Autism & Mad Mothers

This has been one of the most difficult years of my life.  

There was Autism, usual family stuff, college and covid.  But in the Spring, the shell protecting my mental health cracked open and I fell to pieces.  One day, all the defenses I used to avoid my issues (maintaining facades, perfectionism, anxiety, depression, overwork, wine, rationalizing emotions, denying my own needs, unhealthy boundaries, whatever you're having yourself) just stopped working.

It was about fucking time.

My breakdown immersed me in a world of pain that I'd been avoiding for a very long time.

Many months of therapy have helped me to integrate most of my big psychological injuries.  There's still one or two sticky issues  I need to befriend, but I know I'll get there.  Tbh, I'd rather french kiss Boris Johnson after he's eaten a packet of Monster Munch, but you do what you gotta do.  Am wearing Big Girl pants now, and all that.

The big surprise is that processing the awfulness isn't as terrible as pouring all my energy into avoiding it.  I mean, therapy is horrendous.  It's like being atomized in a high-speed blender and then re-shaped in a really unfamiliar new mould.  It takes a while to get used to.  And making friends with the dark creatures in my mental basement has been...... unexpected.  

But avoiding it has been worse.  The relief of allowing the mask to slip is wonderful.  Breaking down gave me the freedom to recognize and discard what was bad for my soul.  It's a work in progress, but yanno.

Autism was the catalyst that forced me to engage with my mental health in a meaningful way.  It's very possible I would have continued to spin in my resistant groove for the rest of my days, had Autism not driven me mad.

It's kinda comical to be grateful for something that caused me pain, but here we are.  Alice in Wonderland knew her shit when she said "curiouser and curiouser".  

Autism & Coping Uncomfortably

Pop quiz.

Is it ever OK to laugh at your kid's autism?

Finian does loads of hilarious stuff.  He wears three pairs of pyjamas at a time.  He steals his sister's (way too small) clothes and puts them on. He tries to sit on my knee even though he's 6ft 3.  He creases up at his own jokes (which usually revolve around purposely mixing up the words of songs).  He steals sweets and hides them somewhere really obvious.  He scripts cartoons in foreign languages (Albanian is today's favourite).  He says "x says fuck off" so that gets to swear without getting in trouble.

It's easy to find the humour in these.

Then he does annoying stuff.  

He asks the same questions a thousand times a day.  Right up in your face.  Tapping you repeatedly on the shoulder.  Usually when you're trying to watch tv, or read, or get housework done. "Can I go for a spin?".  Over and over and over.  And over.  And over.

He paces constantly.  

He plays dvds and online videos across five different platforms.  At the same time.  Its a constant, tiresome game of switch-on/switch-off.  He puts the volume up.  I put the volume down.  I close doors, turn things off, negotiate volume (hmmm.... I can see here that I need to stop negotiating and lay down some hardass rules.... damn, but writing shit down is helpful!).  I'm exhausted before I can turn my attention to other stuff I need to do.

The annoying stuff  eventually becomes insufferable.

Sometimes the only way to deal with the growing tension (other than exploding, which won't help anyone) is to poke fun at the behaviour.  Not in a cruel or demeaning way, but in a fun, silly way.  Sometimes I find myself feeling a bit uncomfortable about this, because it's not like he can defend himself.  He knows that we're having a laugh, but he's unable to retaliate.

When I was a nurse we often made VERY tasteless jokes about death.....made all the more tasteless as we were often surrounded by the dead and dying.  Sometimes we laughed til we cried.  In hindsight, we laughed at death to cope with the awfulness of losing patients we cared about.  Without using some kinda turbo-strength coping strategy, we'd have quickly been devoured by existential emptiness.  If we didn't laugh, we'd have run screaming from the horror of it.

Laughing at the absurdity of it made so much more sense.

So, poking fun at Finian's behaviour seems a better option than screaming.  And the fun is directed at his behaviour, not at him as a person.  Laughing is healthier than pouring vodka on my cornflakes, or sucking benzos like breath-mints.  Still, I wonder.

Not that I'm over-thinking.

Autism & Kindness

Kindness is a tricky concept to teach an autistic kid.

Finian gets that it's expected of him to occasionally share his salt & vinegar Tayto, but I'm pretty sure he only complies to get me outta his face and not out of a sense of moral obligation. 

Really, it's a tough enough gig for many neurotypical people to grasp.  

Kindness, as the cliche goes, is often mistaken for weakness.  This is a sad loss for the western world (it seems to be a western thing to admire stomping all over other people to get what you want?  Just look at the movies we love).  But kindness is not martyrdom.  

As I get older (and work through a lot more therapy) kindness is starting to appear as more of a superpower.  Maintaining the belief that kindness is the antidote to an often jaded, cynical world is an act of faith.  It requires strength and stamina that some days I have to dig awfully deep to find.

Here's what I believe.

Any act of kindness, no matter how small, creates a ripple effect that exponentially increases positivity and goodness.  Ultimately we all benefit, even indirectly, as it makes the world a better place.  Cynics may roll their eyes, but cynicism is lazy.  It takes thought and effort to emit kindness into a world you may have been battered and abused by.

I guess a caveat is that being kind should not hurt you.  There's nothing to be gained by channeling your inner doormat and tattooing 'masochist' across your face (you'd need a pretty big face tbf).  We are also obliged to practice kindness towards ourselves.

I think a particular challenge is to extend kindness (without hurting ourselves) to those who hurt us, or who we don't like.  That's next level Buddhist shit right there.  It makes sense that wishing ill to others is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.  The only person we make sick is ourselves.  It's a counter-intuitive win-win to extend good wishes towards those who wounded us.

Bitterness shrinks the soul and condemns us to live in the half-light.  Love is liberation.

A really hard part of healing my own wounds is being brave enough to experience the pain and bitterness I  buried many years ago. Owning the awfulness I avoided with overwork, perfectionism, wine and fakery has only been possible because I try to be kind to myself.   I've cried more in the last six months than in five decades (and I really fucking hate crying), but I also like myself better.

Being kind to myself has increased my desire to be kind to others, as I know how healing it is.

Now all I have to do is teach this to my autistic son.

morals never tasted so good