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Homecomings

May 24, 2012 By

I am participating in the 2012 Wordcount Blogathon, which means one post every day for the month of May.

When my kids were little – well, littler than they are now – they went to a great daycare centre a few minutes’ walk away from our house. When the weather was nice, the kids would be allowed to play outside at the end of the day while they were waiting for their parents to pick them up. When I got off the bus from work, I would walk directly to the centre, and as I approached, I would hear the sound of children laughing and playing in the outdoor play area behind the building.

There is no sound in the world that is more magical than the laughter of children. I used to treasure that part of every day – those moments in which the sounds of childhood joy floated through the air and reached my ears.

When my boys reached the age-limit of the daycare and had to leave, I knew that I would miss those precious sounds.

Now that both boys are always home by the time I get off the bus, my homecoming is quite different to what it was back then, but it is no less magical.

My husband and children, alerted to my impending arrival by a text or phone call from me, stand together at the front door, peering out of the frosted glass panels on either side. When I appear at the end of the road, my husband opens the door and releases them into our quiet street. They charge down the road towards me, running in that completely natural, unrestrained way that only children are capable of, and they launch themselves at me, giggling helplessly as I pretend to fall over backwards.

By this time, my husband is usually ambling down the road to meet me. We go for a walk around the block, all four of us holding hands. Then we turn and head back towards the house. When we’re about half a block away, we line the kids up.

On your marks!

The kids look up at us with anticipation.

Get set!

George starts to giggle and looks all around him. James, who has acquired my love of running and actually takes this seriously, looks straight ahead as he braces himself for takeoff.

GO!

And they’re off, racing each other to the house. In that moment, we are not looking at a child with autism and a child without autism. We are looking at two typical boys, being brothers.

And this is what life is all about. Love. Togetherness. Family.

(Photo credit: Kirsten Doyle)

Filed Under: 2012 Wordcount Blogathon, Childhood, Children, family, Laughter, life Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
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Sick Child, Sleepless Night

February 8, 2011 By

When you receive a call from your child’s daycare that includes the words “vomiting” and “diarrhea”, you know your day is about to take a nosedive.

Yesterday morning, I arrived at work and went straight into a meeting without even going to my desk first. After the meeting, I returned to my desk and saw the message light on my phone blinking. Three new messages. All of them from James’ daycare teacher, asking begging for someone to pick him up and take him home.

This was a problem for me, since I was sitting in my office at work, more than an hour away by public transit. I called my mother-in-law, who is listed on James’ paperwork as a designated pick-up person. She didn’t answer her phone. I called Gerard, whose place of business is ten minutes’ drive away. He didn’t answer his phone. For about twenty minutes, I was frantically calling the two numbers in turn, picturing my poor child huddled over miserably at the daycare. In the end, my mother-in-law picked him up, and took care of him for the day until Gerard and I were able to get home.

During the night, things got really rough. Right before bedtime, James twisted around to throw up again, into the plastic basin that he had placed beside him. As he twisted, he dinged his knee very hard on the metal frame of the futon he was lying on. All of a sudden, his knee was as much of a problem (although a less messy one) than the fact that he was sick.

He was crying because his stomach was hurting. He was crying because his knee was hurting. He was crying because he felt bad about messing up his clothes. He was crying because he was hurting with thirst and couldn’t keep anything down.

My poor baby.

I lay down with him and tried to sleep.

That didn’t work out too well. During the night, there were two episodes of vomiting and one of diarrhea, along with many, many cries of pain because of the sore knee. I iced and bandaged the knee, and that seemed to help. I dressed James in clean pyjamas, and that made him feel better. I gave him sips of flat Coke, and he managed to keep that down.

Finally my boy went to sleep.

I did not. By now my mind was racing a million miles a minute. I was thinking of anything and everything. Rest was out of the question. Finally, at around 6:00 a.m., I fell into a fitful sleep, only to be woken up half an hour later.

Going to work today was out of the question. James, while a lot better, needs to be at home, and he needs his Mommy with him. Meanwhile, Mommy’s brain is in a complete fog. I tried to do some work from home, but in the end, I decided to take the day off. Work in any reasonable form was just not going to happen today.

On the bright side, we have had about seven hours now with no throwing up, and about five hours with no diarrhea.

Things are looking up.

Filed Under: Children, Illness, parenting Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,