autism is a journey: Costumes and Cousins

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Costumes and Cousins

Tomorrow is Halloween....what will Jax be? Perhaps Kermit the Frog for the 3rd year in a row...hmmm....we'll have to wait and see....

Jackson loves to jump on the tramoline at Aunt Jackies. Tonight we had to go over and visit and he had the best time jumping with his cousin Taylor. Taylor really does a great job with Jackson and has grown closer to him since she went on a long weekend with us. She just seems to 'know' how to engage him. It was heartwarming to see them together tonight...

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from "Metaphor-the puzzle piece symbol"

Ever had one of those "ah-ha" moments? I'm driving down the road today, pondering Jackson's recent successes--boyscout camp and football camp. It occurred to me that each experience gave me back a piece of Jackson. [I'm not doing a very good job explaining this...] When we learned about Jackson's diagnosis, so many dreams were snuffed out. We no longer thought about our son becoming an athlete, a scholar, or even a friend. We thought in much smaller terms:"how many words does he have?""did he learn a new sign""is he reaching out to us?""that's playing pretend, isn't it?"Our perspective as parents permanently changed. It's like we had this complete picture of our child and autism fractured it--into a 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle.Each day little by little, we get pieces of the puzzle back. It'll never be complete, never the same as we expected, but there will be parts that will come together.Like when he participated in the school music program, enjoyed boyscout camp, rode the roller coaster and attended football camp. Bit by bit, we get pieces of what we expected back.Of course, the flip side of this is all the joys we gain from Jackson that we never expected in spite of the autism, but that's another post my friends....