Storms

Our days are sometimes complete crap shoots. We wake up and have the schedule. It's there and waiting. In this house, Monday though Friday, we follow the damned schedule. Even with the schedule, nothing can really be predicted. We bump into people in the outside world. Anxieties about the future lurk. Setbacks happen, they always happen. But I've got this.

I've been wrong before.

Sometimes, two hours go by and it seems like everything is different but the surroundings haven't changed.

This morning was bright and sunny. No clouds. Perfect and hot. I took Morgan to school and we chatted, sang along to songs. He seemed happy, content and excited to be going to his reading program. He was goofing off. We posed for a silly picture before he headed off.

He won't stop making this face.

Two hours later, I picked up a completely different child. He didn't recognize my car, even though his therapist was steering him toward it and I was waving. His functional (as in, conversational) expressive language had shut down. Scripted speech only and that was coming in two word snatches. He was so stimmy. Oh so stimmy. He was bouncing up and down like Tigger.

He said he had "a pain" and pointed at his head, so I figured it was headache. When I asked, he started crying. I called his dad, who wanted to talk to him. By then, Morgan's speech was incoherent, but the crying had stopped.

I examined his pupils, gave him some water and asked some questions, none of which he could answer. I knew we are out of Motrin, so I'd have to stop by the store on the way home. God, the store. I hate the store. I hate bringing Morgan into stores when he's like this. Not because of how people might react to him, but because of how painful I can see this experience is for him. 

I told Morgan the four steps we had to take in the store: return the movies to Redbox (okay, I could have skipped this one, but he was kind of calming down, it's quiet over there and he likes hitting the "return" button), grab some Motrin for him, pick up sunscreen, and check out. Redbox was easy. The store wasn't crowded. My hopes went up, slightly. We went to the medicine area to get Motrin, everything's fine. Sunscreen was a breeze. Morgan wasn't talking still, but he was humming, chugging, chuffing, whistling and bouncing around. He was touching all the things!

Then, somehow, he ran out of steam. He lost his little bubble of happiness he had going right before the checkout. My giant of a boy needed to deflate, it seemed. He just kind of slumped down on the floor, taking me with him, sitting, and began to cry great, huge sobs. His fingers were in his ears, his eyes looked scared, and he couldn't tell me what exactly had made him feel this way.

If people stared and looked, I didn't notice or give a damn. He's my son, he was hurting, and he wanted his mom. It took me to a time when Morgan couldn't talk and cried a lot. When all I could do was try to hold him and let the storm pass.

Within a few, or fifteen, minutes he decided it was time to go. He decided he wanted to help me checkout, so I let him. We came home and had lunch, me worrying the whole time.

He began speaking more again, in sentences, but all in scripts. He built a "roundhouse" out of the chairs in the living room. He lined up the trains along his floor in his room. He's licking his face- if he doesn't stop, it will be raw by morning. There's more, but this is what I'm comfortable telling about my son.



He's in the pool now. Calming down. I'm not there yet. I'm still worried about what made him upset in the first place. He's still scripting more than usual. Where did the kid from this morning go? What just happened? This was like going through a squall. Is there another meltdown coming? Can I get radar with this?

Tomorrow, we will again stick to the schedule and hope for a storm free day. I'll pack an umbrella just in case.

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