Owen slept. He slept all night. But he didn’t exactly wake up in a good mood though. He warmed up as the morning went on but he wanted me to sit. The cool thing though he wanted to sit with me. I think partly he wanted to make sure I was going to wear blue pants. I reassured him, and then reassured him, and then reassured him again, plus we talked about it some more, and then we talked about it some more after that. We moved on to shoes. He wanted me to wear my pink shoes and brown boots. I told him I couldn’t wear both at the same time. He decided he wanted me to wear brown boots in the morning and pink shoes in the afternoon. My heart aches that my shoe choice, my pant choice, and all my choices can upset him so quickly to where it’s a meltdown. I wanted to not wear blue pants to see if we could keep pushing forward but I also wanted him to have a good day. I want to cry a little more. He told me he wanted “black tied your shoes”. I showed him a pair of black sneakers that tied and he said, “no” so I’m not sure what he will do if we try them. He could not handle shoes that tied for years. Anytime the shoelace would come untied or wasn’t the same length he got really upset. I tried slip-ons and those were off in two seconds but he also had a problem with Velcro for a while. He needed the velcro to line up perfectly. When he was sitting with me my alarm set on Alexa went off. He always says Alexa but he pronounces it with a K sound. I got him to say Alexa this morning and he was able to tell her to stop. He was watching his tablet and it was in German. I asked Alexa to play different songs in German and Owen was so happy. We also played some in other languages. We got ready for walking to the school bus and he did great. We talked about clothes a lot and he even said, “we’re done talking about clothes” but we weren’t. When he came home from school he was calm and the night went pretty quickly, until bedtime, and then he wasn’t as happy but fell asleep pretty quickly. Finding strength to look past expectations of the day ahead is sometimes the hardest thing I have to do. I always say autism is as much about how I handle it as it is about Owen having it. I’m thankful for his smile and his amazing gift to make me smile right back. We go next week for a referral for someone else to talk to us about his behaviors so hopefully more ways to try to help him. Find your strength and keep pushing forward. Smiles to all and donut daze!
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