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Firstborn Newborns

May 17, 2013 By 1 Comment

Mom and sleeping babyMy first baby just had her first baby!!

I can’t find the words to describe what I feel when I hold my baby’s baby in my arms…

She is so perfectly beautiful!!

Her full bodied stretches amaze me,

And her wide mouthed yawns amuse me…

Her utter stillness (when something catches her attention) awes me…

And sheer magnitude of what God has done between those two births, 25 years apart, is profoundly affecting me.

My firstborn was born into a manic crises (a story for another blog – after I’ve had SLEEP) … and in all my exhaustion and pain back then, I could not imagine anything in my future being worth living for. Certainly not something as amazing and powerfully good as holding HER firstborn! To me, at the time, my future held nothing but gloom and doom. “Gloom, despair, and agony on me! Deep dark depression, excessive misery! … if it weren’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all – gloom, despair, and agony on me!” (a song from the old TV show, Hee Haw)

It astounds me God wove all these meaningful tender newborn moments into my future.

During those dark days though, my mama shared a tender poem, to encourage her firstborn (me).  This is for any of you in our Chosen Families family, who feel this way:

I’m too tired to trust and too tired to pray,

Said one, as the over-taxed strength gave way.

The conscious thought by my mind possessed,

Is, oh, could I just drop it all and rest.

 

Will God forgive me, do you suppose,

If I go right to sleep as a baby goes,

Without an asking if I may,

Without ever trying to trust and pray?

Will God forgive you? Why think, dear heart,

When language to you was an unknown art,

Did a mother deny you needed rest,

Or refuse to pillow your head on her breast?

Did she let you want when you could not ask?

Did she set her child an unequal task?

Or did she cradle you in her arms,

And then guard your slumber against alarms?

Ah, how quick was her mother love to see,

The unconscious yearnings of infancy,

When you’ve grown too tired to trust and pray,

When over-wrought nature has quite given way;

Then just drop it all, and give up to rest, (mama starred this line)

As you used to do on a mother’s breast,

He knows all about it – the dear Lord knows,

So just go to sleep as a baby goes;

Without even asking if you may,

God knows when His child is too tired to pray.

He judges not solely by uttered prayer,

He knows when the yearnings of love are there.

He knows you do pray, He knows you do trust,

And He knows, too, the limits of poor weak dust.

Oh, the wonderful sympathy of Christ,

For His chosen ones in that midnight tryst,

When He bade them sleep and take their rest,

While on Him the guilt of the whole world pressed –

You’ve given your life up to Him to keep,

Then don’t be afraid to go right to sleep.

– Ella Conrad Cowherd

(one comment: Jesus didn’t “bade them sleep” as in “sweet dreams!” Actually, He urged them to pray, at the worst moment of His life – and they failed Him completely. But their failure did not change His mind. He accepted their limitations, and saved them anyway.)

Sleepy and still saved,

Joan

 

 

Photo credit: David Castillo Dominici/Freedigitalphoto.net

 

 

 

Filed Under: Family, grandchildren, Journey, Uncategorized

Seeing Red

May 16, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Jesse has an infatuation with firefighters. And, for that matter, fire trucks, fire engines, and firehouses.

Not unusual, you say? Little boys love firefighters, policemen, army men, you add? True. So, let me elaborate a bit.

He’s had 2 fire-themed birthday parties, dressed as a firefighter for 3 consecutive Halloweens, owns 4 fire fighter costumes, 1 fire fighter umbrella and raincoat set, 4 model fire house sets, 22 fire engines and 31 firefighter figurines of various size. Each day, he methodically lays out his firefighter costume, invites me into his “fire house” and shows me his gear before suiting up. We have made no fewer than 6 impromptu stops at fire stations we’ve passed on our journeys, and have waylaid something like 10 firefighters from their very real duties in order that Jesse might sit on one of the engines, wear a helmet, or ask “where is your black and white fire dog?” (He’s been often disappointed to learn that Dalmatians are mostly relics of a by-gone firefighting age. If he sees a Dalmatian in his firefighter story book, he LITERALLY expects to see one at the fire house. That literal nature? Yep, that’s ASD.) There are even firefighter coloring books, firefighter pajamas, firefighter DVDs. For a period of time, all Jesse would watch on television was a 1987 firefighter training video we were able to stream through Netflix. He could recite it word for word. It started out as cute. Sometime after viewing 15, it got downright annoying. He had all of us, and PARTICULARLY his older, emotionally labile brother Noah with ASD himself, seeing red.

As you’ve probably guessed by now, a restricted or limited interest (one that plays out in real life more like an obsession) is one of the hallmarks of an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). These are kids who know every Star Wars character ever introduced, or who can name every dinosaur that ever trod the earth. But I was surprised to discover recently that the MORE restricted the interest, the HIGHER the anxiety – that the latter often incites the former. http://ultimateautismguide.com/2011/06/autism-news-anxiety-restricted-interests/  And, with anxiety being the defining emotion of Asperger’s and other ASD’s, it goes to reason that these kids are destined to experience both – some, more intensely than others. I thought Noah was one for restricted interests, but my sweet Jesse has shown the capability to outpace him red engine for red engine.

This morning, I walked into Jesse’s room and found yet another pile of engines and figures to be re-shelved:

Just a small selection.

But this time, instead of seeing the mess, I HEARD what he was saying. So I sat down.

“Can I visit your fire station?”

He grinned, freckles and dimples squinched up. “Yes. Yes, you can.”

Then I asked Jesse why he liked firefighters so much.

“Because.”

“’Because’ is not really an answer, Jesse. Why do you like them more than anything else?”

“Because they put out fires and save people.”

They “save people.” I exhaled, and squeezed my arms around him. I will do what I can, with God’s help, to make him feel safe and ease his worried mind.

And in the meantime, I suppose there are worse things he could be interested in.

- Sarah

Filed Under: Anxiety, Asperger, Autism, Change, Family, growth, siblings, Uncategorized Tagged With: , ,

Always Enough

May 2, 2013 By Leave a Comment

BluejayI watched two jays squabbling in the front yard today over seed that Grace and I had accidentally spilled from the box. The beautiful, black-capped jays with their cornflower-blue wings showed their ugly desperation for more by screeching and flapping at each other in an effort to grab everything they could. Does a bird have a cut-off switch? It’s said dogs can eat until they vomit. I don’t know whether birds can do the same. How much seed does one bird need? There were tiny scatterings of seed beyond the bigger, central pile. But the birds went straight for the biggest payoff, missing what was hidden in the grass.

I can relate.

Money is tight. As Matt is in sales, we live on his salary, but we advance on his bonuses. Bonuses that aren’t around right now. My dear husband is burning the midnight oil on project after project, but to no (seeming) avail. Each night we pray, “Lord let a deal close.” Each morning, He answers, “Not yet.”

And then I spend a fair amount of time screeching at Him like a Jay.

We’ve already burned through our medical flexible spending program, and it’s only May. With two kids on the autism spectrum, Grace’s eye care, and my own medical needs, we spent $5,000 in less time than it takes a Kardashian to start a reality show. This study from the Brookings Institute, indicating a robust and direct relationship between income and well-being, didn’t lift my spirits, either. Apparently, money CAN buy happiness.

But not necessarily contentment.

“I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.” Philippians 4:11-12

Daily, the Lord reminds me I haven’t missed a meal. I have a roof over my head, cars that run, beautiful, healthy children, a devoted husband, and a few nice things (relics of a past, more…..er…..plentiful lifestyle). He has used our present circumstances to forge a new frugality, and we are stretching dollars like they are made of tire rubber. No food goes to waste, no excessive purchases are made. We have prayed for nearly two years that the Lord might heal our finances. His answer to us has included the practice of looking carefully for ways to get by on less.

I HATE less. I like MORE. But I cannot deny that my heart swells with pride when I shave $50 off my grocery bill, or sell outgrown clothes at a consignment store. It is in the saving of money and our systematic downsizing that we are reminded we CAN survive, and thrive, on less. And in so doing, we are content.

There is ALWAYS enough for us, scattered somewhere in the grass.

- Sarah

Contact: Sarah@chosenfamilies.org

Image courtesy of Ron Bird/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

Filed Under: Anxiety, Asperger, balance, Challenge, Encouragement, Family, God's presence, growth, Hope, stress, Uncategorized

State of Mind

April 9, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Noah is an easy crier. But he comes by this honestly. His linebacker-sized father can cry on a dime. Once when I was pregnant, I caught him weeping at a Huggies commercial.

Noah likes to hide his tears. Not even the doctor is permitted to see him cry when we’re at his office to have Noah’s strep or ear infections evaluated. There is no convincing him that it’s okay to cry. Instead, he hurries to find a place to retreat, cover his face, wipe his eyes with fevered intensity. Restaurant bathrooms are a good getaway, for there, he crouches under the downward tilt of the automatic hairdryer and lets the hot rush of air evaporate his tears.

I am not much of a crier, myself. I would rather put on a pair of oversized sunglasses and make a joke than I would let you see me ball. I find something of weakness in it, and so like Noah, I can find crying shameful.

So imagine my surprise this week when both Noah and I let loose a flood of tears over things that might ordinarily have seemed less than tragic. I have come to realize it was due in large part to our states of mind.

For Noah, he was overtired. There is no self-regulation in him (as is often the case for kids with ASD), so he will run until his legs can carry him no further and his lungs are set to burst with effort. He will seem perfectly modulated one day, and then the next, he’s on the floor screaming, terrorizing his siblings with extra force, refusing the simplest of tasks. We had, this night, mentioned the prospect of a small change, with opportunities for all the kids to weigh in. Just bringing it up set Noah to sobbing.

As for me? Well, I too, was exhausted. After hosting a birthday party for Jesse on Saturday that lasted well into the night with flashlight tag, Matt and I unloaded the entirety of our portable storage unit on Sunday. Every last box, bin, toy and furniture item. I managed to bruise my shin and torque my elbow, and the next day, I crawled my aching body to the bed for a two hour nap with Jesse.

I might have left it at that. I knew I was overtired. Instead, I put on my riding boots and went out into the field to get the pony and our thoroughbred mare. After I finally cornered the pony, who made me chase him a good 20 minutes before capture, and in a moment of apparently misplaced confidence, I swung a leg over him in the field, intending to ride him bareback into the barn for our lesson. The minute I got on, I instantly regretted it. He swung his head around, and took off galloping toward the herd, with me clutching like a monkey to his long mane. It didn’t last long. In a moment that seemed like it would last forever, but was in reality probably half a second, I was swinging over his shoulder and heading toward the hard, hard ground.

I fell off and landed square on my pride.

It was too much for my body to handle, and mentally adding it to a long list of second-guesses in this period of my life (“This, too, is doomed to fail!”) I just rolled over and started sobbing. Jesse was calling from the barn, “Mama, are you ok? I will call daddy!” All I could moan was, “Just give me a minute!”

Where the Lord Himself stepped in was with the snuffling sound I heard between my sobs. I felt something on my head and looked up. There, around me in a near-circle were all six horses in the field who had come to stand around me after I’d fallen. Mozart, the largest, and a famed steeplechaser in his day, had rested his muzzle on my head, as if to ask if I was alright. The Lord shepherded me back to the house with my 4-year old Jesse, who held my hand, and asked if he could take me to the hospital in his ambulance. Then, when we finally got back into the house, I felt the Lord stifling a laugh when I fell on the floor crying in Matt’s office, telling him what had happened and that I felt like a failure. Jesse jumped right in: “You can do it, mom! You’re still young!” And there the Lord was, in the end, as Matt looked at me, held my face in his hands, and said, “I have total confidence in you. I love you, and I believe in you.”

What I have learned is that humility comes before honor (Proverbs 18:12). And who else is more humble than s/he who cries? Jesus himself cried at Lazarus’ death – because of His personal loss and the great love for His friend. He is one acquainted with our sufferings – a “man of sorrows” who was despised by many (Isaiah 53:3). I understand now that sorrow is a perfectly acceptable state of mind; it isn’t shameful, and needn’t be hidden. Even if our state of mind is one of increased fragility, and the pain is deeper than usual, or the body hurts a little too much, we are known by a God who understands our tears, who loves us despite – and because – of them. When we’re very lucky, He even send us horses to comfort us as we cry.

- Sarah

Filed Under: Asperger, Challenge, Change, Emotions, Family, God's presence, shame, Uncategorized

When I Am Old

March 27, 2013 By Leave a Comment

When I am old, I will miss the night-time creeping that precedes a whispered request to sleep with me. I will miss peeking at the door through a half-closed eye to watch how carefully one of my children turns the knob, how gently the door is closed. This quietness will always mystify me, for when the sun is in the heavens, my children are only able to slam doors.

When I’m old, I will miss the elbows and knees and pointy joints softened by a covering of baby fat that dig their way into my ribs. I will miss the comfort of their presence beside me when daddy is away – which is often. I will miss how it brings me peace in a home that is still unfamiliar. I will miss having to pause for my evening’s final task – turning on the hall light – so that the path to my room isn’t dark or frightening.

When I am old, I will miss the screaming that takes place between two children above my head at three o’clock in the morning, because each wants me to themselves.

Who am I kidding? I won’t miss that at all.

When I am old I will be the one begging for “a hug and a kiss,” and not Jesse. I will be the one asking if she would lay down beside me, not Grace. I will be the one still seeking out a reticent Noah, wrapping my arms around him in the gorilla embrace that is one of the few he tolerates. And in that way, my world will remain a bit the same.

When I am old, I will miss the baby breath humming through lips parted in sleep. I will miss the fuzz of a Disney blanket carried to bed against my face. I will miss kissing the tops of their heads as they settle in, grinning like monkeys because they’ve had their way.

But for tonight, I’d just really like to get some sleep.

- Sarah

Filed Under: Asperger, Attachment, Blessing, Contentment, Family, General, Journey, Parenting, Uncategorized, warmth

When There’s Time

March 19, 2013 By 1 Comment

I’m sitting at the kitchen table. Grace and Matt are gone for the day, and I’m home with two crabby sons: Noah is crabby because he has strep; Jesse is crabby because he’s three. To compound things, we probably pushed them too hard this weekend. Matt and I both suffer from the same disease – the one marked by lack of a shut-off valve. Matt’s plagued more than I am because my body generally gives out before his, but both of us – we don’t rest on the weekends. We run. Karate, gymnastics, physical therapy for Noah, Home Depot, cleaning the barn, organizing more closets and more shelves, entertaining, running, running, running.

The snow falling outside today is small and light, like flour let loose from a canister. And it falls slowly. It falls in such a way that I long for slow-ness myself. The Lord is here with me at the table. I’m sure He is smiling at that comparison.

“I don’t know how to slow down, Lord.”

“I know. I made you, remember? I know your struggles. Why are you running so hard?”

“Because there is so much to do, and so little time. There is never enough time.”

“There is always enough time.”

“But Lord, my list! There are so many things on it. Mundane things, like laundry and cleaning and errands. And pressing things, like taking care of the children and the animals, and paying bills, and buying groceries. And then there are the things I want to do – my riding, Lord. And my writing. But sometimes I’m so overwhelmed by it all that I just really want to go to sleep!”

“So sleep. Come to me, you who are weary and carrying so many heavy burdens, and I will give you the rest you need.” (Matthew 11:28)

“But when I do that, I wake up to even MORE things to do! Lord, why didn’t you make a 36 hour day?”

“Because your body couldn’t handle it. At the end of this perfect day I’ve created, you are forced to sleep. You must stop what you’re doing, and rest. Even I rested, you know. And I told the apostles to do the same (Mark 6:31) … Have you noticed the snow?”

I drop my head. I think I know what He’s going to say.

“Yes, Lord.”

“Sometimes there is much snow. But sometimes, it is merely a few light flakes, quiet and pretty enough for a dusting, and nothing more. It may be heavy and wet, or dry and airy, falling faster, or slower. It moves as it must, for the purpose to which it’s intended, and what the clouds themselves contain. Snow is not always a blizzard, my child. And neither can you pour yourself out so completely or quickly all the time. There will be nothing left of you for the most worthwhile pursuits if you shake out all you have until you collapse.”

Noah is coughing in the family room, and telling me his stomach hurts. His fever is back, and I get up to medicate him, and bring him more water. His sicknesses are particularly pathetic. He moans and screams in pain, particularly intolerant to it. This is consistent with studies indicating those with Autistic Spectrum Disorder have a hyper/hypo sensitivity to stimuli i.e., above average range of feeling or super-sensitivity, first written about in 1949 by Bergman and Escalona. (Contrast this with my daughter, who sliced her foot open on a beach rock in Virginia, and couldn’t wait to tell everyone about it – refusing pain meds and waving to people from her wheelchair at the airport on the way back home like the Queen of England).

I return to my seat and my coffee in the kitchen, my conversation with the Lord.

“You will finish what you need to, when the time is right.”

“WHEN the time is right? Couldn’t I just get it all finished and be DONE? That way I can rest!”

I can hear Him laughing. “And miss what I’m trying to teach you about prioritizing and resting now?”

“Okay. I give. Two things on my list today, and no more.”

“Just one, child.” He looks into the family room where the boys are watching tv, comatose under their blankets. “They need you right now. I willed Noah’s sickness for reasons you do not know, but today, it is so that you yourself might slow down and just be with them.”

“Whatever’s left on your list, you can finish later. When there’s time.”

- Sarah

Filed Under: Asperger, balance, Challenge, Encouragement, Family, God's presence, Journey, rest, Uncategorized

Moving: A Prayer Answered and New Prayer Requests

March 16, 2013 By 1 Comment

For over two years, my wife Stacy Leigh and I have been praying that God would give me a ministry position which would provide for our family and grant us long-term stability. In the fight to overcome the difficulties of autism, both money and stability serve as great allies. But for the past two years, God has kept these two things from us so that we would learn to rely upon him alone.

Yet, finally after this long wait, on Sunday God called me to serve as pastor of Mount Tabor Baptist Church in Buffalo, Kentucky. As any good Baptist knows, the search process for both ministers and churches can be arduous, but throughout this process, we witnessed God’s grace as he connected us with a church that exceeds our expectations and as he gave me favor in the eyes of that church far beyond what I deserve. In fact, he has so guided us that I do not hesitate to say that it was God himself who called me as pastor on Sunday when the congregation voted.

That said, big changes are coming for our family. As I turn a page in my ministry, our family has begun packing for a move to a town an hour away where we have no connections apart from the church. As we make this transition, we ask that you, ChosenFamilies.org readers, pray for us since we know that many of you understand the specific difficulties we face due to Jude’s hidden disability:

1. Please pray for a smooth move and a quick establishment of routine for Jude.

2. Please pray for deep, meaningful friendships to grow, especially for my wife.

3. Please pray for wisdom as we choose therapists and preschool options for Jude.

4. Please pray for us as we navigate bureaucracy. Even though we are only moving a few counties over within the same state, we must reapply for the grant that pays for most of Jude’s therapy. We have already been warned that there will likely be a lag in services as we transition to new providers.

5. Please pray that I will learn to balance all my roles: husband, father, pastor, seminary student, etc.

Joshua

Filed Under: Change, Family

What Stays Behind

March 14, 2013 By Leave a Comment

We took our time with the move. It spanned weeks; nearly a month and a half from start to finish. Matt’s rationale was that it would allow us to get things organized a little at a time, rather than facing a tower of boxes to be unpacked in short, harried order. He was doing ME the favor, of course. I can tell you only one set of hands in our house is chapped from marathon handling of packing paper and cardboard boxes, and it ain’t Matt’s. (Matt will tell you that I married for looks and brute strength, so I suppose I’m satisfied with this arrangement….)

This past weekend was the last we would set foot in our old home. A few items in the basement and the garage, some trash to be bagged, the garage door openers set out on the island, and we were finally finished. The task of cleaning fell to me, and I went through each room, kicking up dust and memories in each one. I happened by chance to end my day in Noah’s room.

My mother asked me a few days ago if it was hard that Saturday when we tied up all the loose ends; when I cleaned the rooms my children had spent six years playing, sleeping, living in. I remembered my time in Noah’s room, and choked back tears. “Yes,” I said. “It surprised me, but it was.”

There were divets in the baseboards where Noah had pulled his storage bench off the wall to retrieve a fallen DS game, shoving it back with too much force.  There were synchronized stickers on his closet – hold overs from his “Cars” phase. Bits of scotch tape marred the wall where he’d taped up a star wars poster, near the door with the Jabba the Hut sticker, under which Noah had written “Jobu” because he didn’t know how to spell Jabba, and was apparently uncertain as to whether anyone would recognize the identity of the space villain without a name tag. Anakin Skywalker was spelled “Ancin” in similar fashion. The ceiling was punctuated with dents from Noah’s bunk bed mattress, reminders of nights spent changing sheets in the dark, and trying to shimmy a mattress back onto a top bunk because its occupant refused at all costs to sleep on the bottom bunk. None of these things – these bits of our life – were coming with us. They were staying behind. The hand that pushed the vacuum started to quake.

Then the vacuum hissed, and spat out into a perfect square of light on the carpet, the tiny key that Noah used to lock his journal. The very same key that had gone missing two weeks after he received the journal. I reached down and picked it up and from the corner of my eye caught sight of Noah pushing his bicycle up the driveway. It was the bike my dad had taught him to ride, the bike he liked to “escape” on, showing up randomly at various homes in the neighborhood – taking off before I could even notice he was gone. I thought then, “This is the last time I will watch him push his bike up this driveway.”

One last time.

That’s when I started to cry.

“But Ruth replied, ‘Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.’” (Ruth 1:16)

The divets and marks and stickers were staying. The feel of the carpet under my feet, the way my voice echoed in the empty hall. These would be left behind. But the boy outside, all gangly arms and gappy teeth, and his angel-faced brother, and grinning, warrior sister – they were coming with. To make new memories, to mar new walls.  My people, my tribe, our God – they were all going with.

I ran a seeping nose across the sleeve of my fleece.  Then I pushed the escaped tendrils from my ponytail out of my eyes, bent down and put the key in my pocket.

It was coming with, too.

- Sarah

Filed Under: Asperger, Attachment, Change, Emotions, Family, Uncategorized

How Hard It’s Not

February 28, 2013 By 1 Comment

Today I sat down to write this entry, intending to enlighten, amuse and exhort the ChosenFamilies.org readers. In regaling you with stories about Noah, I reveal to you a window through which you might view the reality of life with a hidden disability. That life is often awkward. It’s challenging, and can be complicated, but it’s funny. There are many happy endings as we learn from Noah and his Creator. Our burden is comparably light. Even as Jesse’s own diagnoses have emerged to intensify our circumstances, I can’t plead impossibility of burden. I particularly cannot plead it today, when I opened my laptop this morning, and found this:

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/27/17112877-cops-two-boys-grandmother-found-dead-after-she-takes-them-from-day-care?lite

Another lurid headline pulled me in. Then I scrolled to the bottom, and there it was:

“Jeremy and Brenda Perry, parents of the two young boys, told NBC Connecticut that Denison had a gun and she had a mental illness.”

A mental illness. A reference to a “wide range of mental health conditions — disorders that affect mood, thinking and behavior,” according to Mayoclinic.com. A pattern of being that painted the whole canvas of Debra Denison’s life, and from which there was no escape. My mind went to a dark place as I imagined how she could possibly have thought that killing her grandsons and then herself was the right choice – if that was, indeed what happened. My heart aches for the Perry family, as I wonder what the prologue to this story would have revealed: why Debra was permitted to pick the boys up from daycare? Whether she was medicated for her illness? Whether she was being monitored by a psychiatrist or other mental health professional? Why she had access to a gun?

I wonder most of all why the healthcare system in America is failing those with disabilities. “But your family is doing fine!” you say. Why hasn’t the system failed Noah, or Jesse or me? Because we’ve probably spent $50,000 on medication, therapies and doctors (this is a conservative estimate). Because we’ve worked tirelessly at early diagnoses to alter history’s course at the earliest possible junction. Because we are our own best advocates and we never rest at getting “better.” We are our own champions. God has blessed us in giving us to each other. Yet there are those that must manage mental illness on their own. This is nothing short of impossible, as the way of thinking needed to get better is the very thinking absent from the start.

There is no “funny” in this post. Which is too bad, because Matt never ceases to be amused at the way I laugh when I’m writing (no one thinks I’m funnier than I am, unfortunately). I wish I could be more light-hearted today, but I am hearing the voices of those who are un-medicated, undetected, untreated, unhappy.

“He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.” 1 Thessalonians 5:10-11.

I am lifting them up today, and I am lifting up those who care for them. I am praying for them, and asking the Lord to let us better see and help them whose lives are harder than ours.

- Sarah

Filed Under: Anxiety, Asperger, Challenge, Change, Church Response, community, Family, General, growth, Uncategorized

Open for Business

February 21, 2013 By Leave a Comment

Routine tasks often prove the hardest for my Noah. Tasks of a higher emotional and intellectual input are nearly impossible. This move of ours – wherein we moved a mere 6 miles from our former home, kept all children in the same school, and did it all slowly, as unhurriedly as possible over the course of a month so as to prevent any psychic earthquakes – sent Noah into a tailspin. I should have guessed this was going to be the case. There is only so much cushioning you can give an Aspie when his world begins to change. So, in the wake of the final push of our move, I should not have been surprised that Noah’s behavior fell somewhere between chaos and rage. On the day itself, Noah blasted past us in the foyer, hurtling down to his room, yelling over his shoulder that he had a project he was going to do. That this was his “plan for the day.” Before we settled into our new home, Noah had packed everything from torn posters to bits of tape he’d salvaged from the walls. There were figurines with missing heads, carnival slinkies stretched beyond use, shoes with shredded soles. He was unable to distinguish between useful and superfluous, between broken and functional. Everything that could possibly be thrown away made it into a moving box and came with us. Unpacking this all gave me apoplexy. For an almost 9-year-old, a request to send him to his room to pack his belongings is a natural one. One assumes that there will be some sort of self-governance that eliminates the moving of – for lack of a better term – “junk.” But Noah’s “junk” moving was just the beginning. Once at the house, this “project” of his ate the better part of a day, and I didn’t bother to check its progress because it kept him out of my hair. When he yelled from the bottom floor, insistent that I come see what he’d done, my jaw hit the floor. He opened his closet door to show me this:

Getting down to business.

“It’s my DS store,” he said. And sure enough, on every shelf, Noah had aligned his DS games with cases upright and inserts facing out, just as they are displayed at Gamestop. Now this was a puzzle to me. The boy who packs things like books with missing pages, or plush animals vomiting their stuffing; who throws every lego he owns in a giant box, but tosses the instructions (insuring that he’ll never construct the pieces from the set in their intended way, again), THIS boy had taken the case for every DS he owns and arranged them with the precision of a scientist. WHY? This was also a puzzle to me. All I can imagine – and this is where I must be content to let the questions end (because sometimes guessing is all I’ve got) – is that this was Noah’s way of not only controlling his environment, but controlling (channeling?) his emotions through the precise, repetitive task of touching and working with the familiar things that he loved.

Grace, ever the pragmatist, folded her arms in front of his closet. “Uh, that’s great, Noah. But you have one little problem. Where are your clothes going to go?” We still don’t know. For now, they’re still mostly in boxes on the floor. His room’s a mess, and so is mine. We’re not quite open for business. But we have a little peace.

~ Sarah

Filed Under: Asperger, balance, Challenge, Change, Emotions, Family, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,
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