“He knew how to handle pain. You had to lie down with pain, not draw back away from it. You let yourself sort of move around the outside edge of pain like with cold water until you finally got up your nerve to take yourself in hand. Then you took a deep breath and dove in and let yourself sink down it clear to the bottom. And after you had been down inside pain a while you found that like with cold water it was not nearly as cold as you had thought it was when your muscles were cringing themselves away from the outside edge of it as you moved around it trying to get up your nerve. He knew pain.”
I always feel so weird and uncomfortable and... well... generally, indescribably bad when Mini is going into an evaluation. I used to call it "scared," and maybe it is kind of that. But it is so many other things. Sometimes as I'm driving around or watching TV or cooking dinner or falling asleep or taking a shower or drinking my coffee, a little image of Mini sitting in front of an Expert doing some requested work will pop into my head and I will instantly feel like I've melted into the floor. Instantly I feel small, awkward, sheepish. I feel like a little girl, with big, hopeful, terrified eyes looking up at the All Powerful Oz with eyes that say "Please be careful with me. Please don't hurt me."
Today I was crying in the car as I thought about the three of us, D, Mini, and me, walking into the clinic next Tuesday. We'll hold his hands, we'll toss him in the air as we walk down the sidewalk. D will pick him up if we have to ride in the elevator. We'll take fun treats and talk about animals and Chuck E. Cheese and we'll play memory on my smart phone. Then his name will get called and we'll go learn about him. They'll learn what his developmental deficiencies are and they'll figure out what his sensory processing issues are. They'll count what words he can say, how many he can understand, and they'll watch how often he looks them in the eye and how his facial expressions and social behavior might or might not be appropriate in a given situation.
All the while, I'll be watching, too, reminding myself to breathe in and out, and reminding myself to sit still and not interfere with his evaluation. I'll think to myself "Don't say that. Don't get up. Don't run out. Sit here. Smile. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. Watch. Write down questions. BREATHE, Renee. JUST. BREATHE."
My little boy? He is beautiful. I'm not biased. He is stunning. He has a thunderous laugh, a beautiful smile. He dances with reckless abandon. He loves to run and jump. He kisses his sister with such tenderness, you can only smile and think "love." He is so, so beautiful and I hate having to watch The Experts look hard, study him, to find his flaws. It breaks me into small, jagged bits to watch The Expert begin to see the imperfections and the struggles of my Precious Mini. I want them to gush first, to say "Wow he is amazing, isn't he? What a beautiful kid! These are the thousand things with love about him...." But they don't do that. They just tell me what's wrong.
I want him to just be perfect. I want him to only be happy. I want him to only be successful and to only receive love and approval.
But this hatred I have for evaluations? All of us go through that. My mom watched me, too, as I failed at tasks. I was often betrayed by my girlfriends. I got a D in precalculus. I scarred my singing voice forever. I was deceived by a man I loved desperately and it took more than a year to recover. I ran out of work at two in the afternoon because I was unable to handle a crisis. And now, she is watching me be a mommy to a son with Autism. Now I look back on the struggles I have had to face in my life and I think...
How did my mom watch me live this?
I guess she just took it one struggle at a time. Perhaps that's what we have to do, mommas. We can't bring the struggles of a lifetime out onto the table to try and handle them in advance. It's just too much. Tomorrow, I'm going to be strong and stand beside my little boy as he meets and plays with some folks who are going to help our family. Today, I'll prepare my heart for that. And tomorrow, that's what I'll do. I'll handle Wednesday's problems on Wednesday.
Maybe you will watch your babies go through other things this week, that will chisel away at your heart and make your soul fill with such emotion that your cheeks will sting from the tears. Maybe you will one day, but you'll be spared this week. Whenever it is, we can't live our lives in fear and dwell on what might befall our children. Shitty things happen to everyone in this life. We can't stop it. That is the rub, isn't it? We couldn't walk around our own big issues in life. We couldn't go over or under. We had to walk through. Some of us were fortunate enough to have Love and Support and Compassion on our journeys, but in the end, we are the only ones who could put one foot in front of the other. We did it, you guys. We walked. And our children will do it too.
“Despite your best efforts, people are going to be hurt when it's time for them to be hurt.”
Let's grab the flashlight so we can light the path for our babes. Let's put on our boots and our big girl pants, and grab a backpack so we have what we need to support them on the journey.
Parenthood is the Most Beautiful Job. But it is most assuredly NOT for the weak. When I sat with this little boy in my arms for the first time, I didn't know that from that moment on, I'd have the pain of TWO people to suffer through... Another lesson learned. But, with compassion and deep, inexplicable Love, I will accept the task with humility and gratitude.
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