Zack is back home for a long half term, and with him come the questions, doubts, stresses, anxieties and suspense that mould our experience of Asperger syndrome.
Every utterance is preceded by a host of thoughts: how is he right now? Will he hear a question or an insult? Is he busy, should I wait? How shall I phrase my thought? Do I absolutely need to ask him?
Some will no doubt suggest that I simply talk, that I stop trying to analyse the smallest interaction. To those I answer that my experience has led me to this point. Years of meltdowns, rages, fits of despair, aggression, defensiveness, tears, violence, hurt as reactions to the most normal of words. This is my experience. And as most humans adapt to their circumstance, so have I. The questions that I talk of happen in the flicker of an eyelid, thought not even frozen in words. I approach Zack the way I would approach a wary and wild animal in many respects.
To this heady mix of a decade's life with Asperger syndrome, I have to add the experience of someone who has been abused. That is so so hard to write. But there is a real need to acknowledge this I think if I am to move forward, and if Zack is to manage relationships better. So one of my priorities now is to keep myself safe, not merely him (or my other children). And since Zack, apart from being my beloved little boy, is also the one who inflicts the abuse, I tread a tightrope between keeping myself away from harm and being a mother.
With Zack's return home, Nick and I have both seen our children slip into an alternative world. One in which each of them plays a predetermined character. One in which a script must be followed. Sadly, this movie is one that we have watched over and over and over again. It never has a happy ending.
So we try to steer the family into different directions, but the strength of this trio is remarkable. A few days ago, I likened them to an atom, and I'm drawn once more to this analogy. It took scientists so much energy to split the atom......... the bond between protons, neutrons and electrons is so strong that efforts to break it will no doubt have cataclysmic consequences.
Inevitably, I am back to a conclusion previously visited. Zack, bless him, whom we love and cherish does not allow us to live and thrive when he is with us. But when he leaves, a great hole opens in our hearts and our lives. We cannot make our peace with such a bereavement because every few weeks, he comes back. With his return comes the excitement of seeing him again, the hope of reaching him, the bated breath of maybe enjoying each other...
Every utterance is preceded by a host of thoughts: how is he right now? Will he hear a question or an insult? Is he busy, should I wait? How shall I phrase my thought? Do I absolutely need to ask him?
Some will no doubt suggest that I simply talk, that I stop trying to analyse the smallest interaction. To those I answer that my experience has led me to this point. Years of meltdowns, rages, fits of despair, aggression, defensiveness, tears, violence, hurt as reactions to the most normal of words. This is my experience. And as most humans adapt to their circumstance, so have I. The questions that I talk of happen in the flicker of an eyelid, thought not even frozen in words. I approach Zack the way I would approach a wary and wild animal in many respects.
To this heady mix of a decade's life with Asperger syndrome, I have to add the experience of someone who has been abused. That is so so hard to write. But there is a real need to acknowledge this I think if I am to move forward, and if Zack is to manage relationships better. So one of my priorities now is to keep myself safe, not merely him (or my other children). And since Zack, apart from being my beloved little boy, is also the one who inflicts the abuse, I tread a tightrope between keeping myself away from harm and being a mother.
With Zack's return home, Nick and I have both seen our children slip into an alternative world. One in which each of them plays a predetermined character. One in which a script must be followed. Sadly, this movie is one that we have watched over and over and over again. It never has a happy ending.
So we try to steer the family into different directions, but the strength of this trio is remarkable. A few days ago, I likened them to an atom, and I'm drawn once more to this analogy. It took scientists so much energy to split the atom......... the bond between protons, neutrons and electrons is so strong that efforts to break it will no doubt have cataclysmic consequences.
Inevitably, I am back to a conclusion previously visited. Zack, bless him, whom we love and cherish does not allow us to live and thrive when he is with us. But when he leaves, a great hole opens in our hearts and our lives. We cannot make our peace with such a bereavement because every few weeks, he comes back. With his return comes the excitement of seeing him again, the hope of reaching him, the bated breath of maybe enjoying each other...
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