It’s been three years since I last blogged. I decided that Debbie’s bat mitzvah was the cherry on top of the sundae. She had come so far and I realized that my time of blogging had come to an amazing end. I also wanted to respect her privacy as she had become a teenager. Lord knows if my mom had blogged about my teenage years I would have been horrified. So here we are three amazingly fast short years later.
Three years later and Deb has made progress that has exceeded my wildest dreams. Before reading on, please know that I love my daughter to the moon and back, and there is nothing, NOTHING I wouldn’t do or haven’t done for her!
With that being said, this blog is about me and my feelings about what the next two years of high school will be like. There is a part of me that is going back into period of mourning. I think back to all of my experiences in high school, both good and bad, and then think about Deb’s. On one hand, how fantastic that she is socially unaware right now? She hasn’t experienced crushes and unrequited love, girl on girl drama, peer pressure, and stress about grades or getting into the perfect college. On the other hand though, I’m feeling the pain of missing out on the good experiences of high school with Deb.
Deb is starting her junior year of high school this September. When Joe started his junior we began thinking of college and then in the spring of that year we did a whirlwind tour of three different schools three weekends in a row. That’s not going to happen this year for Deb. What will happen? We’ll have another IEP meeting in January and we’ll start discussing what life will look like as she transitions into post-secondary education. She’ll have the option of staying at her school until she’s 21, something that is pretty much off the table, or doing post-secondary work placement through our county school system. And all that’s okay, except for me right now it’s simply not.
I wish for so many things for Debbie. I wish she had typical friendships. I wish she could hang-out with friends, break curfew, and fight with me about the unfairness of being grounded for a week. I wish she could learn how to drive and argue with Joey over who’s going to drive “their” car versus who’s going to drive my car or Vince’s car. I wish we were talking about SAT prep courses, grades, and potential colleges. I wish! I wish! I wish! And as REM famously sang in Stand, “If wishes were trees, trees would be falling.”
So I’ll do what I always do. I’ll pick myself up off the ground, dust off, and carry on. Because what else is there? Debbie’s life is different from others. It’s not less, just different and it will be okay. Thanks for allowing me this pity party. End of rant….for now.
Then last year I seized the opportunity to have Debbie become a bat mitzvah. It was literally a snap decision. I decided to ask her if she wanted to do it and she said that she did. I called Mr. Joe and he said that without a doubt Debbie could do it and he would help her succeed. And succeed she did!
Intellectual Disability: a politically correct way to say “mentally retarded.” It was made official on paper. And again, I knew it was coming. I was not and I am not in denial. But to see it, to process it, and to understand it was the knock-out blow and right now all I can see is the word “can’t.” The ceiling has just been lowered by several feet and limitations and roadblocks are in our way. They won’t be there forever and I’m not down forever. Eventually I will get back up on my feet and continue the fight. For the time being though, I am hurting and I am licking my wounds. And I think I’m entitled to do so.
Ketchup With a Side of Autism 