Keeping up is easy! It's the thinking that is exhausting.

               We have become very restless around here and by 8:30am my little man is following me around with clothes and a sweet little “we should go” that comes out muffled but still comes out. So today I decided to take him to the mall because he likes it there no matter how much I don’t. There is a funny thing that happens when we are out in public and especially in a big place like the mall. My verbal reminders and guidance almost never stops. Right along with some physical guidance to get him pointed in the right direction if he is too focused on something.

                We walked about half way down the mall and the entire time I am saying his name to keep him close. I am consistently physically moving him out of people’s way because for one people can be rude and don’t move and for two he is completely unaware he can run into people or get ran over by people. I repeat his name over and over and use my hands to gesture him in the right direction and let me tell you this is more exhausting than one might think. Exhausting because I always have to think and keep him moving along safely. Most of the time he does not look forward and while he is moving quickly his eyes are moving all around, often still looking at something that he has passed by. I have to tell him to look out or look up all of the time and I end up acting as the part of his mind that is not doing what he needs it to do.

                Quick trip to the mall doesn’t sound so challenging doing this but this is something I do a lot. Nearly everywhere we go that is big, busy, or new I become the other part of his mind. The part that sees what he does not and tries to keep him directed. At the same time I need to do my own thinking if I can and by the time we leave, that may or may not be a peaceful goodbye, I am mentally drained. Today was not a peaceful goodbye because I turned my head for one second to look at a shirt and he took off. Once I caught him we had to leave the store because his goal was to investigate the dressing room. Not a good thing for the ladies trying on clothes and I had no choice but to pick him up and physically remove him, with a man sitting watching and giggling at his desire to crawl under the doors. That funny man probably thought he was just being a boy but what he really after were the mirrors in the rooms. That was when I had a screaming boy half my size and thankfully the van was not far away.

                He didn’t care about the ladies in the rooms in fact he may not have even noticed them because the mirrors where his main objective and right along with being autistic, he is as stubborn. Once we reach the van and I have him secured in his seat that is when I get to shut my brain off for a moment. Before I start to drive of course but it’s the moment I don’t have to think for two of us and I get a quick break. It’s not always this way because places he can run or places he is very familiar with I can relax although there are very few places like this. Home and my parent’s house are safety zones but even a crowded park without a simple fence that stops him from wandering, keeps me thinking for the part of him that hasn’t come yet. The challenge of keep up with him is not just following or trying to understand him, it is a full time mental work out. I am doing this so much it can be hard to shut my mind down at the end of the day. All kids go through this faze and parents are on guard teaching a child how to gage the world around them but the difference is for an autism parent this is not just a faze or part of the toddler years that passes quickly. This is constant and in many cases it doesn’t pass at all.