I have to start this post off by saying that I have been in a shitty mood pretty much all week. It has just been one of those weeks…scratch that…one of those MONTHS and for the most part, the shitty part has been named Troy. Oh, the wonder of the ex husband slash ex daddy slash asshole. So, all week I have been writing a post in my head about my shitty week and the crushing reminder that for as much as I know Troy loves his son, his acceptance of Julian is nowhere near my own.

It’s funny (in a not-so funny way) because I had just “talked” about how far Troy had come in an e-mail to my friend, Mel…about how last Christmas Julian was forced to wear a three piece suit to a holiday dinner (which left Julian so far gone I was scared I might never get him back) but not even a year later, Troy was buying pajamas for his son to wear to Thanksgiving (what we call “nice” pajamas). I even went so far as to talk to my mother about the same thing as well as friends of mine.

Should have known better, eh?

Those pajamas came back to the house with the tags still on them. I picked Julian up from his Dad’s house only to find him in “regular” clothes. And then I came home and cried. And cried. And cried. I cried not only for Julian who was made to suffer through the weekend but also for my girls, who no doubt were also suffering all weekend because of their brother’s suffering. And finally, I cried for myself because I knew what the next week at LEAST would be like as I tried to bring Julian back through that window after two days of messed up senses. I raged for myself because in two days, Troy managed to undo what I had spent six weeks working on.

I know you’re probably wondering if I spoke to Troy about it. I did. And the conversation isn’t worth repeating. However, I will say that it ended on a fairly positive note.

Should have known better, eh?

Julian had an even worse weekend this one past and came home even more far gone than he had been before. His sisters were beside themselves. Hence my shitty mood.

So, that’s what this post was going to be about…a continuation of the Can’t Make Me Be post…a post about acceptance above all else…a post about working with a child instead of against one (does my child suffer from autism? No, he * lives * with autism)… a post about the continuing disappointment the family that is supposed to love Julian brings me when I am hoping for the best and really trying to believe in them.

But…

Instead I am sitting here with a pajama clad boy who is munching on popcorn be bought from the lady at the corner store (it is our Thursday night ritual to walk to the store to buy a treat while his sisters are at the library with my parents. We then come home to watch “Iggle Piggle” which is In The Night Garden together but tonight the girls were going to an art class at the library which started early so we’ve got time to kill before Makka Pakka and Upsy Daisy) smiling and laughing because that’s what ASD can do sometimes. It can often turn a seemingly easy and even fun task or outing into a living nightmare BUT it can also turn a shitty week into a funny story.

I was changing Julian’s diaper on my bed and was trying, as best I could, to explain to him that he needed to tell his Dad when a piece of clothing was irritating him. That might not sound like a difficult task, but believe me, it was. Is. Julian has terrific verbal skills but is still a very literal, concrete thinker and his language is composed mostly of echolalia. So trying to get something into his head can take weeks, months even. The key (usually) is to just keep repeating something to him in clear, direct words.

Julian had been telling me for days that Caillou (he’s a cartoon character and was on the front of one of the shirts Troy made Julian wear) had burned him. In fact, it was nearly all Julian would talk about after he got home and it was the only thing he would tell me about his weekend with his Dad.

So, there he laid, not looking at me at all as I explained to him for the hundredth time that when a piece of clothing was irritating him, he needed to tell his Dad and asked to be changed (this might sound like I was putting the responsibility on a three year old instead of on the adult but I wasn’t…it was a last resort…part of Troy’s defence after putting Julian in regular clothing was that Julian didn’t tell him that he was irritated. I could rant about Julian’s language skills and Troy’s asshole skills but instead I’ll end the bracket). Finally, I said, “You have to tell Daddy when Caillou burns your boobies.”

As soon as the words left my mouth, Julian’s head jerked. He didn’t exactly look right me but he got close and quickly corrected me…

“No, Mommy. Caillou didn’t burn my boobies. He burned my boobie NIPPLES!”

Now, tell me you aren’t laughing.

It’s easy, most days, to write about the stressful parts of the day. The parts of the day… week… month that made me want to pull my heart out or cry my eyes out or both. But instead of complaining about all of the ways Julian isn’t accepted, I think I’ll write about the ways Julian’s autism sometimes makes me smile.

For instance…it is one of my little joys in life when Julian freaks the lady at the corner store out with some weird thing he does or says. Tonight it was the fact that Julian noticed they changed their fire extinguisher. But a few months ago…

We had a dead groundhog at the end of our driveway. I live on a highway and it had gotten hit and landed square in the middle of the end of the driveway. My Dad came over to throw it in the ditch but all day all Julian said was, “Where did that dead thing go? Where did that dead thing go?” When we walked to the store, all Julian did was look for the groundhog, excuse me, dead thing, in the ditch and say, “where did that dead thing go?” We got to the store and the lady behind the cash (who is a grandmotherly type and very sweet) tried to engage Julian in conversation as she usually did. Up until that night, Julian had said nothing to her, didn’t even acknowledge her. But that night as she bagged his treat he said, quite loudly, “Where did that dead thing go?” I nearly peed my pants and I’m pretty sure the lady shit hers and I was at a loss as to how to explain. Oh, I tried but it didn’t seem to make matters any better.

She stopped trying to engage Julian, though.

Come to think of it…maybe he knew what he was doing, eh?