Categories: general-stuff
Date: 15 March 2009 08:23:36
OK so regular readers (hey mum and Ian and others :) ) will know that son boy is autistic. Depending on the day it's either severe (non-understanding and head hitting) or... well, I was about to say mild, but that's not necessarily the word... Cope-able. Some days we feel like we've survived, others we feel like we've been hit by a hurricane.
Sometimes it's a complete downer and yesterday I had one of those moments. Standing at a bus stop watching others watch him as he sat and played with his new toys that he'd saved for in the way that he plays... I must admit I as standing there feel quite demoralised and wondering if I'd be standing in the same place in ten years using the same coping strategies watching people watch and judge us.
Fast forward to today and maybe the answer is there and it's not the one I expected. Being autistic means (and this is a generalisation - it's a lot of things) that there's a lot of routine and a lot of cause and effect. Sometimes it helps: son boy ran through stinging nettles once and I kissed it better and said it was and then stopped crying and went back to normal, looking down at the stings with a questioning look every so often. (I didn't say all better with that in mind natch, was just surprised at the result).
It also means that, for the past five years, he's woken up at 4 or so, come into our room at 6 and that's when the day starts, noisily and without slowing down. He'll jump on one of our heads until we get up and get him breakfast which, with the occasional deviation, is always the same thing and works around his trigger colours (in face we realised recently that everything he eats, especially his favourites, are based around his trigger colours: duh, THAT only took us three or so years to work out).
And then, today, he surprised us. I mean full on, out and out mouth open surprise. Still came in early but, this time, closer to 7. We woke up groggily - a little lay in will do that to you - and he said the normal questions: do you like this, do you like that... After a half hour or so we said: daddies turn to make breakfast (I didn't even wake up at all yesterday after the filming of the school show) and he replied, in a very off the cuff remark, that he'd already had it.
Cue brakes slam on, tires screeching, mouths open. Whu de Whu?
He made his breakfast, still, from the state of the kitchen table, very much to the rules he lives by and I'd be surprised if the order deviated at all... But he made his breakfast, on his own, because he wanted to...
Maybe I won't be standing at that bus stop in ten years time... Who knows. But breakfast in bed was a lovely surprise.