We are only as impaired as we see ourselves!

  There are some words I don’t like when it comes to how general information describes autism. Impaired is one because I don’t feel or see that my child is impaired. He is extremely in tune with the world, so much so that he is unable to ignore it. His senses are so powerful that he sees and hears everything around him. As he has gotten older it has been easier for me to understand just how in tune he is and I even use it from time to time. Yesterday we were outside playing and while he was holding leaves up in the air so the light could show him the veins of the leaves I was sitting there trying once again to find a way to get him in the house without protest. Sometimes I use the bath time to manipulate him indoors but I like to find other tactics if it’s possible. I went in the house and put his favorite movie in at a normal volume and went back outside leaving the door wide open. He didn’t have to come right next to the door to hear it, but when he did he ran in to watch it. Amen, I was able to shut the door behind him and find a peaceful transition. That is not what I would call impairment at all because I couldn’t hear it and I was next to the door.

Another word or words I don’t like are birth defect.  I don’t see being born with a mind that doesn’t operate exactly like the general population as a defect at all. The definition of a defect is the general word for any kind of shortcoming or imperfection. If that’s the case we are all walking around with an undocumented case of birth defects. It is odd to me that because autism isn’t understood anyone would call it a defect. That is the society we live in isn’t it? If people don’t understand or are unwilling to understand on a personal level the person who carries the mystery must be the defective one.

            Disorder is another one that I could argue to the end of time. I can say because of the way my son processes information and operates through the day there is nothing disorderly about him. He is the definition of order sometimes because order eases him and if things don’t make sense he will focus as long as it takes to make sense of it, at least the little things. If we take him to a busy and crowded place he will focus on one thing at a time but eventually his desire to find order in everything around him becomes too much to organize in his mind. Yes, that inability to adjust to chaos is a disorder but we all have it to a point, it just doesn’t hit us until we leave and feel exhausted from it.

           Having ADD has given me the pleasure of living in constant disorder but my son’s autism has actually helped me overcome some of that because it forces me to create order. I personally love that his so called disorder has helped to balance my so called disorder. Somewhere in there we find order in each other!

           Whatever label this perfect and orderly society puts on us I can find humor in because if we believe every word we read we all have birth defects, we all have a disorder, and we are only as impaired as we see ourselves.