autism is a journey: Paradigm Shift

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Paradigm Shift

It just hit me.
Like. A. Mac. Truck.

All this time, I've been trying to play the mediator, the educator in this.
Wrong Playbook.

I'm the parent.
I'm the advocate.
I'm the voice.
I'm the expert.

My role is to act on behalf of my child
Who cannot speak for himself.

Paradigm shift, I get in now.

In it to win it.

1 comment:

tylerbritney said...: You know Jackson best. Good luck tomorrow. I will keep the prayers coming and hope all works out the way it should for Jackson. Go get em!!!; May 19, 2009 at 6:42 PM

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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....