A new begining

After more than 3 years of non stop stress and worry I have finally found the room to breath. I have never….never lost hope for my son. I have always known we will recover him from Autism but it’s the path that has not always been clear. Our son is a miracle baby…beating the odds of even surviving his birth let alone being healthy…yes healthy! Yes he is on the spectrum and has some real challenges ahead but you have never seen such a strong and beautiful boy. He has a light in his eye that never stops shining. Hope and love has led the way through these difficult times. There have been moments when I have been reduced to a lump on the kitchen floor sobbing uncontrollably…emotionally exhausted…and then brought to such heights of joy holding my son in my arms. The emotional swings have been severe and forever unpredictable. But after years of struggling to make sense of it all…clinging to the hope that one day my son will recover I have found respite where I never thought to look for it….in loving and accepting my son exactly as he is right now. Not focusing on what the future will be or what I hope it will be. Not focusing on what has already past or the mistakes I have made. I have found peace in embracing the present for what it is with love and understanding. In order to do this I have had to come to terms with the fact that I must first love and accept myself for who I am right now. I discovered I can’t truly embrace my son until I embrace myself and it’s from this point that the healing for both of us will begin.
I started opening my eyes to this approach several months ago and the effects were immediate and powerful. As soon as I shifted my perspective of my son, from viewing his Autism as something I must remove from him to loving it as I would any other part of him the change was profound. Instead of trying to dodge his Autism in an attempt to reach him I ran towards it with both arms open…loving and celebrating him. I was floored by the response I got. My boy who would retreat into his own world to cope with an onslaught of sensory input he could not begin to handle turned to me laughing…looking me straight in the eye…giddy…as if to say “Hey dad! You found me!!! Yea!!!!”
I can’t say it’s been all happy days since then but we turned a corner…we found the missing piece we had been searching for. The growth we have seen since summer is amazing. I just spent a week at the Autism Treatment Center of America where they teach this approach to parents just like me. I spent a week with 62 parents who knew exactly what I have been going through. It has been a life changing experience and I feel now that I have reawakened a part of me that I had lost track of. I no longer feel numb and battered….I feel empowered and ready to handle what ever comes my way and that will allow me to love and accept my son for who he is right at this moment. It is absolutely a profound and liberating experience that I am deeply thankful for.