I don't think that it is possible to actually be ready to hear that your child is autistic. While you might have started to accept that this diagnosis is a possibility for your family, hearing the words come from your child's doctor is still hard. Now imagine hearing those words about your 3 year old and then immediately also hearing the doctor ask that you bring your one year old baby in for an evaluation in a few months because while evaluating your older child, they also noticed some telling traits in your baby as well. Welcome to my autistic life! In an instant, we went from having one autistic kid to having two.
I grew up in a family of 5 with my younger sister being dyslexic. That was the most I knew about special education. My sister was diagnosed with dyslexia I think around ten years old, but my mom knew years prior that she had issues and needed help. However, my family doesn't communicate with each other, so the only thing I've ever known about dyslexia is that my sister sees letters backwards, and has trouble reading sometimes. I've never known anything else about it. She was enrolled in special education classes at school, and with the help of some amazing teachers she learned to overcome her disability, and went on to get good grades, and graduate from college with a teaching degree. I was never included in any family stuff, so I never had a part in helping my sister, or learning about her disability while growing up.
As a young adult, I got to know my extended family, and found out that several of my cousins are on the autistic spectrum. Again, I really never knew anything about it other than which cousins were autistic, and which also suffered from things like asbergers syndrome and ADHD. The most understanding I had about my cousins' disabilities is that they were super hyper and often seemed to be obnoxiously out of control. They were loud, in your face, running around all over the place, getting into everything, and often irritating to be around. Being so young and inexperienced, the only thing I knew was that I was bothered and thankful that they weren't my children. And stupid me, I hoped and prayed that I would never have autistic children of my own. Oops!!!
I'm sure being so selfish as to hope and pray about being spared an autistic child is exactly why I was given two of them. I always thought that autism is so hard to deal with, and that I could never be a decent parent to a special needs child. But surprise!!! I've become THAT parent!
My life revolves entirely around my autistic children. From the moment they wake up every morning, until I finally pass out from exhaustion sometime after midnight (usually between 1 and 3am), my entire day is spent chasing after and taking care of my kids. Having a two and a five year old is never easy, but when you throw in an autism diagnosis (or in my case two), it really takes things to a whole new level. Nothing about our life is easy. And honestly, sometimes it really feels like my kids take the phrase "go big or go home" to the extreme.
Each autistic person is so different, and can fall anywhere on the large spectrum that is ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder). Each person can be similar to others or completely different. No case is the same. And go figure, my kids are polar opposites. What works for one of them, can't possibly work for the other. Other than the fact that my kids are both autistic and look a lot like their father, that is where the similarities end. Each of my kids like and hate completely different things. While my son loves macaroni and cheese, as well as peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, my daughter won't touch them. She would rather eat chicken nuggets and goldfish. If you dare try to give either kid something that they don't like, but their sibling does, it will result in the world coming to a screeching halt, and imploding all around them. Life as they know it will cease to exist, and it'll all be because you tried to give them the "wrong" food to eat. It all seems completely ridiculous, and a lot of the time I feel like I am raising the most spoiled, self centered children on the planet. But at the end of the day, deep down I know that I can't blame myself, because this is autism, and I am doing the best that I can.
My kids have no idea what they want most of the time, and couldn't tell me even if they did. They have no idea what is going on inside their heads. They just know that something is telling them that they need one specific thing, and until that need is satisfied, life as all of us know it, is completely over. And even when they get the one thing that they've been demanding for who knows how long, within seconds, their needs can change to something completely different. One minute my son might be throwing a tantrum wanting some juice, but as soon as you hand him a cup of juice, he'll set it down, completely forgetting all about it and start demanding something entirely different, like his tablet. The full cup of juice sitting on the table in the middle of the living room will have been completely abandoned, and the next obsession has completely taken over our lives. It might seem crazy, but sometimes when my kids start whinging and incessantly begging for something, I'll purposely ignore them, making them wait several minutes before I finally respond to whatever it is that they want, just to see if their mind changes. Sometimes, waiting them out will work, and I'll completely avoid having to respond to two different demands. But then again, there are times when my evil little plan will backfire, and they end up having 3 completely different back to back demands. There is never any way to tell if they will be changing their minds, so you just have to roll with the punches.
Even though our days are completely ruled by autism, no day is the same as any others. You can plan and prepare all you want, but in the end, nothing is going to go according to your plan, and you'll just have to deal with it. I've been living the autistic life for the last two years, and every day I have to be reminded that everything is going to be OK, and I just need to breathe, and keep going. My two year old may be tormenting my dog and making me want to rip my hair out, while my five year old is running around the house terrorizing his sister and making messes out of everything in sight while I try to make them some lunch, all while fantasizing about how amazing a nap would feel right at that moment. Life gets extremely hectic and chaotic, but I know that I just need to hang in there, and keep breathing, and just maybe, in the very near future, I'll get a much needed nap.
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