No Doubt

Today I do not have a single doubt about my son having Aspergers. Yesterday was a very exciting day for us, and today it shows.

When his sister was playing with a piggy oven mitt that she wasn't neccessarily supposed to, he wanted a turn. "Yes, you can have a turn. But then it goes back in the drawer." I told him.

Said oven mitt is the shape of a piggys head, who's mouth opens. It is silicone. Our son picked up a magnet in the piggy's mouth and was trying to hide it so that the magnet would have been "swallowed." But his sister was peeking. "Don't look!" he said over and over again, getting louder and more frustrated by the second. She thought it was quite funny, teasing him and making a game out of watching the piggy hide the magnet. But our son, not so much! Next thing I know, he is trying to knee her and push her and there are arms flying everywhere and screams from both of them.

I hastily jumped in the middle of it, and told him that the piggy is going away now because he can not be hurting others. I had to literally wrestle it from his hand, as he kept screaming that his sister was watching and that she had a longer turn. "Yes, she did have a longer turn honey, but you were hurting her."

Him: "No! I WANT YOU LIVE SOMEWHERE ELSE!"
Me: "I can't go and live somewhere else with you grabbing and hanging from my arm."

As I walked back to the kitchen with Mr Piggy, our daughter decided it was a good idea to taunt him about it.. so he kicked her chair really hard. I picked him up, the safest way that I could (he is five, and over 40 lbs) and carried him to his bed. I layed him on his bed where he started making whimpering sound and lay still, and I wrapped him up tight in his blanket. "You can lay here until you have calmed down." I then left the room and went back to the kitchen.

When I went down a while later to check on him, he was calmly playing with his marbles as though nothing had happened. Here, he was in his element. I snuggled up beside him on the floor and wrapped my arms around him, "I love you," I said. He continued to look at his marbles. "I love you." I said again.

Him: "Mommy, I hold the black marbles up like this to look through them. See, this one is really purple, but it looks black! Then it goes in this dish."
Me: "That's really pretty. Sweetie, I love you. Do you still want me to live somewhere else?"
Him: "Look at this one!"
Me: "It's really nice Kairan. I need you to answer me though. Do you still want me to live somewhere else?"
he shakes his head no..
Him: "Do you like this one? I will share it with you."
Me: "I do like that one, but you can keep it. Do you understand why I took the piggy away?"
Him: "But I share with Daddy, so I want to share this one with you."
Me: "I know you share with Daddy, that is so generous and kind of you. Do you understand why I put the piggy away?"
Him: "Yeah. I'm putting the white ones in here" (points to a container) "and you can have this one if you want it." (the same one we spoke about earlier)
Me: "No thank you, but would you like some more containers for sorting our your marbles?"

I almost began to cry. This, THIS was his element. Sorting marbles and telling me about the different kinds. I told him which ones were my favorites, and he told me which ones were his. He never once looked at me. He never once stopped what he was doing. His tiny fingers reached into the bucket to pull a marble, his hand went up to the light infront of the window, then back down to the appropriate container. Then again. Then again. I love him so much. This was his safe activity, something that helped him to feel calm, something that he could focus on. This, was his aspergers shining through. On most days, it is barely noticeable. We'll have a situation or two where he wants a specific colour and we know, that no other colour will do. Or when his dinner has to be laid out a certain way, or the blocks have to go away in a certain order. My husband and I don't generally notice though, because that's just our son. We've come to expect it on a daily basis, so it is as natural to us as taking a drink of water when we are thirsty. But today was different. Today was an Aspergers Day, or as well call them often, a Max Day.

I can not put the video up, but if I could - I would suggest watching Parenthood Season Two Episode One. Highly recommend it, if you watch it my entire post will be clearly explained. Hopefully I can find a way to add video's that are not on youtube one day.