We went to our first Autism Society parent support group meeting this week.
Their regular meeting room smelled like a squirrel died in the heating duct (I took their word for it), so we set up 30 chairs in the hallway. We faced each other knee to knee and yelled from one end of the corridor to the other.
"Hi, I'm Bonnie and I have an autistic son."
All: "Hi, Bonnie!"
Bonnie: "What? I can't hear you at this end!"
It only took a few minutes for the Tai Chi and American Sign Language groups next door to kick us into a photocoping room.
As we dragged our chairs around the building everyone kept saying, "It's not usually like this," so I had to ask, "Does that mean Bonnie is normally serious?"
"Ah...no."
People came from so many different situations. There were foster parents, grandparents, newly diagnosed parents, parents caring for nonverbal adults or precocious toddlers, linked by the shared experience of being different. Speaking a common language. Walking together in the fog called Autism. (Okay, I'm getting carried away, it's not like we sang Kumbaya or anything.)
But by the end of the evening other parents were offering to drop off resources and giving me their number in case I ever needed a shoulder. That kind of support works for me.
I hope one day soon I'll feel strong enough to be a support to them too.
No comments:
Post a Comment