Loving with Autism Update: As I start to put my book on Autism together I have been asking Thomas if he is able to share some of his memories of being a little boy with Autism that couldn’t talk… as his language has increased slowly over the years he has surprised… and scared me, with some of his reflections (and he has a memory like an elephant!)… like the time we walked into our local pub through the back entrance with the big POKIES sign flashing, Thomas says, ‘I remember when my Daddy used to take me here when I was a baby!’… news to me and Flash wasn’t around to explain himself..lol… I laughed and laughed.
And then last night when I asked him what he remembered… well I knew this day would come, the day when all my worst parenting moments would come back and haunt me..
He said, “Well I remember you used to tell me you would smack me with he wooden spoon when I was breaking everything!’…
I apologised and explained that Mummy was scared, sad and frustrated and didn’t always do the right thing… and then reminded him that he fixed me with that… you see I could never find me wooden spoons and kept buying more and then one day I saw Thomas down near the drain on the street… I went to see what he was doing and to my surprise there were 5 of my wooden spoons sitting at the bottom of the drain… he may not have been able to talk but he was on to me and his problem solving skills were already superior!