Crying in The Dark - Chapter Four - Riding a Bike

           How many things do we take advantage of?  I know I know, a lot of people are always pushing the subject, but I’m not trying to take it very far.  So take a minute, close your eyes –I’ll still be here!  And think about everything you do in a day and pin point one thing in particular that you loved doing as a child.  Got it?  Okay, want to know mine?  Mine was riding a bike.  My mother, step father, and step sister would go on bike rides and it was by far, one of my favorite things growing up.  So naturally, when I found out I was pregnant – I COULDN’T WAIT!  I was so excited to know that my mom and I could take my son on a bike ride and he would see so many things and oh I could see the smile on his face just thinking about it!
            My son turned five this year and his father and I went half and half on his bike, even though he thinks it was all him (hey, he had to get SOME credit, right?).  I knew he was going to have a hard time with it, because he had one before but he wouldn’t ride it.  So this time I bought a 20”, because if I was going to buy another bike, it was going to be one that lasts a long time.  So it takes us about an hour for him to pick out the one that he wants and even then, he was apprehensive about it; mom and I never once discouraged him.  Happy thoughts always.
            So here I am, walking next to my son, listening to him scream at me as we walk down the road.  Why is he screaming?  Oh, because he’s scared and he’s taking it out on me … yay.  The things that he yells at me range from ‘NOT THAT SIDE OF THE DSFKJSDLFKJREIOG!!!’ (inaudible) to ‘MOM!!! What’s wrong with you?!  Do you not listen?!’  In my defense, when my son gets mad I can’t understand half of what he says.  So anyhow like I said, I’m walking next to my son while he’s riding his bike and people are staring at us as we make our way down the street.  Some peek through their windows, others come outside and pretend they have something to do whilst being nosey.  I love my neighbors – they’re so interested in life; especially mine.  While I’m pretending not to notice everyone staring at us, I’m attempting to calm him down because no matter how upset my son gets over potentially falling off of his bike, he’s not going to.  For one, I’m right there, holding on to his bike and for two, he has training wheels that don’t let him teeter-totter.  However, my son does not believe a word I say and will continue to scream, and yell inaudible words my way.  We finally get home and he starts crying.  I’m assuming that it’s because we’re home and he wants to keep riding his bike.  Finally in all of the pitiful crocodile tears, and gasping for air, I find out that it’s because he’s glad he’s home and hates his bike.  Mind you, this is not the first time he’s rode it, but each time he rides it, he gets more scared.
            I’ve discussed this with his therapist and he says that this is all normal and I should start getting used to him liking something one day and being scared of it the next.  So while holding my son and rocking him, after the traumatic experience, I realize that in fact, my dream of family bike rides may not come after all.

Crying in The Dark - Chapter Three - The 'S' Word

           Last night, I was talking to a mom on a website, which I will not name.  We were discussing Autism and how she has a family member with Aspergers and because he isn’t around her often, she forgets that he has this disorder and she feels that he’s selfish.  There it is, glaring at me – the horrible ‘S’ word; spoiled. 

            I do not blame anyone for looking at a parent of a child who has Aspergers and saying to themselves ‘Man, that mom (or Dad) needs to get a hold of that child, they’re out of control’ or ‘Did you see what her child just said to her?  My son would not  get away with that!’  The reason I don’t blame them is simple, they don’t know.
            My son, appears to be the most selfish child I have ever met.  But all I can do, to stay sane – is breathe; just breathe.  This is what I told her, when we spoke about the disorder and what I went through last night during dinner.  My mother, son and I LOVE breakfast for dinner (mainly because we love biscuits!) and so last night, we treated ourselves to one of our favorites.  This is what dinner went like:
            My mom, my son, and myself sitting at the dining room table. He has Country Ham (cut up before he sits down ... you'll see why in a minute), fried eggs, a bowl of country gravy and we have a bowl of fresh biscuits. He sits down, chooses his own biscuit (he also has a spoon for the gravy, a fork for the ham, and a fork for the egg; because you cannot let a fork that has touched an item of food, touch a different item of food). We ask him what he wants to do with the biscuit and he places it inside of the bowl. My mom asks if he wants the gravy on top of the biscuit, he says yes. NOW ... When my mom is doing this, she proceeds to CUT the biscuit while he's watching. Plus, he's already seen it was whole, so he'd know if you cut it. He FLIPS OUT and yells at her because she cut his biscuit. I in turn, take the bowl, dump it on my plate and we start all over.  It is easy for me to see why I am a single mother; not many people can understand what it is that we go through every day.  Some days we have a fantastic day, others are fine, and then … we have ‘those’ days.  I am going to take you back to a time when I was in a relationship with someone and I will not give a name, because he deserves better than to have his name splattered all over a book.  So in order to keep the identity of my ex and friend, a secret, we’ll call him ‘Friend’.
            My son was two and friend and I thought it would be nice to go to his brother’s house because it would give us a chance to get to know one another.  So, it is around 9:00 at night, so the sun has already gone down.  Yes, I know … I’m bringing my son out late; but he was going to be going to sleep at Friend’s brothers’ house which was about 30 minutes away.  Anyhow, we’re walking out the door and my son see’s that we are not walking to mine and immediately we have a problem.  My son does not understand why we have to take that car, when we have our own car.  Well, I didn’t have enough gas in my car, we would have had to stop to get some, and I didn’t know the way to his brother’s house.  Yes, all of that could have been worked out, but I thought he was just being a child set in his ways.  So he’s in the car, safely buckled up in his car seat and we’re driving.  All of a sudden, he starts screaming.  He can see white lights coming at us and he doesn’t understand, it’s dark, ‘hold my hand mommy’.  He’s screaming as if someone is killing him, but he only see’s the headlights from the cars on the other side of the median.  As we’re going down through his brother’s neighborhood, he is still crying uncontrollably and I have been trying to soothe him the whole way with nothing to show for it.  Friend yells a cuss-word and my son jumps and squeezes my hand, he hyperventilates.  We’ve arrived at the house, I pick him up and I hold him.  I hold him like someone is going to take him away.  I was scared for him.  That night was a bad night for everyone, my son most of all.  Friend was very displeased with himself, but the damage was already done.  He knew then that he could not be in a relationship with someone who had a child like mine.  The ‘s’ word strikes again.

Crying in the Dark - Chapter Two - He's Okay

            Thinking back to when Christian was a baby, there were signs.  When a mother talks about the signs that her child is exhibiting, friends and family members do their best to console her.  She begins to hear ‘Children hardly ever reach milestones at the same time that others do’, ‘He doesn’t like certain things, that doesn’t make him any different’ or my favorite: ‘He’s okay, there’s nothing wrong with how he’s growing’. 
            I remember being in the waiting room at the Pediatricians office and hearing all of the babies with their cute baby talk, babies being fussy, or the sounds of the mothers calming a crying baby.  I look at my son, sitting in his carrier – he looks up at me and smiles, I smile back.  I love you.  Mothers would always come up to me and tell me that they wished their child was as well behaved as mine or that my son was so quiet and they hoped that theirs would be the same.  I never knew the difference; I just thought that some days, they may have good days like I did.  Christian was always a good baby.
            When Christian was two months old, yes I said two months, he stopped eating puree food.  So then what did he eat?  Well, food that was not ‘slimy’ or having a ‘liquid’ texture.  I have lived with my mother almost the whole time I have had my son and he’s five now.  So I have had some help along the way and she said that we had to do what we had to, to keep him healthy.  He ate and ate a lot.  We would microwave waffles for him and made sure that we would buy the wheat waffles or even the ones with the fruit inside.  We did everything we could, to get him to eat.  When it was bed time, I would make him a bottle and put baby food inside, because if you shook it good enough, it was like a flavoring to the milk.  He loved it and slept almost the whole night.
            As a young mom, I was scared that there was something wrong with my son, because he showed signs of autism.  Although the signs he showed were small, I could see them even if no one else could.  Eventually I let those thoughts seep into the back of my mind to be opened four and a half years later when a stranger came up to me.  Until then, I believed everyone else when they said ‘He’s okay’.

Crying in the Dark - Chapter One - Morning Blues

         It’s cold and I am bundled up in my comforter.  I’m staring at the walls as I listen to the clock tick; knowing I should be fast asleep by now because morning comes way too early.  I can’t fall asleep because my mind keeps racing and I don’t know what to do anymore.  I can feel the tears getting ready to fall when I hear footsteps and I know he’s had a bad dream again. 
         In the morning the days starts the same as any day, I get up, wake Christian up and I ask him if he wants five minutes.  If I don’t ask him, we have a fight and it is far too early to fight.  He tells me yes, and I make sure he’s covered before I leave the room.  I get dressed, brush my teeth and I take an Ibuprofen because I know I’m going to need it in the near future and I want it to start working before it’s too late.
         So I’m dressed and ready to go … time to get him up.  I walk into his room on egg shells and I carefully ask him to wake up.  As he gets up, I have to read his facial expressions so I know what day we are going to have.  This morning – he smiles; it’s going to be a good day.  I can’t help but smile back at him, my handsome man.
         He gets up and goes to the bathroom, when he comes back I have pulled three or four shirts from the closet, laid them out and I have his jeans on the bed … waiting for inspection.  He looks at each shirt and decides that he doesn’t want to wear any of them.  I look at the clock; it’s getting close to being time to leave.  He goes to his closet and looks at every shirt he has – nothing works.  I become anxious and I wonder what he’s going to do or say; but I say nothing.  He thinks for a minute before looking back through his shirts.  He’s found one!  I leave the room as he gets dressed.
         We drive to school in silence and when we get there, he takes me by the hand and leads me to the doors.  We cannot go in yet, because there are still people walking in, so we wait.  When no one is outside, walking in to school, I get a kiss and a hug.  We did not do this one day and as his teacher took him to his class, he screamed like I have heard time and again if something changes.  He looks frightened and I am scared for him.  I ask him repeatedly what is wrong and so does his teacher; he says nothing.  She lets go of him and he grabs me tight.  His eyes are filled with tears and he kisses me.  ‘I love you mom’ he says and then he walks away – seemingly unaffected.  I drive home, in silence.

Crying in the Dark and what this book means to me

         I'm currently writing a book and it's called Crying in the Dark.  Crying in the Dark is all about the struggles that my family goes through on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis.  Through all that we have come across, we have hurtled over them.  This book I know, will speak to a lot of parents and caregivers of those who have children in their life who are suffering from the disorder known as Aspergers. 
         Autism is like an umbrella disorder with several disorders linked to one another under it.  Aspergers happens to be one of those disorders and my 6-year-old son was diagnosed with it in June of 2011.  I never knew what was happening to my son or how to talk to anyone about it because for the most part, people do not really know all that much about the disorder.
         This book is allowing me to express what happens and educate those around us who do not know what's going on, to help them with tolerance, humility, and respect.