Autism Is Too Hard

I've mentioned the Raptor noise. I've mentioned the fact that Miles makes the noise and Charlie goes crazy. I haven't mentioned that when Charlie goes crazy he attacks someone, usually me.

Miles makes the noise specifically to incite Charlie. Why? I don't know. Evil? Glee? Joy? Malicious intent? Often at the same time he signals Charlie to surrender whatever he has, toy, pillow, blanket, piece of string, it doesn't matter. Charlie will surrender it and then start screaming - followed shortly by ATTACK.

If you haven't even been attacked by your own child, well, that's a good thing. It's a very specific sort of hell. If your child is big enough to hurt you, and strong enough to be a problem, well that's even worse. Mine is big and only getting bigger. He'll grab the flesh on my abdomen and back and twist and squeeze so hard it feels like he's going to rip me open. Or he'll jam his chin or head into me, usually someplace soft, or an arm (or hell a leg) repeatedly, as hard as he can. He bares his teeth like a chimp attacking, the chimp smile they talk about on nature shows that is actually a threat.

It's scary.

What's worse is that having to extricate myself means defending myself  FROM my child. Sometimes I have to fight back to get free, to keep from getting knocked down the stairs, to keep from getting truly hurt vs just bruised and mentally broken. Every time I happens I get lost in the horror that this is my baby, that baby that I gave birth to and was so tiny, so fragile. And he's trying to hurt me because he's in a rage he can't control.

Yesterday in the car he attacked Julia. Driving to pick up Louis from scout camp Miles started the noise, and Charlie started shrieking and screaming. Then Julia started shrieking and screaming - because she was being grabbed. I was driving 50 miles per hour. By the time I got to the pick up location the screaming and shrieking in the car had ramped up to the point that people were staring as we pulled up, more so when I left the car and took Julia with me.

Louis welcome home was a charming reminder of the nightmare his home life can be. Screaming and shrieking for no good reason, and people staring. Welcome home Kid, oh life sucks remember?

They're my babies, and I love them. Sometimes I don't know what we're supposed to do though. Just a notch or two up on the Spectrum would've made our lives so much easier. I don't know how to deal with this new behavior, I don't know how to deal with the way this breaks my heart.

This screaming, this fighting, this attacking and hurting, this is the kind of shit that long term breaks families apart.

Who could blame anybody for wanting to escape this situation? Poopie diapers from 11 year olds and nonstop chaos? Yeah, I can understand not wanting to be here. This is why families with special needs children get divorced. 

There's no  magic pill to make this better. This is literally my life for the rest of my life. I'd like to say I'm at peace with it but that would be a fucking lie. I'm not. I'm pissed off. We're both pissed off and would like our normal lives back now please. 

It's not happening, and I'm trying to find some level of peace with it I am. I don't believe THERE IS A PLAN or I'M BEING TESTED (in fact, I might smack you one for suggesting it). I'm just trying to find a way not to cry at bed time, not to feel like I'm failing everyone, and that there is no hope. That's what I resent the most, the fact that there is no hope. It might get better in degrees but there is no cure.

I normally try to be positive about their autism but sometimes even I can't roll with that shit and after this past week I just can't. It's been bad. 

It'll get better. It'll calm down. 

But when?

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