Make No Mistake...

...nothing about this is easy.

I think sometimes I make it sound to easy, but that's because I'd rather you see forward motion, positive things than the days that a child is shrieking hysterically because I would like him NOT to drink all of my coffee two minutes after I pour the cup.
That's the missing piece from my life. Rationality.
Autism doesn't know rational. My oldest and my youngest child know rational. My husband knows rational. Autism, though, doesn't.

I focus on the days that look like this, where we are playing and smiling and having fun, because I don't want to focus on the days when I think that yeah......I could run away and join the circus. Or maybe be a carnie. I could sell you darts to throw at balloons, three for two dollars.

One of the greatest insults I ever heard, was from a Peter Benchley book. It went something like "If you think this is nothing, it's only because you lack the alchemy to make it worthy."

It's that phrase I think of on hard days. I'm smart, I'm capable, and I love my children fiercely. I won't love the autism that has two of them so confused and challenged, but I love them. I can and will deal with this and make it work. Somehow. WE will make it work.

No one promises you when you have a child that everything is going to be OK. That's a mistake we all believe when we set out on the path. I think sometimes, it's easy when you have special needs kids to slip back into that. To think MY LIFE WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE LIKE THIS. I wasn't supposed to have 8 year olds in diapers who scream and shriek for no reason. I wasn't supposed to live this way.

But when your head clears and the tears stop, you hit this moment of reason. Why not? Why weren't you supposed to? Was there a contract? Were there promises made by a supreme being? "Gee you've been so good in XYZ lives that THIS time, we'll give you one without hardship. WELL DONE!"

Nope.

What you are promised, in fact, is nothing. Not even tomorrow. 

If a genie came by today and said I will trade you Miles and Charlie for two different children, and those children will be 100% normal in every way, yet they will not be yours, I would decline. Every bad thing that ever happened to me is a drop in the bucket compared to what has happened to other people. 

I do not lack the alchemy to make this worthy. 

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