Letting Go of Ideals

When you have children you have to let go of ideals.

You might have pictured you would easily give birth with no pain medications needed, breastfeed with ease, and would never watch your child watch television.

Sometimes those ideals happen for us, making us very happy.  

Sometimes they don't.

Sometimes the real world comes into play.

Sometimes you have to let go of control to experience the true joys of having a child.

We just recently moved into a beautiful home (we're so happy!) and I wanted to make sure it stays beautiful (I can see all of you autism Mama's shaking your head with laughter right now).

The first week we were here the boys took their first bath.

I walked in to find bubbles all over the walls and the marble floor.

My very first instinct was to yell.  To take them out of the bath and make them help me clean up the mess.

However, I'm so happy I was able to stop myself and take the moment in.

My boys were laughing.  

Corbin would throw bubbles at Brian and Brian would laugh.

Brian would then reciprocate and throw bubbles back.  They would both laugh.

They took turns using the monster squirters to squirt each other.

They were playing.

Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing is more important than that.

Tomorrow Is A New Day.

"I wish I never had a brother with autism!"


I can't believe how those words always cut right to my heart.  I think I'd rather hear "I hate you" than that.  My eyes instantly water and my mind begins racing and I just feel like I'm failing somehow.

To be fair to Corbin and his emotional outburst, it was a really hard day.  Autism and OCD levels were through the roof and I felt like I had lost every bit of sanity and patience I could muster up.  I was barely holding it together and felt like screaming at the top of my lungs too.  I can't imagine what my 9-year-old was feeling.  (And let me tell you, Brian's moods exacerbate Corbin's moods.  He wasn't no angel today either.)

I started to write a super-long post about all of the incidences today that included eloping, screaming, crying, gastrointestinal issues, self-injury, repetitive door-closing and light-switching, and high-pitched shrieks.  However, reliving it through writing was just depressing me even more.  So I'll do like Emerson and wait for tomorrow to arrive.  It is a new day.


Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

That Moment

It's moments like these that make me so incredibly proud of the boys I am raising.

We were at the parade and a float had handed out freeze pops to all of the kids along the route.

Brian was having trouble figuring out how to get the popsicle from the bottom.

He didn't whine or ask for help.  

It was noisy and there was so much going on, that even I didn't notice his struggles.

Yet, I looked over and there was Corbin holding up the bottom of the popsicle for Brian to get.

Holding his own popsicle, waiting to finish it, after he helped his brother with his.

I am so proud of that compassionate, helpful, caring little boy.