Saturday, March 7, 2015

blessings

I am going through Asperger parent hell at the moment. I won't even go in to it, but due to sensory issues, my daughter is currently starving herself to death. We're on day 7 of no food no liquid now, bar Thursday when I got some soda and milkshake into her. 

On the plus side, when I went into town to buy a remedy for her, I met a lovely woman whose mother has Asperger's and she has spent her life, from far too early an age, trying to deal with it. The mind boggles. 
Anyway, she talked to me for ages, gave me advice, understanding, recommendations and her phone number. She only works two days a week there, and was just back from lunch when I rolled in (far later than I'd intended). It was ... very nice. 

I just saw my friend's face book page - they saw an otter (a rare event, I've never seen one), out on a walk, while her daughter was in full on Asperger's meltdown mode. The otter was a delight and a distraction, she said. A godsend. Possibly similar to the one I had today when I met the woman in the health food shop. One of her friends responded 'you're blessed!'. 

Really? The internet is full of rage at the moment at the terrible parents who are afraid of their children developing autism, and how wonderful Autistic kids are, how wrong we are to demonise it. I think of my daughter upstairs, having screaming hysterics over the issue of having just one sip of water, hating me for trying to keep her hydrated and alive. Of how difficult it can be to just go for a walk with your family. I don't she was blessed. I think she was compensated. Briefly. 

2 comments:

Ms. Moon said...

Yeah. What a blessing. What a shit-blessing.
May your daughter come out of it soon. That is scary, Jo.

Jo said...

Normally I do think it's a little bit of a special thing to see an animal in the wild, and there's no doubt this came along at the same time. The otter was special, no doubt, and I know that's what the friend meant, I just think people need to choose their words carefully.

Another friend's six year old son is having horrible chemo for kidney cancer at the moment. I wouldn't swap with her. It's just...