Raising a Child (and a New Generation) with Autism
When asked about the challenges of being a mom to a child with special needs, the first thing that comes to mind is that there is not enough time. Not enough time to laugh, to cry, to teach, to learn, to work, to play. You see, my son Jake is 16, and at 6’2” he seems so capable; he is handsome, intelligent, humorous, loving, and yet he is absolutely not ready to become an adult in 14 months.
Jake is on the autism spectrum. And even now, after years of struggling to form apologies and presentations of the “bright side”, it is still difficult to explain precisely what that means. With the surge of autism awareness in the media, many realize that autism is a spectrum, but what many do not realize is that each person on the spectrum is a kaleidoscope unto their own.
There are vast challenges, not the least of which are schooling and behavior modification. However the biggest challenge by far is not necessarily Jake’s problems fitting into society, but rather society’s problem allowing him to fit in. The daily hurdles in deciding if and when we can take an outing and where we will go and how many people will be there and how much anxiety this might cause is a high-wire algorithm, a decision-making process that vibrates at such a high frequency that it can only be described as a mother’s instinct to protect her young.
It is lonely in our world. Not many welcome Jake into their homes because he can be emotional and because I am “not as fun” when I am looking after him. Along with invitations that ceased were flat-out boycotts where I was told that Jake was not allowed. Of course I was welcome, but only without my child.
Has this been difficult for me? Sure. But even more difficult is his query, “How come I don’t have friends?” Indeed, it is problematic to schedule play-dates with Jake’s classmates because often they do not return messages and being that the apple does not fall far from the autism tree, neither do their parents.
There was a time when I might have written about the incredible The Shriver Report – Raising a Child (and a New Generation) with Autism: