I have been reading The Complete Guide to Asperger's Syndrome and have learned so much just 100 pages into a 300 page book. To be honest I can only read this book in small doses because I get very sad. I do realize that Asperger's is not a death sentence and families struggle with much more challenging conditions than this all the time. In fact, I have two friends who both have daughters with severe Cerebral Palsy. These wonderful girls who are in wheel chairs will (without a miracle from God or a major advance in medicine) never walk; talk; toilet, dress or feed themselves; or do so many of the other things I take for granted each and every day. They have had countless painful surgeries and procedures to try and keep their conditions from debilitating them further and will continue to have more.
Still I have learned that pain is pain and it must be dealt with and worked through - and this is painful. Anytime we see how sin has affected mankind it's difficult because this was not how God meant things to be. Little boys should not have to cry when their brother gets invited to yet another playdate and he hasn't been invited to one in over a year. Little boys should not have to deal with being called "dork" or "weird". Little boys should not be excluded from sports just because they are physically clumsy and can't catch a ball at the age of eight. And when pain affects our kids, it's even harder because our hopes and dreams rest in their sweet souls. And when those dreams begin look different than we'd imagined, we grieve. That's where I have found myself in the past few months - grieving. My husband says that my, "dreams have been shipwrecked on the jagged rocks of reality."
Yet slowly I am moving past grieving into a new phase of empowerment. We can help our son. He will have an amazing and fulfilling life, even though it may look different than we had originally imagined. It's a good place to be for sure. I will be blogging in coming posts about what that empowerment looks like for us.
Still I have learned that pain is pain and it must be dealt with and worked through - and this is painful. Anytime we see how sin has affected mankind it's difficult because this was not how God meant things to be. Little boys should not have to cry when their brother gets invited to yet another playdate and he hasn't been invited to one in over a year. Little boys should not have to deal with being called "dork" or "weird". Little boys should not be excluded from sports just because they are physically clumsy and can't catch a ball at the age of eight. And when pain affects our kids, it's even harder because our hopes and dreams rest in their sweet souls. And when those dreams begin look different than we'd imagined, we grieve. That's where I have found myself in the past few months - grieving. My husband says that my, "dreams have been shipwrecked on the jagged rocks of reality."
Yet slowly I am moving past grieving into a new phase of empowerment. We can help our son. He will have an amazing and fulfilling life, even though it may look different than we had originally imagined. It's a good place to be for sure. I will be blogging in coming posts about what that empowerment looks like for us.
3 comments:
Some days are harder than others, that's for sure! I often focus on how far my son has come, but then there will be something like the day my son sat down at a table for a church dinner and all the boys picked up their plates and left. It just broke my heart. But I am confident that God has a purpose in all this, and that He is and will continued to be glorified through my son.
Thanks for sharing your heart,
Kellie
The grief we experience regarding our children's struggles is a painful grief. Thank you for sharing yours.
Jennefer,
I grieved with you this morning when I read your post. I do not know the pain you know. But I have a daughter that is "different" than her peers. I had to endure seeing her swing by herself every Tuesday at her co-op for 30 minutes. I sat in the car each Tuesday, out of her sight, anbd just cried and prayed. Very few kids her age "get" her and many are overwhelmed by her and this leaves her without many friends. And I thought of another friend of mine, he is 56, an artist and horticulturalist. The other day I was visiting him and he was talking about how he didn't fit in as a kid. He was drawn to art and music and saw things like the beauty in nature, when other boys his age could think only of sports. He has felt different and often isolated all his life, but he is the most contented man I know. He found his gifts in the arts and paints and sculpts and grows plants that are beyond beautiful. Thatcher with God's help, will find that which he was created to do. God will use you and your husband and his brothers and many others, and even isolation at times, to lead him towards the very thing God wants him to use to Glorify Him. How blessed he is to have you as a mom. Thinking of ya'll today.
Sheryl
Post a Comment