Bursts of Hope Part 3: Tim's Story - Home Care InSight Magazine

Most people sit down with a puzzle by first looking at the box and then building the edge pieces. Tim just dives right in, clicking pieces together without a visual aid.

Tim Lechner, 30, is full of surprises. His mother and caregiver, Denese Wallace, says surprises happen in small moments like recently when she found him drumming the beat to rock music for the very first time. Or the way Tim wakes up every morning in the home in Everett with a grin on his face.

Although Tim has never been formally diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Denese believes many of his behaviors indicate he is autistic. As the caregiver, she has learned how to interact with his behaviors, such as throwing fits and repetitively asking questions.

Tim also works at Grocery Outlet handling recycling and cleanup. A job coach helps keep him on track and watches out for his safety.

Q&A with Tim Lechner

Tim, what do you like best about your job at Grocery Outlet?

Clean the parking lot.

What are your hobbies?

Puzzles and collecting wrestling (items from) WWE.

What kind of things do you like to do?

I like going to the movies.

Do you like to go to Full Life?

Yes.

Who are your friends?

Casey (co-worker).

What is your favorite thing to do there?

Meet my friends and walking club and when they do plays

Q&A with Denese Wallace, Tim’s mother

What kind of autistic behaviors does Tim have?

He has repetitive behaviors. He talks nonstop, saying the same thing over and over. Tim must also put things in order. When he was little, he had to line up his cars in a certain way and he rearranges stuff in stores when it is out of place. He gets stuck on that and cannot move on until it is in order. One time we were on the bus and he had to align the bus book exactly right before we could get off the bus.

Why do you think he was not diagnosed when he was younger?

I don’t think they diagnosed the milder cases of autism back then. When he was 2 years old, I thought he acted like a regular 2-year-old and the fit throwing wasn’t abnormal. It wasn’t until he was about 7 and still throwing fits that I thought we needed some help.

Back then, the doctors said he probably wasn’t autistic because he had language and they told me people with autism don’t have language. They told me people with autism sit, stare, and rock and Tim didn’t do that. We did seek help from medication which calmed him down a lot. I quit trying to find a label for him and I just try to do whatever I need to do to make his life better.

What is Tim like now?

The best way I can describe him is he has scatters of intelligence, which scatter into the higher ranges. He has a lot of trouble with expressive language. When something is bothering him he can’t always find the words to tell me about it.

When he goes to bed he repeats the same things every night. He says, “Don’t miss my bus, not wake you up, clock wakes me up.” We have told him the clock wakes him up and then he can wake us up. Otherwise he wakes us up in the middle of the night to ask if it is time to get up.

Denese Wallace, Tim’s mother, prepares an inhaler. (Photo by Paul Joseph Brown)

What are his fits like?

He screams and yells and cusses. Sometimes it takes so much of my attention, especially if I’m trying to go somewhere I often don’t get to go. I need to deal with the situation and I want to deal with that behavior at home. I’ve had to leave places before when he’s having a fit.

How do you handle the fits he throws?

When he was younger I would hug him against me in safe way, but he is too big to do that now. And I don’t know if it was that effective anyway. The hard thing about his outbursts is he is not a little 2-year-old throwing a fit. He is a big guy and he has hurt people.

I don’t think he means to and he is very apologetic when the outburst is over. Once when he was upset he threw one of his trucks through his window. I try to stop it before it gets that far.

Now I can handle the outbursts better and I try to give him choices. I also have to word his choices very carefully so he won’t be overwhelmed.

Has he ever had a bad reaction to medication?

Yes. One behavior medication caused him to be out of his head for two days. He was hitting people and yelling at everyone. He was so upset I couldn’t calm him down. I took him to the mental health counselor and he tried hitting the counselor. The counselor wouldn’t deal with him and told me not to bring him there again when he was like that. So I had to figure out what was causing the problem by myself. I figured out that it was the medications. I took him off that med and those problems stopped.

Denese Wallace, right, inspects her son’s arm, Tim, left. (Photo by Paul Joseph Brown)

What strategies have you figured out that work for Tim?

I’ve found having structure, along with daily routines and medication have greatly reduced his challenging behaviors all around.

How do you take care of yourself?

It’s important for me to just get away from everything for a bit. Thank goodness for [home care agency] Full Life. They have trained people there as well as a nurse, so if something happened trained people can take care of it. When he is at Full Life I get to have a break and not worry about him. I can do something for myself, schedule a doctor’s appointment, get a haircut, or just take a nap.

What is some advice you would give other parent providers?

It’s a lot different when you are a caregiving mom. Your adult children aren’t doing a lot of stuff by themselves. I think a lot of the time we don’t think there are outside people who can take care of our children as well as we can. It’s true that there are not a lot of people to provide respite for us but there are people who can do it if you ask and it’s important to get away.