Going back a bit today, before Phillip was tested
for autism. I didn't always have a positive outlook on this. In fact I was a
total mess trying to figure out what went wrong. I actually burst into tears in
front of my amazing doctor I was so run down and confused. The wondering if
people will treat him badly, or being blamed for how he was, and really just
not understanding how life was about to drastically change. Wondering if the judgment
would continue on what kind of mother I was and the judgment on my son I could
barely stand to think about.I had a moment shortly after that changed
everything. I don't know why it affected me so much but it did and I am very
glad.
A week before his testing we took a road trip to
Washington and not too far down the road we stopped at a McDonald's with a huge
play area for Phillip to burn off some energy. The play area had big twisty
tubes with a slide and a little room with rubber balls with a basketball style
setting. Phillip played but not like the other kids did. He refused to go into
the twisty tubes which could have been fear. I like to think it was logic, by
that I mean kids would climb in and not come out. You couldn't see more than 2
feet inside the tube before it became a total unknown. Maybe in the mind of
autism, that was just insane to risk.
Phillip
stuck to the room with the big rubber balls. We watched him carefully and he
would take a ball to the corner and bounce it over and over again. If he lost
the ball, he would grab another one and do the same thing. Stuck to the area he
chose for whatever reason just carefully bouncing that ball. Chaos all around
him with kids yelling, balls flying by his head, and in my mind I was actually
thinking...please do something normal!
There was another woman there with a child around
the same age and the difference in communication between Phillip and this
little boy was hard to watch. He was not even close to that kind of progress.
The mother would watch Phillip and glance over at us, with a look of pity.
Then the defining moment came. Her little guy shoved Phillip out of his way, not hard but mom saw him do it. Phillip dropped his ball totally oblivious to what just happened, grabbed another ball and continued bouncing. The mother told her son...” you need to keep your hands to yourself and show other people respect!"
Here is comes....the boy looked at his mom and
yelled back, "No, I can't and I don't want to!" mom told him he will
have to sit if he doesn't. He gave her a dirty look and continued running also
oblivious to what mom was telling him. Quickly I realized Phillip would never
do that. I really mean never, he just doesn't have that in him. So just like
that it became me watching her child and glancing at her. My first thought? Lady....you
have a real problem on your hands.
That is the moment for whatever reason my entire attitude changed towards autism. My pride was totally restored and I remembered even if someone doesn't have an autistic child, we all have parenting challenges to face.
That moment proved any judgment that was about come
pouring over us, was just simply hogwash.
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