My Talismans

I’ve been wondering what every one says to their God (or themselves if they see fit) what they think about their lives, their lives with their children? What do you really say (or think)? Do you wish your lives were different? How many of you are satisfied with the way things are? When the going gets tough, do wish it could be easier?

Why is their so much irony in everything?

Adam lashed out at me yesterday for the first real time. He has experienced frustration in the past, some “obsessive interests,” for sure. Yesterday, in the midst of excitement and then going to the potty, he just lunged at me and pulled my hair. I put him on the soft bed and said no. I said no about three times. He rolled around and cried, but looked at me the entire time. I sat on the bed and held him, telling him to calm down. He did after a while, but certainly, the “upset” stuck, and remembering it just set him off a little again – on and off for about an hour.

Again, this morning while making eggs, he grew impatient and grabbed my new and adored love handles (hey, I just started training again). There was clear frustration on his face – all tensed up and red. I told him that I couldn’t cook them any faster, and held him as we counted to ten with some deep breathing. I’m hoping that maybe he will start counting to ten on his own one day, to help him self-regulate.

With the parallel experience of some profound advances in Adam, and some unbelievable skills, I am finding that his emotions don’t follow suit. My thoughts on the matter are this: I want to show him that I care, that I understand (or at least think I do) his frustrations, while teaching that aggression isn’t acceptable and by giving him tools to enable his success with all kinds of skills, including communication. If we can provide him with tools to be successful -- and I define success in an indigenous way, not always contingent on outside definitions, then perhaps I am filling a gap for him. I like to call it building bridges (a title of a book by O.T. Ellen Yack), that allows us to travel between both our worlds, sometimes allowing us to meet in the middle.

But for now, he is becoming so frustrated. He is having difficulty with unstructured time, which occurs at the end of the day. He wants so badly to communicate – he is typing every day on the computer – the animals he sees on the videos is one thing he does on it and together we are learning about the seasons on the computer as well as labelling actions. When I acknowledge what he writes with a song or some script, he is so delighted that I “get it.” In some ways, I hope that he understands his power and that I do “get it,” even if I feel clumsy in how I help in through this phase of his life. Perhaps that's how we all feel as parents -- clumsy, uncertain and in need of support that not pities us at the expense of our children, but that educates us to at least feel we are helping them the best way we can -- to morally support us, and accept us as the blubbering dimwits we sometimes are. In terms of parenting, for me, the goal is to understand Adam during the chaos of a tantrum, or the obsessive wandering up and down the stairs. During these so-called "obsessive" episodes, is he Gutstein's confused child, or Tito's child in need of gravitational pull? Indeed, the most terrible feeling of all for a parent, is the feeling of helplessness. There are times, in autism, when a parent feels such a disconnect between making a child happy, teaching a child through the tougher phases of life, discipline which tends to get wrapped up in the terms "weakness" and "deficit." The tendency is to look at the latter without remembering that our little ones need guidance just like any other child, but delivered differently.

So what do I ask the God I am still not certain exists, but seem to question a lot? I ask a lot of why questions, but most often I ask him how do I be the best parent for Adam? What should I do? How do I do it? (Please don't write ABA in the comments section -- I'm for finding effective ways to educate and teach and ABA is a term that means many different things to different people).

Life’s questions seem to all boil down to Adam’s joy, his contentment, his ability to do the things he wants. It feels that so much is riding upon my shoulders and it is those days I need to take a deep breath and count to ten myself. Practise what you preach, right? It seems that Adam’s life is built on the decisions I make today, and in the autism world, those decisions can feel heavy. Trial, error, thought, personal research, and time seem to be my most effective talismans. With every hurdle, there is a joy. With every sunset there is a dawn.