If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to live in my household with all of our little quirks, let me paint you a picture.
Hudson refuses kisses.
Not because he isn’t affectionate. Quite the opposite, actually. This kid will ask for a hug approximately every three minutes.
But kisses?
Absolutely not.
Kisses carry germs and we are simply not about that.
He also will not share drinks. If you take one sip of his drink, congratulations—you’ve just contaminated it. He needs a completely new one.
He won’t go get something from the fridge in the basement because there might be spiders.
And not just “ew, there’s a spider.”
No.
Hudson has an extreme fear that a spider is going to spontaneously emerge from the ceiling of the basement and ruin his entire existence.
Meanwhile, I have my own collection of quirks.
We have small utensils in this house because I cannot handle the big ones. The thought of putting a giant fork in my mouth while I’m eating makes me want to throw up.
And plastic?
I’m sorry, but you will never convince me that plastic is truly clean.
You can wash it. You can sanitize it. You can put it through the dishwasher.
I will still taste whatever was in that container before.
It’s gross. I can’t do it.
And yes, I am also the person who uses a sponge to essentially rinse my dishes before putting them into the dishwasher.
Because apparently my dishwasher needs assistance.
This is what life looks like here.
Little quirks.
Specific needs.
Things that make perfect sense to the person experiencing them and might look completely ridiculous to everyone else.
And then there’s Louie.
Oh, Louie.
Louie has an exact process for basically everything.
If the process is out of order, we’re potentially looking at overstimulation, frustration and a whole new challenge.
Unless, of course, Louie decides to change the order himself.
Then we were obviously supposed to know the new order.
Because apparently there is a meeting about these things and I keep missing it.
But here’s the thing.
Having these kids has taught me so much.
Not only about them, but about myself.
It wasn’t until Hudson was diagnosed with ADHD that I really stopped and thought:
Wait.
This is me too.
So I went for my own diagnosis.
And after years of asking myself, Why am I not like everyone else? Why is this so much harder for me? What is wrong with me?
It was honestly a relief to finally have answers.
There wasn’t something wrong with me.
I simply think and process things differently than other people.
And that’s okay.
I don’t want to say there’s something wrong with me anymore.
Because I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with my children simply because they’re different.
Hudson started shining a light on that for me.
And then Louie came along with a giant spotlight yelling,
“NOPE. YOU STILL DON’T GET IT. TAKE IT TO THE NEXT LEVEL.”
😂
Louie’s autism has taught me to look underneath the behavior.
Because people can see his quirks and assume he’s being difficult.
Or spoiled.
Or that he’s getting special treatment.
But there is almost always a reason.
Take transitions.
One of Louie’s hardest things is switching from one activity to another. His brain doesn’t always just flip a switch because an adult said, “Okay, we’re done.”
But give him a timer.
Tell him he has five minutes.
When that timer goes off, it’s time to move on.
And suddenly?
He gets up.
He cleans up what he was doing.
And he moves on to the next thing.
The timer gave him the information he needed.
That’s not spoiling him.
That’s giving him a tool that helps him succeed.
Or lining up.
Louie needs to either be the first person in line or the last person in line.
People can look at that and think, Why does he always get to be first? Why does he always get to be last?
The answer is actually pretty simple.
The middle doesn’t give him the space he needs.
He isn’t comfortable with people being right up against him. Being at the front or back allows him to create enough distance to feel comfortable.
Eventually, yes, he’ll probably have to learn how to wait in the middle of a line.
But right now?
There are bigger fish to fry.
And I have learned that sometimes progress isn’t about forcing a child to tolerate something simply because everyone else does.
Sometimes it’s about giving them the tools to feel safe enough to learn.
We learned that lesson the hard way last year.
His school tried to make him get used to things by throwing him into the mix.
You have to get used to it eventually, right?
Except when Louie feels trapped, confined or overwhelmed, his instinct isn’t necessarily to explain what’s happening.
He wants out.
And sometimes, for Louie, “I need out” meant taking his clothes off.
At school.
Because when the world feels too close, apparently clothes are just another thing holding pressure on you.
And Louie has absolutely zero shame about it.
He isn’t thinking, Oh my gosh, everyone is going to see me!
He’s thinking logically:
I am uncomfortable. This is making me uncomfortable. Remove the uncomfortable thing.
Problem solved.
Except, you know…
Mom gets called to the school.
There were times last year when I was getting called up four days in one week.
Eventually, I couldn’t keep working because I was constantly having to leave to handle his needs.
That was one of the reasons we changed schools this year so he could have autistic support.
And it has made such a difference.
Because sometimes the support a child needs isn’t more discipline.
It’s someone who understands why they’re doing what they’re doing.
Louie still has accidents sometimes and needs bathroom support.
If he has an accident in a regular bathroom, he may walk right out without his clothes on.
If he needs to poop, he may take his bottoms completely off because that’s what makes sense to him—and then struggle to get them back on correctly.
Backwards.
Inside out.
Whatever configuration his brain has decided is acceptable that day.
And general education staff couldn’t always help him with those things.
So Mom got called.
Again.
And again.
And again.
And then there are the bathrooms themselves.
If Louie sees water around the sink, he needs to clean it.
Paper towel immediately.
Mess on the floor?
He’s cleaning it.
Which sounds wonderful until you remember that this is a first-grade boys’ bathroom and apparently several small boys are still working on the whole aiming thing.
Suddenly the child who wants to clean everything becomes a child who absolutely cannot be trusted alone in a public bathroom.
And that’s one of the hardest parts of parenting him.
I want him to have privacy.
I want him to have dignity.
I want him to be independent.
But sometimes he genuinely needs help.
And that’s okay too.
There are also plenty of days when Louie is simply a kid.
He doesn’t understand why he can’t do exactly what he wants.
He doesn’t understand why he can’t win the game.
Someone says something he doesn’t like.
And suddenly he’s on the ground.
There are times when being overstimulated can lead to him hurting himself. He has scratched himself, bitten himself and banged his head.
Thankfully, that has gotten better.
And finding the right sensory tools has made a huge difference.
He is a massive sensory seeker, especially orally. For a long time, he would put absolutely everything in his mouth.
I tried so many different chews.
He could destroy some of them in a day.
Then we found his Chubuddy.
That thing has been a lifesaver.
Food is another adventure.
Textures can completely change whether Louie will eat something.
But I have to give him credit—he will at least try.
The other night I convinced him to try a taco.
He took a bite.
Thought about it.
And informed me that the taco meat tasted like “poop juice.”
Child.
I have one question.
Why do you know what poop juice tastes like?
Can we talk about that for a minute?
😂
And then there are his tricks.
Louie LOVES tricks.
One time he convinced me there was a banana peel in the toilet.
He is ridiculously believable when he’s trying to trick you.
I fall for it every single time.
And apparently his latest masterpiece was hiding his glasses Monday night because he wanted an extra day off school and thought if I couldn’t find his glasses, I wouldn’t send him.
Joke’s on him.
I sent him anyway.
Without the glasses.
He was not impressed.
And I still haven’t found the damn glasses.
At this point I’m pretty sure he’s sending me on a scavenger hunt just for entertainment.
But here’s another thing about Louie that absolutely amazes me.
He can struggle to read a single sight word from an index card.
One word?
Nope.
But put those words into an entire story?
Suddenly he’s reading like he’s been doing it forever.
He was nonverbal until around two and a half and is still considered speech delayed.
For a long time, it was easy to assume that if he couldn’t communicate something verbally, he didn’t understand it.
But we’ve learned that’s not the case.
He may not communicate what he knows the same way you or I do.
Give him a nonverbal test with pictures, patterns and puzzles, though?
Watch out.
This is the same kid who could put the entire solar system in order when he was three.
And I still sit there sometimes wondering:
What the hell is going on inside that brain of yours?
Because I don’t know how you got there.
I don’t understand the path you took.
But somehow…
you got the right answer.
Just not the way I would have gotten there.
And that has changed me.
Because I used to think that if something wasn’t done the way I would do it, it was wrong.
Now I ask:
“Why?”
What are they seeing that I’m missing?
What does this look like from their side?
What information do they have that I don’t?
What is their behavior actually communicating?
Louie has even shown me a side of himself that completely destroys the stereotype that people sometimes have about autistic children.
Because this kid has an enormous heart.
When Kalli was crying and covered in slobber, Louie grabbed a paper towel and ran over saying,
“Don’t worry, Kalli! Lucious is coming!”
That’s Louie.
The same child who may completely melt down because the world isn’t going according to his plan can also notice that his little sister needs help and immediately run to her.
The same kid who struggles to communicate his own feelings can be incredibly aware of someone else’s.
And that is why I don’t want to describe him by his challenges.
Because those challenges are only one tiny part of who he is.
His autism isn’t something I need to fix.
It’s something I need to understand.
And honestly?
That’s probably one of the biggest lessons my children have ever taught me.
Different doesn’t mean wrong.
Hudson’s ADHD made me look at myself differently.
Louie’s autism made me look at the entire world differently.
And somewhere along the way, I became less judgmental.
I don’t take someone’s rudeness as personally as I used to.
Maybe they’re having an awful day.
Maybe they’re overwhelmed.
Maybe they’re overstimulated.
God knows I’ve been overstimulated enough times to know that sometimes my patience disappears faster than I’d like it to.
Maybe someone is responding to something I can’t see.
Maybe their experience is completely different from mine.
That doesn’t mean I have to agree with their actions.
But I’ve learned to separate intentions from actions.
I can judge myself by my actions while giving other people enough grace to consider their intentions.
Because good intentions don’t always result in good actions.
And sometimes people aren’t trying to be difficult.
Sometimes they’re struggling.
Sometimes they’re communicating the only way they know how.
Sometimes they’re just different.
And maybe the world doesn’t need us to make everyone fit the same mold.
Maybe we just need to get a little better at understanding that there are a whole lot of ways to be a person.
So when you look at my household and see Hudson refusing a kiss but asking for his fifteenth hug of the morning…
When you see me eating with a tiny fork because the big one makes me want to gag…
When you see Louie insisting on being first or last in line…
When you see him clean the bathroom because he can’t stand a drop of water being out of place…
When you see a timer go off and watch him immediately switch gears…
When you see him struggle to tell you something but then absolutely blow your mind with what he knows…
I hope you don’t just see quirks.
I hope you see people.
People who experience the world differently.
People who have different needs.
People who sometimes need accommodations instead of consequences.
People who may need a little more patience, a little more understanding and occasionally a very specific type of fork.
😂
And honestly?
I’m grateful for every one of them.
Because these kids didn’t just teach me how to parent them.
They taught me how to see people.
And they taught me that sometimes the thing we call “wrong” is simply something we haven’t learned how to understand yet.
Maybe that’s the real wonder.
Not figuring out how to make everyone think the way we do.
But learning to wonder:
“What am I missing?”