Autism Awareness Month Day 9

I was up even earlier than usual for a Saturday to start a 2 hour road trip to a conference. It was so early that all my babies were sleeping so I went to them to kiss them goodbye. Nae-Nae woke up at that point and wanted me to remind her where I was going, how long the journey was and what time I was expecting to be home again. I answered all the questions correctly apart from the last. I gave her a return time slightly later than I planned. I expected to be home by 7.30 ish but I added extra time and stated 8.30pm. I did this to allow extra time for unforeseen circumstances. If I gave her an earlier time and I wasn’t home at that precise time I would have received numerous FaceTime calls from her checking on me and she would want to know the exact reason why I’m not home when I said. She doesn’t mess around with time so if I managed to get home before 8.30 it would have been a nice surprise for her. She responds well too that, just not as well to lateness.
I was so excited as it was a bit like my respite day. I was attending a conference to help improve me so it was a day not about just being mum but being MrsJK in all capacities. MrJK had plans to do some baking to entertain Nae-Nae in particular so I was also looking to come home to some lovely treats too. I will get to the gym properly next month. I’m not going to put too much pressure on myself throughout April as this is my transition month, so I need to prepare for what is next and tie up all loose ends.
The drive to the conference was very straight forward until I got to the city. There were road works everywhere so certain streets were closed off. My sat nav couldn’t cope with the changes and couldn’t get me to the road I needed without me driving in circle 50 million times. One thing I hate is being late to anything so this was really stressing me out and at one point I was close to tears. I just wanted to get there. Once I was nearly at the edge I just called out “please help me.” I didn’t get a verbal response but somehow I managed to calm down and focus better and once I did that I felt that somehow I was directed down the right street and I saw where I needed to be. Then I needed to find parking. The first car park I went to charged quite a lot for the day but at that point I just didn’t want to drive around and look for another and potentially get lost again and be even more late. Therefore I just entered the car park closed my eyes to the price and just rushed to the venue.
Fortunately once I arrived it was only 10 minutes later than the conference start time, but the conference had not officially started as breakfast was being served first to give us the chance to network. I even managed to get there before they started serving so I sighed a big sigh of relief. I talked about Nae-Nae not messing around with time but actually I’m the same. My family come from a culture where if something states it starts at 10am people don’t start arriving until 12 noon. So if you want people to be there at 10am it would be better to tell them it starts at 8am, that way there will be some that arrive on time. This doesn’t work well with my ASD traits! It actually really vexes me and as I have gotten older I’ve become less tolerate with it. I do the opposite and want to be at places early even if everyone else turns up late.
Nae-Nae also needs to be somewhere before the start time. This helps as she doesn’t like joining crowds but she is ok for the crowds to join her. We are like the gatekeepers at her school. I think all the caretakers that have worked in her school over the years, and there have been several, know her by name because we’re pretty much always the first there whether she is with me or MrJK. Although Nae-Nae is in year 6 and we don’t live far from the school she is always accompanied by one of us. She has limited awareness of danger, she is very dreamy but also vulnerable to other risks so it’s currently not wise to let her walk alone or even with her friends. Lots of her friends walk to school alone now, but that’s just something we can let her do right now. Although she wants to be treated the same as other children her age she somehow understands why walking alone to school is not a great idea now.
Even from September when all her friends will probably be walking or getting on the bus alone she will still be accompanied by one of us and that;s just what we have to do for her safety and comfort. JJ still gets driven to school and collected by either me or his friend’s dad. However he has been on the bus to school once or twice and even then it was a really massive deal. We had to go through the timetable a million times. The bus was a school bus so it goes directly from outside our house to the school car park, but JJ is another one that doesn’t joke with time and doesn’t do lateness so his main anxieties were around the potential of lots of traffic causing a delay. Nevertheless, both times he travelled on the bus he arrived at school in time so he was fine. I’m going to be away fro a week during term time next month so we have already started preparing him for travelling on the bus that week.
I may be starting new ventures in September and I’m actually planning ahead to ensure that whatever I do I will have the capacity to drive both children to school and pick them up the majority of the week. It’s just a sacrifice we have to make as parents right now. MrJK doesn’t drive and both secondary schools are on the other side of town so I will be needed more for school runs so actually all the different changes in my life recently are working together for our good bearing in mind the additional demands I will have. It will all work out well no doubt. God’s got us.
The conference was fantastic and actually quite life changing. It helped me to challenge my thinking and get ready for bigger things ahead. I travelled home with one of my sis’ who doesn’t live anywhere near me but we decided we were going to go out of dinner and chat after the conference but as time was ticking on and I didn’t want to be home later than I suggested, we decided for her to travel my 2 hour journey, pick up food on the way home and then I drop her to the station in my town and she can continue her journey home. It was a beautiful time and it helped me process some stuff.
When I arrived home at 8.20pm the house smelt of Iovely muffins and everyone was peacefully chilling in their rooms. I went to Nae-Nae first to ask about her day. The first thing she said was “Mummy I got up after breakfast and had a bath and got dressed before I did anything else and there was no screaming or fighting all day.” If you remember this time last week… If not please refer back to day 2 last Saturday where Nae-Nae caused a bit of stress in the house because she didn’t want to bathe and dress at the time she was told, because it was cutting into her time of doing something else. Then that evening we spoke about it and discussed strategies going forward. Well… admittedly I forgot about that until she mentioned it as the first thing she needed to tell me. It was at the top of her list of priorities. She had really processed what we discussed and implemented the changes without being reminded and she wanted me to acknowledge this and congratulate her, so I did. I was so proud of her. This shows so much growth and commitment to do better. She is aware how some of her moods and actions affected others once she has reflected on it so she worked on herself to improve. Seriously this is massive!! It just confirms even more so that ‘programming’ and ‘fine tuning’ (as I like to call it) can help overcome things that are difficult or provide solutions for better ‘mood’ management. If we help to give our children strategies for different things it can sometimes help change the pattern of things for their good. With the right support everything is possible!
So all in all it was a great day!!!

Please feel free to comment, discuss what I say or share your story like Lady B did the other day. Its really encouraging.

Peace and Love

MrsJK