Inappropriate Girl

Month: April 2011

  • The Gift of Autism

    It’s in the letting go of expectations that we find the freedom to truly be.

    The expectations. Oh, the plans I had for my kids. I’m not even sure what they were anymore. Time has a way of blurring our memories. That’s good, because reality has a way of changing our plans. It’s hard to be disappointed that things didn’t turn out the way you planned if you can’t remember what you planned in the first place.

    Our kids and their futures go from a concept to a fact faster than you ever realize it could happen. One minute you’re dreaming of having kids and the next they’re walking out the door, heading off to pursue their own plans. That’s just how life goes. As much as we try to control it, time has a mind of its own. So, too, do our children. So why does it come as a surprise that we can’t control them either?

    I’m not even going to get into the concept of controlling your teenagers. I don’t have one yet. Mine are 8, 10, and 12. Even at this young age they’ve proven that, as much as I’d like to control their destiny, I can only do so much. The rest is up to them.

    None of my kids has done so much to reinforce this concept as The Son. He was our second-born child and our first-born (and only) boy. So, boys. You probably have some sort of preconceived notion of how boys are supposed to be. Certainly we did. He’d be a rough-and-tumble type, play baseball or soccer, be a Boy Scout, and maybe someday join the armed forces. We nurtured those dreams for the first few years, but even then he seemed so different from other boys. Eventually we found out he that he hates sports, doesn’t like to participate in group activities, and doesn’t like being outdoors because there are bugs outside. We also found out that he has High-Functioning Autism and ADHD.

    Imagine taking all of your plans and expectations, and realizing that most of them are no longer an option. Military service is obviously out. We could force the sports issue, but he hates it. Why try to make the kid unhappy? He doesn’t like to spend much time with people, so Boy Scouts isn’t a great option either.

    What’s left? Him, just being himself, and us trying to figure out how to help him be the best person he can be. Instead of trying to get him to meet our expectations of what he should be, we’re helping him to be successful as himself – and oh, what a self he has. He’s more self-confident than most people I know. He’s content to let his freak flag fly. The other day, as I was picking him up from school, I noticed that he was wearing his ball cap on top of the hood of his jacket. It looked a little silly to me, so as he got in the car I mentioned to him that it was supposed to go on his head. He told me that he knew, but that’s the way he wanted to wear it. Good enough for me, but not good enough for his younger sister, who also remarked upon it when we picked her up at her school. He told her that he wore his hat that way because it looked weird and that’s the way he liked it. “Cool!” she said, in her typically enthusiastic way. It hit me then – her approach to him went from derogatory to celebratory just because he displayed some confidence in his approach to life. Why can’t we all be that brave and strong?

    Most fourth graders want to fit in. Mine’s ok with standing out and being his own person. I can attribute this directly to his autism. He honestly doesn’t care what other people think of him. He’s empathetic towards others, but he’s self-possessed enough to not really care about their feelings towards him.

    This gift of his has helped me be a better parent. I don’t try to make the kids be how I want them to be. I try to let them be the best person they can be.They only get one shot at their life. It should be theirs to live for themselves, not to live for what I want. If I don’t have expectations about how they will be, I’ll never be disappointed that they didn’t turn out that way. That’ll just leave me more time to love them for themselves, which is what a parent should do.

  • ‘Tis Ausm!

    Today is Autism Awareness Day.  In fact, April is Autism Awareness Month.  So much awareness directed toward something I can never quite forget.  You see, my son has Autism.  It is as much a part of him as his beautiful green eyes, wavy hair, fantastic sense of humor, and bright smile.  It’s not something I’d change about him, nor is it something I think he’d want to have changed.

    So many people are unhappy with the way they are.  They change their hair, makeup, body parts, clothing, anything, just to be happier with themselves, or to make others happy with them.  The Son, at 10, is one of the most self-confident, self-assured, and self-aware people I know.  This may change as he navigates his teenage years, but for now he’s comfortable with who he is.  He can articulate the intricacies of how autism affects his life, even if he doesn’t realize that autism causes them.  What a gift it is for him.  He’s comfortable being himself.  It’s others, including sometimes his father and I, who have the difficulty of accepting him the way he is.

    Being diagnosed with Autism means that the Son get a lot of services from the school.  He’s had an IEP since preschool.  No one has ever contested his diagnosis.  Indeed, his doctor once remarked that the Son was one of the kids the cleaning crew could diagnose.  One of the services he’s given is social skills training – teaching him how to get along with others in society.  I’ve often remarked that it’s those in the world around him who need the social skills training.  We can teach him how to deal with them, but they need to be able to deal with him.

    Take lunchtime, for example. The Son explained to me that he was trying to sit alone when some other kids wanted to sit with him.  He’s trying to decompress while they are trying to spend more time with him. He’s lucky – he’s quite funny and apparently well liked, but he has very little desire to have friends.  How can we figure out how to get him to spend more time with other people while at the same time get them to not spend too much time with him?  Such are the mysteries of Autism.

    He has it easier at home – we understand him here.  Still, we fight to get him to be more social overall.  That sometimes means accepting that he’s had enough, and other times encouraging him to spend just a bit more time with us.  We get him to have dinner with us at the table, but acknowledge that he has no interest in lingering long past mealtime to chat with others.  At the same time, we try to be available when he is feeling social.  The ride home from school is prime time for him – he’ll talk nearly non-stop during the pick-up time for his younger sister but then head to his room as soon as he gets home.  He needs that time for himself.  Other times he’ll come to us for a snuggle and a chat before announcing “end of conversation” and walking away.  He’s not trying to be rude, he’s just done with interacting and needs time to process.

    Those conversations, however brief, are fascinating.  The things that come out of his mouth are often heart-breaking or jaw-dropping.  He makes observations that most adults aren’t capable of.  Maybe all that lack of socializing gives his brain time to produce genious thoughts?  Of course, the conversations are also peppered with 10-year-old-boy-isms.  He does have some age-appropriate behaviors, even if he tends to express them in language that often sends us to the dictionary.

    We just need to finesse certain behaviors so he blends in with society a bit better.  At the same time, we need to realize that just because we have certain social needs, doesn’t mean his are the same.  He just has just a different way of doing things.  Not wrong, just different.  He is an like an anagram – same little boy like so many others, but put together a bit differently. Just like Autism = ‘Tis Ausm.  And he is, indeed, quite awesome.

  • I am the Anti Luddite

    I know, I know. The last time I posted, I declared that I’d blog more often.Yet here it is, three months later and I’m just now making a post.

    You see, I was taking a break from technology. That’s right – I made the very, very brave sacrifice of turning off all my electronics. I just wanted to get back to the way things used to be – no iPhones, email, text messages. While I was at it, I also stopped answering the phone and picking up my mail. If people didn’t want to talk to me in person or send letters by pony express, then I didn’t want that communication to intrude upon my precious time with my family.

    Right.

    Who am I kidding? If I were any more plugged in, I’d turn into a Cyberman. Thank goodness The Doctor will be around to save me, though, because I still have TV. No cable or satellite, true, but still – I have ample opportunities to view just about any program I wish, when I want to. That’s just the way I like it.  Entertainment should be at my fingertips on an on-demand basis (so should chocolate, but I digress). Sure, there’s other forms of entertainment out there, but why discount one format? There are many people who gleefully pat themselves on the back for not ever watching television. They’re also the ones who are missing out on countless learning opportunities. There are so many valuable programs on tv.  Refusing to watch them because of the medium doesn’t make you a better person. It just limits your horizons.

    Sure, you can argue that using electronics limits your horizons too. There is an opportunity cost to almost everything you do. The trick is to make your choice wisely. I could stop using Facebook and rely on traditional methods of contact, but why? Who is to say that in 10 years or so, Facebook won’t be considered a “traditional” method of communicating, much like the telephone is now? Using technology has only expanded my horizons. I am in touch with more people on a regular basis than I ever would be if I relied on using a telephone to talk to people. I hate talking on the telephone. Not to mention, telephones are the dreaded “technology” that people are complaining about – they just don’t think about it that way because it’s something they’re used to.

    Douglas Adams made this point quite eloquently in his essay, “How to Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Internet.” It’s all new and many of us don’t feel comfortable with it, so we shun it. Several people have shunned it to the tune of a book deal. Why?? What is the interest in ‘getting back to the way things used to be’? What is this ‘used to be’? I’m not the same person as I was when I was 10 – why would I want my technology to be the same?

    I’m teaching my children some of the recipes my grandmother made. That doesn’t mean we’re using the same methods. We have electric mixers, convection ovens, oven mitts that keep your hand from burning, ingredients that I can buy in reasonable quantities at almost any hour of the day. You don’t often hear people giving up that, do you? No, it’s just easier to meeble about how you gave up technology and …oh, was that the sound of those same people giving up their cars? Giving up their appliances? Washing their clothing by hand? No? If you’re going to “give up technology” then give it ALL up. Otherwise, stop complaining and embrace the changes in your life. You’ve changed and so has the world around you. It’s ok.

    Above all else, embrace moderation. You really don’t need your computer every moment of the day. Or your radio. Or the laundry. Or do you? Then maybe you should be in rehab or at a retreat, not writing your book.