Do you ever find yourself making allowances for your “special” child? Giving that extra helping hand? doing things for them they may be able to do perfectly well on their own? The urge to protect is the strongest primal emotion for all parents- it’s part of our DNA. And when we have a child with autism, it is so hard not to protect. Our hearts bleed for all those things that are so hard. And then we compensate, wrap in cotton wool, make easy.
Today, I witnessed a wonderful example of not making easy, of going the extra mile. In this case, the extra mile was literal. I was out for a day’s hike with my friends and their lovely “special” boy. We were on a sponsored walk around the absolutely stunning Loch Affrich deep in the Highlands of Scotland (www.treesforlife.org.uk). The sun shone in a blue sky with little white scuddy clouds. The Scots pines stood proud on the hillsides. The peaks of the nearby mountains were dusted with their first snow. It was picture perfect. You could have bottled that Autumnal scene and sold it around the world as essential Scotland.
There was only one problem. It was quite a long walk.
My friends’ little boy had never walked so far. One mile into the eleven mile walk, “Are we nearly there yet?” Four miles in, “Its too far”. Five miles in, “We’ve been walking from the morning right into the afternoon and we are not even half way there yet”. (I kind of felt the same way…) But he kept going. There was the opportunity for a pick-up on the way home, but his parents decided to walk all the way.
That little boy was not molly coddled. It was tough. But as he reached the car, he knew he had done something he will always be proud of. He had gone the extra mile.
Filed under: autism, parents of autistic children, parents of special needs children, special needs
