Autism & Remembering

So, bear with me on this one.

Sometimes I forget that Finian has Autism.

He just kinda bops along, doing his Finian thing, until he does something so ridiculously autistic that it makes my eyes water.

I changed his bedclothes this morning, which seemed like an excellent idea at the time.  I was all aglow (real word) with smug mammy housekeeping vibes.  I washed floors.  I hung clothes out.  I hoovered ridiculous places like underneath sofa cushions. This lasted at least until lunchtime, when I got fed up of it.  Then I thought "fuck this for a bunch of bananas".  So I made tea, read books and abandoned the laundry to the mercies of the elements.  If the sheets survived on the clothesline, good luck to them.

All was grand til bedtime.

Finian went upstairs, supposedly to bed, but instead performed a convincing imitation of a herd of coked up wildebeest.  

Ngl, I was getting annoyed on a coupla counts; first, wildebeest are not native to County Monaghan ...... second, I was trying to watch my fantasy dad Stephen Fry on QI.  Stephen Fry doing QI is balm to my soul.  He could read me a bedtime story, convince me that everything is OK, and I'd sleep with the depth of an innocent.  The wildebeest thing was wrecking the vibe.

Then a Bad Mammy truth bomb reminded me that I'm the middle aged mother of an autistic young man.  

It was The Fucking Sheets.  

I'd put sheets on Finian's bed, but they weren't the right sheets.  

I muted my fantasy dad Stephen, went barefoot out into the dark, took the correct sheets off the clothes line, tumble dried them and replaced them on Finian's bed.

The correct sheets are not just important.  Sleep will not happen without them.

I love a bitta crazy, but I'd prefer it at a time other than 10pm on a Friday night.

Autism isn't just trippin'.  It's faceplanting into anything close to restful.

my son at bedtime