A letter to my son with autism

Hey Timothy, its Mom here.

Its September 13, 2014 and as I type you bounce beside me; your eyes filled with a joy only you can understand.  You are six years old.  You like pizza, jelly donuts (only the red jam) and Batman.

Tricia Rhynold's photo.

 

You seem happy today.  This makes my heart full and warm.  When you smile you make everyone around you smile!  The days when you are so full of angst and distress are so much more painful and hard to watch.   I know you don’t mean to hurt me when you strike out in anger.  What makes you feel that way? I have always wanted to know so I could make it stop.  Its my job as your Mommy to protect you and keep you from hurting.  But you can’t tell me.  No one can.  We can only guess through pictures and trial and error.  Some days, magic happens and you shout out new words.  Often you’re not quite sure what they mean or they are said in the wrong context, but you are trying hard! 

I know that life isn’t easy for you.  Many of your peers seem miles ahead of you.  While you are toilet training and learning to dress and feed yourself; they are playing competitive sports and video games.

While you are learning to tolerate having others in your personal space they are wrestling with each other, but not with girls~eeeeeew!  Most six year old boys think girls have cooties (little invisible bugs)  while you are learning to discern between girls and boys.

You tried a new food this year which puts us into the double digits of foods you will eat.  Rice crispie squares!  Aren’t they good?!  I hope you will continue your brave quest through the food jungle, just like Batman would.  He is one of your favorite super heros right now.

Mostly I just want you to know you belong to a family who love you very much.  I bet all of the therapies you have to go through are tough and you don’t like me very much for making you do them.  Timothy, we are doing this because we hope they will help you to communicate with us better.  Think of Batman. Autism has sort of put an invisible force field around you and you are trapped inside.  You need to keep being strong like Batman and try to figure a way out of this force field. 

You may not be able to.  That is ok.  We will figure it out together.

Love always and no matter what,

Mom.

HEART

tHe BoOk Of TiMoThY

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