, some for younger. This explains my moving around. 6 years in Philadelphia (My pharmacy college days), 15 years in Baltimore and 3 years in Atlanta.
Things got worse in Georgia. KJ was taken away again for safety reasons as Eni was constantly agitated when he heard loud noises. When you yell at him, he would go nuts. Eni eventually went to a residential institution for a year and I got KJ back after 2 Years in foster care. 2 YEARS! They purposely suffered me thru several ridiculous case plans and racism played a big part there in the deep south. I started a movement against Georgia Social Services and headed to the State House and United States Congress to testify about how the state destroy autistic families. The US Congressional team imposed a $130,000 fine on Georgia for mismanaging federal money (stashing children wrongly taken away in foster care) and destroying families. Many families came out after seeing my story on several local news channels and story after story came out.
Members of the Georgia State Senate said they did not know many of us had our kids taken away or their siblings. I changed the laws. I made a difference in the society, something I said last week at the parents forum in Toronto for parents of disabled adults. Don't wait for Tory and McGuinty, do what you have to do FOR YOUR CHILD! We are getting older and still have to remember who will care for them when we become elderly? In my time spent in the U.S, I spent $85,345 on attorney fees constantly battling the system to let my family be a family. Eni was mute till 9 years old when he finally talked. He ended up in Special Education till he got to high school in Georgia. Autistic people do not relate well with others but because he was so cute (LOL), the girls embraced him and all his friends are female. Eni only has one male friend "Junior." The autism factor of communicating and relating to others plays a significant role here. He does not relate to young adult males at all! After 23 years we left the U.S and returned to Nigeria in January 2006. I literarily had to protect my own children from their own government.
I began working at Radio Nigeria and someone at the Canadian embassy told me about Canada and services for older autistic people. Eni really had nothing back home and his frustration levels got worse. After contacting agencies like JVS Toronto, Community Living Toronto, Ontario Disability Support Program, I got Eni into his own independent shelter, where he cooks his own meals, goes to job training daily and is preparing to get his first job in Canada. He has only worked in McDonalds in the States cleaning tables and taking trash out but he wants more.....more specialized skilled good paying jobs and that is why JVS is there for him. We arrived in Toronto June 6th 2007 and only for me to see two politicians battling about Autism on TV. John Tory says Dalton Mcguinty failed in his promise to parents of autistic children. Parents must look into what is best for THEIR OWN children. My story is worse than I have here but the rest belongs in a BOOK. I want to write about it but time is the problem. In my leaving full time jobs in 2004, I decided to take on this fangled thing called the world wide web and set up a home office reading and writing articles freelancing and finally started Keminications in Atlanta. I would breeze thru TV and radio channels and listen to all kinds on media news and gossip as well as read endless magazines, blogs and links on the web and Keminications was born. Look at all the links I bring you daily. It takes time to read and do my story selection. I sold ads on the site, made a living and found my own niche. Though I'm not selling ads yet on this Canadian version, I want to use this site to network with other media professionals and the public. I want people to enjoy coming here daily!
Lastly autistic individuals can do extraordinary things we may not be able to do as a result of the side of the brain that's too fast. Eni cannot tie shoes, so all his shoes are velcro. His fine motor function is delayed. It can take him 2 hours to put a pillowcase in a pillow and he cannot button a winter coat properly....BUT, he can program MS DOS which most of us can't. Some kids don't even know that operating system and were born in the "Windows XP" era. He can master 50-100 phone numbers and tell you over and over. He is OBSESSED with transit systems and has mastered transit systems all over the WORLD. London's Tube, MARTA-Atlanta, MTA-Maryland, SEPTA-Philadelphia and TTC-Toronto. Eni can tell you how to get from point A to B in Toronto. He can tell you how to get from point A to B in Chicago without ever being to Chicago before. He wants to work for the TTC, washing buses and trains. In Baltimore, he would ride around the buses all day and when he gets to the last stop, he will take a bag and pick up all the trash in the bus and give the bag to the drivers who would tell him..."you didn't have to but thanks." He is addicted to cleaning too! He played all the early video games in the 90's to the END! When you get to the end of a video game, do you know that the company gives you your money back? I collected so much money from Sega, Nintendo and Sony. It's like getting the games for free! The folks at JVS have put the TTC in mind when job placement begins for Eni. Canada has done a lot for me and Eni. My 16 year old Oyin is still in America with his dad attending high school as we want him to finish there. He is an aspiring movie director and his works have been published on the American Film Institute's website. His friends on MySpace are Spike Lee, Sean Penn, Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Frances Ford Coppola and more. Oyin wants to attend a Toronto Film school and was watching all the TIFF activities closely but most importantly wants to be closer to Eni.
Eni is finally settled and KJ is in elementary school and on this blog constantly. It has affected his siblings, imagine the 2 years KJ lived with strangers. The foster mom was discovered to be a 3-time convicted felon in New York and was working for the State of Georgia as a foster mom. She was caught shoplifting with my kid in tow...IMAGINE! The racist caseworker Susan Winter said..."We can't use that against her." I lashed out and finally he was moved to another foster home. Winter was eventually fired! I am hoping to get my Canadian Pharmacist license soon and also find a part time reporter gig doing any beat in Print, On-air or Editorial. If you know any media houses or organization that would like me to come and speak about raising an older autistic child or want to do a special, I would be glad. Celebrities all over America are now bringing out the plight. The doctor on the show last night with Larry King treats Jenny's son and he has an autistic child too. My last attorney in the States asked me if he could use my case as a case study and I replied YES! He told me how the media is now focusing more on Autism since I left. You have to help other Canadians get the services they deserve. Above is a 2003 picture with my sons, Eni, Oyin and KJ now 20+, 15+ and 6+ almost all 21, 16 and 7 in November 2007. Also Eni at his first job, McDonalds in the States and at church with me. More on Eni's personality profile below. DON'T FORGET TO VISIT MY AUTISM BLOG ON SWIMMING SAFETY! Canada has done a lot for my son in only 4 months! Thank you Canada! My life is back!!!!!
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