Autism And Parenthood

One of my favorite TV shows is Parenthood.  NBC really hit a home run with this show, I would argue.  One of the storylines is about a family with a nine year old boy with Asperger's syndrome--a form of high functioning autism.  Max, the boy with Asperger's, doesn't know he has Asperger's or that Asperger's is a form of autism.  On next week's episode (Tuesday night, 10 pm) he will learn that he is autistic, and I'm so curious how this sensitive issue will be portrayed.

In Max's mind he's just a normal kid with normal interests.  In his world it's normal to have a behavior coach help you throughout the day.  It's normal to have specific likes and dislikes and a rigid, predictable schedule.  He's unaware that other kids (primarily his cousins) have friends and attend school in a typical classroom.  Granted, my Nolan is only four, but I wonder if he knows that he is different from other children his age.  He doesn't know what autism is, nor do I expect him to, but I wonder if he ever senses the differences between him and neurotypical kids.  As much as I want him to be around normal kids, and fit in, and have friends who are not on the spectrum, it is truly painful for me to watch him around other children who are not autistic.  When he's with his friends from school it is so clear to me that he is high functioning and can "make it" in the world.  He stands out among them and I am so proud of him.  But when he's around neurotypical kids the differences glare at me and I wonder if he is headed for a life of loneliness.

Nolan is a wonderful, loving, perfectly formed little boy...and I just want other kids to know it!  I want Nolan to be able to make lifelong friends.  I want him to desire relationships.  I want him to know how to appropriately interact with people.  He is only four years old and has made huge progress in the last year, but I just wonder what his life will look like in five, ten, twenty years.  Regardless of what Nolan's life looks like right now or what it will be in the future I need to surrender my dreams to the Lord and trust that His plan is perfect for Nolan.  It's a constant relinquishing of my will to His, and to be blunt, I really suck at it.

Brokenhearted X 2

My sweet Nolan.  I love this boy so much.  I love how he is growing and changing daily.  He is becoming more aware of his emotions and I witnessed his tender, fragile heart this morning.

Yesterday was one of his friends last day at school.  E's family is moving to Texas tomorrow.  This morning Nolan sat at the breakfast table with big crocodile tears streaming down his face.  "E is gone.  E goes to Texas.  E comes back on Sunday?"  It then progressed to "D in Virginia.  B is in Kindergarten.  No more N on bus."  He proceeded to name and lament each one of the children who have moved out of his class over the course of the last few months.  He was so brokenhearted and missing his friends.  It was all I could do to not cry right along with him.

I scooped him up and hugged him tight.  When we prayed this morning before he got on the bus I made sure to include his friends he misses so much.  I truly hope he has a happy day with the friends he still has in his everyday life.

It All Began With A Light Fixture... (AKA: The Snowball Effect)

A couple of weeks ago, on a very ordinary Saturday morning, our little family of four set out on a "quick" run to Home Depot.  Our mission was to pick up two new dome lights for the boys rooms.  They both have cute table lamps, but cute doesn't necessarily emit sufficient light...and I was tired of feeling like I entered the shadows whenever I set foot in their rooms.  On the way there, Todd and I agreed that our bedroom could use more light as well, so we decided to look at lighting options for our room, too.  In five minutes flat we had chosen fixtures for the boys rooms, and saw a few options we liked for our room.  But just to be sure we were "covering our bases" we decided to head a few minutes farther down the road to Lowe's to check out their lighting department.  Lowe's had a completely different array of choices and, all of a sudden, our decision loomed much MUCH larger!  Fortuitously, we then remembered that there was a Lamps Plus closer to home and we certainly wouldn't be savvy shoppers unless we checked out their inventory, too!  We loaded the boys back up in the van and headed to the overkill that is Lamps Plus.  Too.  Many.  Choices.

Did we want a simple dome light?  A ceiling fan with lights?  A pendant?  And then Todd asked me the question I never thought I'd hear from his mouth..."What do you think about a chandelier?"  A chandelier?  Now you're speaking my language!  He was surprised that I was surprised by his suggestion of considering a chandelier!  Truthfully, I shouldn't have been surprised because we watch enough Divine Design With Candace Olson to know that we both appreciate the look of a chandelier...in the right space.  But could our bedroom be "the right space?"  Just maybe...

When my eyes fell upon the chandelier we ended up purchasing, I knew we had come across "the one."  It was hip, a little bit edgy, but girly and glam enough to make my heart swoon.  Todd spends lots of time in high-end posh hotels and comes home to tell me about them.  This piece looked like it would be at home in a Four Seasons or up at The Nines.  We decided it would make its home in our bedroom as well.

So we got the beauty home and installed in a few hours time and ooh-ed and ahh-ed over it, happy.  But then the rest of our bedroom looked a little "shabby," but not in a shabby-chic way.  I rummaged through our linen closet and pulled out some curtains we had hung in our last place.  We hung them up in our bedroom and liked what we saw.  But our bedroom doesn't have just one window, it has three, and the other two windows looked neglected.  Off to Bed Bath and Beyond we went, hoping to find the exact same curtains that we had just hung.  We did find those silk curtains, but we didn't remember the steeper-than-we-wanted-to-pay price, so we opted for a sheer version instead.  We got home, hung the new sheers on glitzy new hardware, and then realized that the bedside lamps we had didn't complement the ethereal / romantic / glam look we were creating.

A trip to Home Depot later, we came home with two new lamps.  I knew I didn't like the shades from the get-go, but the lamps were on clearance so we snatched them up and opted to replace the shades with something else.  Lamps Plus to the rescue!  Now I was grateful for the too. many. choices.

As for the rest of our room?  We bought our bedroom suite about four years ago and I love it now just as much as the day we bought it.  (Todd says that's a good thing because we are both going to die in that bed!  Quality furniture is not cheap, people!  And then Thomasville had the audacity to discontinue the line despite the fact we hadn't purchased the armoire yet!  We were going to...when it went on massive sale!  And now it won't ever be on sale because it no longer exists!  Humph!  Someday I'll need to look for it on ebay.  *Sigh!*)  Anywho, I had the accessories here and there around the house, so with a little re-purposing and re-arranging we now have a bedroom we both adore.  Without further ado, our new bedroom...

The glitz and glam that started it all!

We did not paint.  The wall colors were chosen by the owner...but we sort of like them!

The feathers are cranberry colored, like the wall.  We had to bring in that color somehow!

So what do you think?