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Photographic Retrospective

January 25, 2011 By

Do you remember the days when we used to take pictures with cameras that required film?  When all 34 pictures on the film had been used up we would take it to the drugstore for processing and pick it up three days later (eventually, drugstores got their own in-store processing equipment and the concept of “one hour pictures” was born).  We would go home and look at the pictures, only six of which were any good, and we would throw them into a cardboard box already containing seventeen thousand other pictures.  Every time we put the box back in the closet we would say to ourselves, “I must buy albums and get these photos organized”, but we would know that the pictures wouldn’t be looked at for at least six years, when the bottom of the box would collapse and all of the pictures would fall onto the ground.

Things are so much easier now.  We just take the picture, plug either the camera or the SD card into a slot on the computer, and ten seconds later the pictures are there for our viewing pleasure.  We print the ones we want to print.  Mostly, though, we make desktop backgrounds out of them, upload them to Facebook, and email them to friends and family.  There are no pesky films that cost a fortune and get all screwed up if you open the camera at the wrong time, no dusty old cardboard boxes that take up space, and no pictures lying around that we cannot bring ourselves to throw out even though the top of the subject’s head is cut off and the red-eye makes everyone look like minions of Satan.

The thing is, we look at the pictures.  If we don’t like them, we can edit them, remove the red-eye, fix up the lighting.  And if we really don’t like them, we just hit the Delete button.  Easy-peasy.  The point is, we end up with pictures that we actually like and enjoy looking at.

And that’s what I was doing earlier today.  I was looking at pictures of my kids from when they were a lot younger and littler, and marveling about how they’ve grown and changed since the pictures were taken.

Here are a few of my favourites…

George, age 3

James' first Halloween, aged 10 months. He was a pirate!

Family picture taken on Gerard's birthday, 2006. George was almost 3, James was 8 months

George (almost 4) and James (19 months)

James, about 15 months

George, aged about 3 1/2 - a rare shot of him looking into the camera

Ah, how they grow up!

Filed Under: Children, Photography, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , ,
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Being An Alien In A Strange Land

January 24, 2011 By

The date was August 14, 2000.  I have no idea what time it was, but it was already dark, I had had a long day, and my head was several time zones to the west.  Even though I was sick with exhaustion, I felt the exhiliration of having arrived.  After months of planning and finding my way through bureaucratic tape, after some last-minute logistical crises, I was here, ready to start my new life.

The man behind the counter came back from wherever he had been, handed me my freshly stamped passport, and with a smile said, “Welcome to Canada”.

Well.  This was a nice change from the way airport officials had treated me in the United States earlier in the day.  This was back in the time when South African nationals were allowed to be in transit through the United States without a visa (I’d bet my left arm that this is no longer the case).  I had been made to sit in a departure lounge with security guys watching me from the doorway, as if I was about to take off and make a run for it.  The fact that my friend Kane had come out to meet me helped me ignore their suspicious gaze.

I mean, honestly. I was a smallish woman, bogged down with enough stuff to weigh down an elephant, and I had just travelled across seven time zones.  What damage did they think I was capable of?  I was barely capable of beating an egg.

But anyway.  Now I was in Canada – had been WELCOMED to Canada – and I was allowed beyond the confines of the airport.  I picked up my baggage, paid a visit to the foreign currency exchange desk, and caught a cab to where I would be staying for the first six weeks.  It was dark so I could not see much, but all the way to the rented furnished apartment I peered excitedly through the window like a little kid looking out for his first glimpse of the ocean.

By the time I got to the apartment and checked in, it was well past midnight.  I was tired, but the time change had played silly buggers with my mind, so sleep was out of the question.  I unpacked, called my parents to tell them I had arrived in one piece, and then spent the rest of the night poring over my travel guide.  I fell asleep at some point in the early hours of the morning.

I had a week to explore and find my way around before I was due to start my new job, and I got started right way, the day after I arrived.  My first venture into the City of Toronto is an experience I will never forget.  The apartment was located right in the city centre, so I reasoned that it would probably take a day for me to explore my immediate environs on foot.  I would tackle the subway system the following day.

Armed with my map, and with my camera hanging around my neck (face it, I may as well have had the word TOURIST stamped right on my head) I stepped out from the apartment building and started walking.  When I turned a corner not far from where I was staying, I saw a life-sized fibreglass moose, painted in bright colours.

I thought this was pretty cool.  I mean, a life-sized moose in the middle of Toronto. For someone who had just landed in Canada to see something so symbolic of – well, Canada – this was kind of neat.  I liked it.

It had the added bonus of being a handy landmark.  When I see the moose, I thought, I will be close to the apartment.

Four very confusing blocks later, I sat in a coffee shop reading an article about Toronto’s project to put brightly coloured moose sculptures on almost every street in the city.

So much for my landmark.

By the time I wanted to go back to the apartment, I was thoroughly lost.  Those damned moose!  I felt as if I should have sprinkled cookie crumbs in my trail so I could find my way back, like Hansel and Gretel (although look what happened to them – probably not the best example).

Eventually I found my way around.  I learned how to tell one moose from another, and I became proficient at travelling around on the subway.  It took a while for me to really get to know the place, and to build up a social support network, but as the saying goes, I got by with a little help from my friends.

It is strange to think that more than ten years have passed since then.  In that time, a lot has happened.  I have met my life partner and husband-to-be (and YES, it’s the same person!).  I have had two kids.  I have left one job and started another.  I have run races, made friends, weathered a financial crisis, travelled home to bury my father.  I have become a Canadian citizen and for the first time,exercised my right to vote in a Canadian election. A lifetime seems to have happened in the last decade.

It would be easy to reflect on the ways in which my life would be different if I had not packed my life into checked baggage and left South Africa. But that would be pointless.

It is enough for me to know that I have held onto cherished family relationships and friendships from my previous life, while forming some new ones here in Canada.  I feel like I have the best of both worlds, and I am exactly where I want to be.

Filed Under: Canada, postaday2011, Toronto, Travel Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,
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Make A List, Check It Twice…

January 23, 2011 By

They should provide customized checklists when they issue children to parents.  I mean, think about it.  We pop out these babies, and we follow the generalized instructions in baby books, which pretty much say the following:

  • Whenever the baby cries, shove a nipple in its mouth.
  • Rest when the baby rests.
  • Establish a consistent bedtime routine.
  • Don’t let the baby sleep on his tummy.
  • Cover a baby boy’s willy with a washcloth during diaper changes to avoid being peed on.

There is very little consideration given to the fact that:

  • said nipple is attached to a human being who is capable of feeling physical pain from literally being sucked dry, and besides, baby bites on nipples can really hurt, even when no teeth are present;
  • when the baby is resting, Mom actually has time to take a shower or, you know, eat;
  • babies will throw up on parents who try to impose routines that they don’t like;
  • if the baby is very determined to sleep on his tummy, there’s very little you can do about it;
  • baby boy willies can be very wayward and have a mind of their own.  Kind of like grown-up mens’ willies.

And that’s before you even get into the individual differences between regular babies.  I’m sure new parents would appreciate knowing up front that their child will barf all over their nice new couch, that their daughter will like peas until the age of four and then start throwing them at everyone, and that Junior will be sent to the principal’s office on the first day of Kindergarten.  Don’t you think our lives as parents would be much easier if we knew ahead of time what contingency plans should be made?

Things get even more complicated when you add a child with special needs into the mix.  While I would certainly want the ability to eliminate the things that George finds frustrating or distressing, I would not want to change who he is (who would?  The kid is SWEET!). However, it would have been good to know some things about him right from the beginning.  My checklist for George would include the following:

  • He’s going to bang his head when frustrated, so you are going to have little dents all over your drywall.
  • Baby-proofing devices will not even slow him down, so don’t waste the money.
  • By the time he is five, there will be no such thing as a “good place to hide stuff”.
  • He will find out the password to your YouTube account simply by watching you type it in.  Very visually oriented, these autistic kids.
  • He will be freakishly good on the computer, and he will be counting backwards from 100 in increments of 3 by the age of four.
  • You will need several large boxes to store all of the Mr. Potato Head stuff, but you won’t mind because Mr. Potato Head will prove to be a major catalyst for speech.
  • He will use Lego for stimming.  You will have to make sure you have plenty of the long Lego pieces in pink and yellow.  If you don’t have the same number of pink and yellow Legos, there will be meltdowns.
  • He’s going to know how to fix your DVD player!
  • He’s going to rip down your mother-in-law’s wallpaper and write his name in Magic Marker on her couch.

And what about James?  What would his checklist say?  Let’s see…

  • He’s going to be obsessed with cars so you may as well start collecting them now.
  • He’s going to come flying out like a cannonball at birth and he’s going to just keep going.
  • If he’s anywhere near water and you’re within a thirty-foot radius, you will get soaked.
  • He’s going to go to the emergency room five times in his first four years.  He’ll just be that kind of kid.
  • Don’t let him anywhere near the diaper cream.
  • Don’t let him anywhere near the talcum powder.
  • Don’t let him anywhere near the toothpaste.
  • Be prepared for the fact that he will publicly ask his Granny if she has a willy.

The checklist would also say that the boys will fight like cat and dog but they will be the best of friends, that George will make off-the-charts progress after his autism diagnosis, and that parenting would be the best thing to ever happen to me.

I love my boys.  They are a joy and and adventure.

Filed Under: babies, parenting, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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We Apologize For The Interruption…

January 22, 2011 By

I find myself unable to write today.  It’s not that I have nothing to write about.  Material is plentiful – I just spent the day at a phenomenally good autism conference, at which I learned a lot and met some valuable contacts who could potentially help me to help George to help himself.

But that will be another post for another day.

Today my mind is in a dark place, one that I really don’t want it to be in.  I cannot write about this dark place, and because I am currently consumed by it, I cannot write at all.  I need to focus my energy on snapping out of this funk.  In an attempt to lighten the mood, however, I will share a picture that makes me laugh every time I see it, no matter how bad I might be feeling.

This is a picture of George when he was a few months old.  You gotta admit, the facial expression is priceless.

George, thinking - what, exactly?

I will be back tomorrow…

Filed Under: Photography, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , ,
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Getting Roped In

January 21, 2011 By

"Peep And The Big Wide World" by George

A few months ago, George went through a phase of tying one end of a rope to his ankle, and the other end to the ankle of a willing or not-so-willing participant.  He would then insist that the other person walk with him to wherever he wanted to go. He didn’t care what the other person was doing, so frequently I found myself trying to cook dinner or do the laundry with a kid attached to my ankle.  He also didn’t mind who the other person was, as long as they had two legs and the ability to walk.  Guests to our home would discover that there was suddenly a child at their feet tying up their ankles.

The rope wasn’t always a rope.  Usually, it was a bathrobe cord, which meant that every time I needed to put on a bathrobe, I would stalk around the house cursing while I looked for a cord to tie it with.  When I got the brilliant idea of hiding the bathrobe cords, my mother-in-law’s measuring tapes started disappearing, much to her consternation.

Initially, we weren’t sure what all of this ankle-tying business was all about. The whole thing loosely resembled a three-legged race, but we couldn’t think where George would have been exposed to that.  We’re pretty sure they don’t do that kind of thing at the therapy centre.  Lord, can you imagine trying to do that with a bunch of kids who all have autism?  But we went with the three-legged race thing because we just couldn’t think of what else it could be.

At around the same time, both of the boys were discovering YouTube videos featuring Peep And The Big Wide World, a children’s TV show that remains a firm favourite with both of them. You should listen to the theme song – it is very catchy.  I have to confess that I find the show itself kind of catchy.  Shut up!  I know I’m 41 but I can still be a kid, can’t I?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqikhlUodC8]

To provide context for the rest of this story, I have to give you a brief outline of the cast of characters in this show.
Peep – a baby chick who has just emerged from his egg, who is very curious and wants to explore the world that he finds himself in.
Chirp – a baby robin who has a strong sense of fairness, and frequently finds diplomatic solutions to a problem.  Her biggest ambition is to be able to fly.
Quack – a purple duck who I think actually looks more like a grape with legs.  He is obsessed with wearing a hat (a characteristic he shares with George), and he is very vain and bossy.  He thinks the sun shines out of his you-know-where.

So anyway, one evening I happened to be passing the kids’ computer while they were watching a YouTube episode of Peep.  And all of a sudden the whole rope-around-the-ankle thing fell into place.  In this particular episode, Chirp and Quack somehow find their legs joined by a rope, so they have to go everywhere together.

All of this time, George had been replicating this episode.

Can we take just a moment to consider the significance of this?  George was engaging in PRETEND PLAY!  For a child with autism, this is through-the-roof HUGE! What made it even bigger was the fact that it was pretend play that required a partner.

Hmmm.  Pretend play that incorporates social interaction. To borrow a phrase coined by my online autism support group, Holy Moly Shit! This represents an exciting chapter in George’s development.  He has outgrown this phase now, and he has not engaged in much pretend play since then, but it’s the potential that strikes me.  The fact that he CAN.  If it’s happened once, it will happen again.

Shortly after the ankle-tying phase came to an end, George drew his first real picture (i.e. the first picture that actually depicted something other than scrawls and scribbles).  I was most amused – and highly thrilled – to see that the picture was an illustration of George’s favourite Peep episode.

This kid astounds me. From time to time, he does these amazing things to remind me of what he can achieve if given the opportunity.

Archimedes said it best: “Give me a place to stand and I can move the earth.”

Filed Under: autism, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Giving Blood, Giving Life, Giving Hope

January 20, 2011 By

I sit in the chair across from the nurse, anxiously waiting for that tiny little needle to pierce the end of my finger.  Has it worked?  Has my healthy eating, strict regimen of iron-enriched vitamins, and consumption of gross vegetable juice made my blood as healthy as it needs to be? If I am turned away now, I will be pissed off.

I am lost in my thoughts, willing my blood to cooperate, trying to analyze everything I’ve eaten in the – OUCH!  Holy crap!  For a tiny little needle that HURTS!

Not as much as the big fat needle going into my arm is going to hurt.

Not as much as the multitude of agony that Captain Snuggles has endured over the last five months has hurt.

It’s a tiny little needle, don’t be such a baby.

The nurse puts a little smear of blood onto a slide and feeds it into a machine.  She tells me that the number has to be 125 or higher.  We wait for a few seconds, the machine beeps, and…

…154.  YES!  As I follow the next nurse into the next screening area, I imagine my healthy blood cells, marching around my body like sergeants, getting ready for deployment into the next human body that needs them.

Screening goes well.  My temperature is good.  My blood pressure prompts the nurse to tell me I must work out a lot.  My heart rate is slightly elevated because I am excited to be doing this.  No lesions or bruises on my arms, all of my questionaire answers are acceptable.

I am deemed Fit To Donate.

I am taken to a row of folding chairs, where I take a seat and wait my turn.  I know that my friend extraordinaire and maid of honour Michelle is a short way behind me in the process.  I look for her and she is not in the room; she is probably in the screening area telling the nurse whether she has ever taken money for sex or taken cocaine intravenously.

As I am waiting, a man starts to pass out with his blood in mid-flow.  The kindly woman seated beside me looks at my “First Time Donor” sticker (which I feel entitled to since my one and only donation attempt, over 20 years ago, ended in disaster and could not be completed) and says, “Don’t look at him.  He’s a man.  Us girls can handle this!”

I am led to one of the stations, and as I take my seat in the thing – it’s not a chair; it’s not a bed; what’s the word for it? – I imagine those blood cell sergeants lining up in my arm, getting ready for their marching orders.

Michelle takes a seat on one of the folding chairs, which means I can talk to her instead of looking in the direction of the nurse who is taping tubes to my arm in an ominous manner.  I squeeze my eyes shut, grit my teeth, and – the needle is in!  Those little sergeants have started marching!  I imagine the blood cells in the Captain’s body straightening up and getting their act together (because let’s face it, they have been slacking off in the last little while).  I imagine them coming together, strong and whole, forming a line of defence against illness and infection.

As my blood flows out of me, I imagine Captain Snuggles getting better.  I picture his broken body healing, becoming whole.

My actual blood will not get to Captain Snuggles.  But it will get to someone who needs it.  Captain Snuggles, through his suffering, will have saved a life.  Many lives, since I am now committed to being a regular donor.

It takes less than ten minutes.  When the needle is removed, I sit in my thing-thats-not-a-bed-or-chair for the prescribed five minutes.  There is more fiddling with my arm and bandages, and then I am permitted to go and sit down in the cookie and juice room (no caffeine for first-time donors!)

As I sit there drinking my orange juice and eating my cookie, I imagine where my blood will go from here.  Samples will go to the lab for testing, and the donation will be added to the blood bank.

I imagine it being transfused into someone’s broken body, transforming the probability of death into the possibility of life, into hope.

I imagine the joy of some family, in some hospital, when they are given the news that their loved one is going to make it.

I imagine Captain Snuggles healing and becoming whole.

I imagine myself someday saying to him, “Thank you.  Thank you for making me a better person.”

Filed Under: Blood donation, life, Medical, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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With These Shoes I Thee Wed

January 19, 2011 By

In 102 days – or 3 months and 12 days – I will be getting married.  I’m OK with this.  The list of things to be done between now and then is staggering, but as long as there are more than 100 days to go, I will feel as if there is plenty of time.  Lots of time to get the wedding dress finished and make sure all of the bridal party have their outfits sorted out.  Time to book the DJ and the photographer, and get our invitations sent out. Time to arrange hair and makeup trials, speak to the florist, decide on guest favours.  There is time for us to make up our friggin’ minds what we want the cake to look like (we both want something highly original, but we have differing ideas, and mine is definitely better).

As long as there are more than 100 days to go, there is loads of time to take care of this and everything else that I haven’t even thought of.

On Saturday, when there are 99 days left, I will probably go into total meltdown.  I even know what the meltdown will be about.  It won’t be about all of the stuff I just mentioned, which might stress me out, but I know it will get done on time.  Most of it has been started in some form or another.

It’ll be about the shoes.

On Saturday, I will wake up and realize that I have only 99 days to find, purchase, and break in the perfect pair of shoes.

I hate shoe shopping with a passion.  I find it next to impossible to find shoes that meet both of the following two basic criteria:
1) To be comfortable
2) To be pretty

When I look at the shoes that other women wear, it boggles my mind.  How are these ladies able to squeeze their feet into tiny little capsules that compress their toes and are on four-inch heels, and still walk normally?  If I tried to pull that off I’d stumble around like a drunk giraffe and then fall over in a very undignified manner and twist both of my ankles.

My feet, you see, are too important to me.  I am addicted to running, so I kind of need my feet just for the sake of maintaining my sanity.  I need to take care of them, so my shoes have to be comfortable and stable.  I have to have space to wriggle my toes around.

“Open-toed shoes!” I hear you call out.  Yes, open-toed shoes do tend to be more comfortable for me, and in the summer I wear them a great deal.  Open-toed shoes do have a lot of potential to meet the “be comfortable” requirement.  The “be pretty” requirement is another story altogether.

My feet are ugly. I do not say this with embarrassment, but with pride.  My feet with their calloused heels, and with their blackened and missing toenails, are a testament to my running. They tell the story of many hours of training in the gruelling heat and the biting cold, the accomplishment of personal best times, the amazing feeling of triumph at half-marathon finish lines, and most importantly, the funds raised through my running to benefit people with autism.

Yes, I am proud of my feet in all their butt-ugly glory.

They look crap in open-toed shoes, though.

I am looking at getting running shoes for my wedding.  On Friday (when I have 100 days to go) I will start my quest for running shoes with bling. Shoes that will be comfortable and look pretty, and have the added bonus of reflecting who I am.

Or maybe I should just go barefoot.  No-one’s going to see my shoes anyway.

Filed Under: postaday2011, Shoes, Wedding Tagged With: , , , , ,
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Farewell To A Hero: RIP Sgt Ryan Russell

January 18, 2011 By

Today, in a departure from my usual selection of topics, I want to talk about the police.  Depending on who you are talking to, this can be a surprisingly heated topic.  People go on about police brutality, racial profiling, and all of that kind of bad stuff.  I am not denying that it happens.  Some police officers are total asshats (I saw that word in another blog and liked it, and I’ve been itching to use it in a sentence ever since).  There are the bad cops who will discriminate, abuse, and power-trip from here to the moon.

But for the most part, police officers are the good guys.  The cop who responded when George accidentally called 911 at the age of eleven months was very understanding.  He allowed us to take a picture of himself with George, and with the two firefighters who also came.  We didn’t get hit with a fine, our child was not incarcerated, and everyone went home happy.

Then there was the policeman named Larry who took time for James, who was two at the time and had squealed excitedly upon seeing a real police car.  Larry showed James the car and chatted with him, and by the end of it James was wide-eyed with the wonder of talking to a “real policecar man”.  It may have only been five minutes of Larry’s time, but I will never forget how his kindness made my child happy.

And today, as the city mourns, Toronto’s Finest are burying one of their own, Sgt. Ryan Russell, killed in the line of duty last week.

In a sequence of events that seems so pointless, a man stole a snowplow and for two hours he used it to go on a terrifying rampage through city streets.  He crashed into parked cars, drove into a storefront, and rammed into a taxi occupied by its driver.  As Sgt. Russell tried to intervene, the snowplow was driven right into him and crushed him.  He was taken to hospital, where he died of his injuries.

One police officer taken from us while trying to serve and protect.

One woman thrust into widowhood far too young.

One two-year-old child who will grow up without his father.

An entire city grieving for the first Toronto police officer killed in the line of duty since 2002.

As I write this article, the funeral has just started.  More than 10,000 people are there – friends and family members of the man being honoured, members of the public, police officers from all across North America.  The show of respect is phenomenal.  And that’s the way it should be.  Police officers are heroes.  They deserve recognition and appreciation while they are alive, and they deserve a damned good send-off when they die.

R.I.P. Sgt Russell.  You are a hero and I am shedding a tear for you.

Filed Under: Death, Police, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
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Farewell To A Hero: RIP Sgt Ryan Russell

January 18, 2011 By

Today, in a departure from my usual selection of topics, I want to talk about the police.  Depending on who you are talking to, this can be a surprisingly heated topic.  People go on about police brutality, racial profiling, and all of that kind of bad stuff.  I am not denying that it happens.  Some police officers are total asshats (I saw that word in another blog and liked it, and I’ve been itching to use it in a sentence ever since).  There are the bad cops who will discriminate, abuse, and power-trip from here to the moon.

But for the most part, police officers are the good guys.  The cop who responded when George accidentally called 911 at the age of eleven months was very understanding.  He allowed us to take a picture of himself with George, and with the two firefighters who also came.  We didn’t get hit with a fine, our child was not incarcerated, and everyone went home happy.

Then there was the policeman named Larry who took time for James, who was two at the time and had squealed excitedly upon seeing a real police car.  Larry showed James the car and chatted with him, and by the end of it James was wide-eyed with the wonder of talking to a “real policecar man”.  It may have only been five minutes of Larry’s time, but I will never forget how his kindness made my child happy.

And today, as the city mourns, Toronto’s Finest are burying one of their own, Sgt. Ryan Russell, killed in the line of duty last week.

In a sequence of events that seems so pointless, a man stole a snowplow and for two hours he used it to go on a terrifying rampage through city streets.  He crashed into parked cars, drove into a storefront, and rammed into a taxi occupied by its driver.  As Sgt. Russell tried to intervene, the snowplow was driven right into him and crushed him.  He was taken to hospital, where he died of his injuries.

One police officer taken from us while trying to serve and protect.

One woman thrust into widowhood far too young.

One two-year-old child who will grow up without his father.

An entire city grieving for the first Toronto police officer killed in the line of duty since 2002.

As I write this article, the funeral has just started.  More than 10,000 people are there – friends and family members of the man being honoured, members of the public, police officers from all across North America.  The show of respect is phenomenal.  And that’s the way it should be.  Police officers are heroes.  They deserve recognition and appreciation while they are alive, and they deserve a damned good send-off when they die.

R.I.P. Sgt Russell.  You are a hero and I am shedding a tear for you.

Filed Under: Death, Police, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
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Mirror, Mirror, On The Wall

January 17, 2011 By

Before I go into the story of what happened last night, I should set a bit of context.  When Gerard’s Dad died almost eight years ago, we moved in with Gerard’s Mom, who at the time did not want to be alone. We live downstairs, she lives upstairs, and each of us has own own fully equipped kitchen and whatnot, so we can live completely independently of one another and yet still be in the same house.  For a while, things were kind of tumultuous, but now they have settled down and we are all getting along famously.

My mother-in-law – or future mother-in-law, if you want to get technical about it – is making my wedding dress.  The woman is a phenomenon with a sewing machine, and she is going to create something spectacular – far better than anything I would find in a store.  I am not even intimidated by the fact that my wedding is the day after the British Royal Wedding.  My dress is going to be much prettier than Kate’s.

Last night’s drama started because my mother-in-law and I needed a mirror. A full-length mirror that we could prop up against the wall in her sewing room, that would allow me to see the dress in all its full-length glory during fittings.

Gerard and I just happen to have a spare mirror.  I think it was originally part of some long-gone piece of furniture, and for the last three years or so it’s been propping up the wall in an impractical spot in George’s room.  No-one ever uses the thing, so last night Gerard took the mirror upstairs to the sewing room (after the work-in-progress that is the dress had been securely hidden away, of course).

To say that George got upset would be like saying Donald Trump has a little bit of spare cash.

The kid exploded.  This small change to his immediate environment made him go into utter meltdown.  He was frantically running around in circles, screaming, “Put the mirror back!  Put the mirror back!”  It wasn’t angry, tantrummy screaming.  It was the kind of screaming borne of frustration and anxiety.

You see, George doesn’t cope with change.  When the slightest thing changes – a lightbulb burning out, the laundry hamper in the wrong place, the cordless telephone not in its docking station – he gets really stressed.  A few weeks ago we thought our dishwasher was leaking, so we pulled it out to take a look, and this sent George into such a flurry that it was days before he would set foot in the kitchen again.

The mirror being taken away sent him right over the top, in a way that nothing else has before.  I’m guessing it’s because the mirror was in his room; that it was his own space being violated.  It’s not that he looks in the mirror, it’s just that he’s used to it being there.  And when something he is used to is taken away, it represents a wrinkle, an interruption of stability.

At some point during this wild, frenzied activity, George ran up to his Dad sobbing, and beseechingly wailed, “Put the mirror back, please!”  He turned and looked at me, and in his eyes I saw utter desperation and fear bordering on panic.

Some people might argue that we should have stood our ground, that “giving in” to George would set a bad precedent.  They might say that the only way to get George to cope with change would be to desensitize him to it, to expose him to change and weather the storm, no matter what.

But you know something?  Sometimes, it just ain’t worth it.  Nothing is worth seeing your child in that much pain and anguish. Gerard and I agreed that we would just pay twenty bucks for a new mirror, and he went back upstairs, retrieved the mirror and put it back in its place.  When the mirror had been restored, we picked George up from where he had been cowering on the couch, and took him into his room.  He refused steadfastly to look at the wall, but he must have seen the mirror in his peripheral vision, because that heartbreaking wailing came to an end.

At that point, the stress of what he had just been through must have caught up with him.  All of a sudden, he jumped up off his bed, ran to the bathroom, and threw up.  A lot.

I wanted to cry.  My poor beautiful boy was in such a state of stress that he actually threw up?  That is awful. Do you know how stressed you have to be for it to make you physically ill?  No mother wants to think of her child going through that level of anxiety.

I gently cleaned my son’s face and dried his tears, and then I turned out the lights and hugged him as lay in his bed.  Right before he drifted off to sleep, I asked him how he felt.

“Happy,” he whispered, as he closed his eyes.

That’s all a parent really wants for their child.

(Photo credit: Flickr Creative Commons Attribution License)

Filed Under: anxiety, autism, postaday2011 Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,
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