I saw such clarity in Owen’s eyes today. That doesn’t always happen. Some days no matter how hard I try he can’t process what I’m saying to him. However, his clarity means I was on my toes most of the day and on lack of sleep to boot. He was full of energy from the minute he woke up. His stimming was in full motion and I hadn’t seen him quite this active in a long time. He will watch the same parts of a video over and over and over again, miraculously able to go to the same spot almost every single time. He was watching the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and he was on sensory overload. You can’t derail the train either. I learned that lesson years ago. If he needs to process something it doesn’t matter what I do to distract him he will go right back to the same action when I’m done. Years ago he was doing about the same thing, watching a video over and over again, but instead of happy squeals, he was crying. I thought after thirty minutes I needed to find a way to stop him. I brought him to me looking at other videos with him, singing songs, and anything else I could think of. As soon as I stopped distracting him he went right back to the exact same spot on the video he was watching before. The same screams, tears, and emotions were being poured out again. He had to work through those emotions and then he moved on. Nothing I was going to do was going to change this. It took me a while to understand it all, but now I try to let his emotions run their course unless I know it’s leading to a meltdown, and then it’s a whole different agenda to try to get him to move forward. He screamed himself to sleep, happy squeals that seemed octaves higher than his normal voice. I prayed he would find calm and within a few moments, mid-scream, he was out. It takes me a while to calm down after a day full of his emotions. He wants me to follow all his leads, not play any noises on my phone, and he wants it all in his timing. But we had a good day. He’s growing, we are learning together, and I’m finding ways to have a middle ground for both of us. Never give up. Miracles happen every day. My miracle puts a smile on my face and a song in my heart. Make today matter. Smiles to all and donut daze!
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