Wednesday, June 24, 2015

My Crazy Little Road Map

As with most things in life when you plan and hope and dream and wish for things to go one direction, they inevitably go the opposite direction.  Whether you want your little girl to have long hair and she chops the curls off or you want to be a successful career person and end up a stay at home mom.  And no matter how many times these directional changes occur we, as humans, don't like it.

There really are only a few ways to deal with these surprises in life.  We can sit down and stick our fingers in our ears and go "lalalalala" and refuse to accept it.  We can fight it to the point that we look foolish and tire ourselves out.  Or we can let the wind blow us along with it all.  You can even have a little pity party first, because we are still human and that happens too.  And doing all three are definitely an option as well.

One of the hardest things that I have one of these back and forth relationships with is B's autism.  I never thought it would be a thing I would love, but I do.  We definitely began the journey with our fingers in our ears sort of saying, "well yeah he has autism, but we will FIX it."  The next step was us fighting it.  Trying everything in our power to make him catch up.  We could not be patient and let things transform as they would, we needed him to be "better" now.  It was what was best for us.  But time and time again I go back to the third option.

I definitely sit and have a pity party.  Sometimes alone, sometimes in public, and sometimes with good friends to remind me why we do these things.  And then I remember we aren't trying to change that quirky little man.  Sure I want these things that all parents want for their kids, but I need reminders that our path isn't like everyone else's.  No matter what I try to do to make it so it isn't going to change.   So I come to the wind.

This isn't to say we aren't still working in therapies and trying to give him what he needs to be successful.  We still do these things.  But when we try to do things, most recently VBS at church, I have to step outside of that invisible box and figure out how to help him gain from the experience.  I also have to mourn a bit, and accept that this is okay too.

Not mourn that my child is the way he is.  Albeit exhausting, I like him ALL the time.  The other two are just as, if not more, exhausting as him.  But in my mind is the times I had as a kid at VBS and all the memories I made.  Memories that I had hoped my kids would make.   And memories that he won't make.  But not because he is miserable, or that his memories are going to be less than mine and those I wanted for him.  But different memories.  And different is okay.  And different is good.  And different can make me happy too.

Because in the end when you have kids you get off of your road and onto theirs.  I may have two straight roads and one that twists and winds and climbs hills and mountains(let's be honest neither girls' road is THAT straight anyways) but how boring is a straight road anyways.

No comments:

Post a Comment