Your kid still loves you..

I talk a lot about the good things about Autism. I also talk a lot about the hardships and frustrations. What I don’t talk about are the really bad days. The days that bring us to tears, that break down our resolve to just keep moving forward. That make you question if you can do this..

All the movies and TV shows that have been made about a character with Autism portray a positive outlook. Don’t get me wrong, I can appreciate that as much as the next person. Sometimes positivity is all we have in our arsenal as special needs parents. In fact, we all hope our children will succeed in school, in business and in love. But these stories are not giving the reality many families face with kids on the more severe end of the spectrum.

I want to share a bit about aggression and self-injurious behavior. Many people with Autism experience one or both of these at some point in their life. And it is the hardest part for a parent.

Let’s start with the latter. Self-Injurious Behavior (or SIB) is any behavior that results in the physical injury to an individual’s body. This could be banging one’s head on the wall or ground, picking at one’s skin, excessive rubbing of one’s skin, or punching/hitting oneself (among many others). Usually it comes about in stressful situations or when the person is unable to communicate something.

Z has had SIBs for several years now. His can occur when he is stressed, unsure of expectations, not able to communicate a need, told “no”, or it could just be plain sensory. He didn’t always have it but it has gotten worse as he has gotten older and hit puberty.

So what does this look like for Z? His main go-to is to punch his chin really hard. That has steadily progressed to include punching the side of his head, hitting his arms together, hitting the floor with his wrists and throwing his body around. On top of this, he has high anxiety and that comes out as picking his skin. He will pick at the same small spot on his skin (face, arms, legs, everywhere..) and once it becomes a sore then he will pick that scab off until it bleeds and then start the whole process over for the next several days.

Now, you may be wondering if he ever hits anyone else? This is the aggressive side I mentioned earlier. The easy answer is Yes. The more complicated answer is that he does not seem to seek other’s out to do them harm. He usually only attacks someone else if they have gotten close to him or have tried to stop his SIB. When he was smaller and he lashed out, it was easy to control him and help him through the episode. Now that Z is the same size as me (maybe even taller), it’s getting impossible.

Just the other day, I tried to help him through a meltdown (and protect our house from being demolished) and got in his path. Actually, he cornered me in his room. He went for my arms with his nails while his head tried to butt me and his legs kicked at my legs. I managed to get him subdued by basically taking the hits and guiding him to the ground where I used my body weight to stop his movements long enough for him to come back to us. I came out of the room with bloody arms, bruised legs and a traumatized spirit.

We’ve had this happen in public, we’ve had this happen in front of family, we’ve had this happen in front of friends. It is not easy in any of these scenarios. For me, this is the hardest part of Z’s Autism. It pains me to see him harm himself. As a parent, you never want to see your child hurt.

As to the aggressiveness towards me, it honestly confuses me. How can he treat me like that after everything I do for him? Does he not love me? Will my own child truly harm me? What am I doing wrong? I must be a horrible parent.

For Z, he is not himself in a meltdown. You can clearly see he is not truly running the show. You can also feel and see when he returns after the meltdown. It is hard to explain but it is an out-of-body experience for him. When his meltdown is over and he has calmed down, he simply walks back into the world like nothing just happened. I mean, now that he is older he seems apologetic but it doesn’t erase that it happened. Because, it certainly wasn’t an out of body experience for me. I felt and saw and experienced all of it and the fact it was my own child cemented those negative feelings even more.

But what do parents do? We swallow our own feelings for our children every day. I can’t be mad at him for what he did even if deep down I feel that. I can’t walk away from him like you might if a friend did this to you. He may immediately need assistance from me and I have to step away from my feelings and care for him in that moment. You take the backseat and at times that boils up and you lose it. You have a “meltdown” of your own and cry it out and feel anger to parents that don’t have to go through this. You get lost in your feelings but somehow always bring yourself back out.

And as bad as each time is, as hurt as you may be, you learn from it and become stronger. Ever talk to an Autism parent of an older child or adult? They have this air about them like nothing can touch them. And after years of dealing with this, nothing can. Nothing can be worse than your own child harming you and harming themselves. Nothing can be worse than being afraid of your own child.

So all I can say is take care of those around you. You never know what someone has gone through that day that they aren’t prepared to talk about. You never know and they may never tell you. So just be kind for nothing, offer assistance for nothing. Don’t wait for someone to tell you they are hurting or having a hard time. Assume everyone is having a hard time at any point in their day and make that day brighter. Radiate positive vibes in everything you do. Believe me, you may never know it, but you helped someone that day.

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