Overtaken – Weds 1st July 2015
By Jeannette | July 1, 2015
Sometimes I don’t feel like blogging about our day, today has been one of those days.
But then I guess I started blogging because reading other people’s helped me, enabled me to realise that yes, there were many other parents living with autism and it was a relief. To know that we weren’t alone in the joy and the tears, the frustrations and the triumphs.
So, on to today, primarily so I can “blog it out” and then look forward to a new day tomorrow, because no matter how difficult we may have found today, tomorrow is a new dawn, new day.
Anxieties overtook D today. She was due to perform with the school choir during Proms week at her school (an annual week of music performances which is always a privilege to watch).
We walked to school with D twisting my arm (literally), sometimes gently, sometimes painfully, all the while her saying that she didn’t want to take part. Which was surprising really, because D loves to sing, she and two others performed a fantastic solo in the Christmas concert and to hear D is singing at home is always an indicator that she’s happy.
Not so today. I dropped her off, mentioned to her teacher that she was very anxious and nervous and hoped she’d be okay.
Her mood didn’t lighten. She did go on stage with the group but didn’t sing, won’t do the actions and every time I caught her eye (which I stopped doing because..) she would fold her arms even tighter and scowl at me. The two TAs either side of her tried to encourage her to join in, but no.
Afterwards she came over, plonked herself on my lap and demanded to go home. Unfortunately she couldn’t. It was an effort to get her back to her seated classmates and the (really quite) angry expression returned.
I know it was an achievement for her to get on the stage (she’d never have got that far in mainstream) but it’s such a shame for her that she couldn’t enjoy something she loves to do, because of those anxieties.
It got worse after school. She had a meltdown near a busy road, parents and children from the nearby two schools going past and the distinct risk that she could bolt into the road. Lots of tears, lots of emotion and then a slow walk home (T having decided he’d walk in front of us, he’d had enough too).
Some splashing in the paddling pool and our girl was still fragile but at least smiling again.
Tomorrow will bring three Proms performances for D – 1 singing, 1 xylophone playing and her class performance – it’s a new dawn and I have fingers/toes everything crossed that it will indeed be a new dawn, new day and maybe one in which those anxieties don’t overtake D quite so much. That “glass half full” approach here, definitely.
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