#youmightbeanautismparentif

There is a new hashtag on twitter, #youmightbeanautismparentif, that has been making the rounds of the autism circle.  Not that I really know what a hashtag is or how to really use twitter.  I have, however, searched what other parents are tweeting.  Some made me laugh, some made me cry, some did not apply to my life at all.  Overall, they hit the nail right on the head about what it is like to be an autism parent. 

Today Bobby and I had an experience that you have made a perfect tweet under this hashtag, but since I have a blog, it makes more sense to put it here. 

Last night Bobby was playing in his room and when I went to check on him his new container of Tinker Toys was sitting in the middle of the room.  He tried to open it himself but had no luck.  I opened it for him and he seemed to have some interest in the toys.  There are pictures of ideas on the container so I tried to make one for him.  He wanted to line them up instead of build so I stopped building.  While he was in school today I got the Tinker Toys out and put together a ferris wheel.  I was pretty proud of my results.  It took over an hour, because I am not good at this type of activity, and the ferris wheel actually spun.  I sat the ferris wheel on the kitchen table so that Bobby would see it as soon as he came in from school.

When Bobby walked in the house from school, he immediately noticed something.  However, that something was not the structure that I had built for him.  He instead noticed something else that I had bought him today...

Target had some Advil 2 packs on clearance (they clearance the oddest things) and Bobby was excited to have 4 boxes that were the same to line up!  He chose to line up the boxes over looking at a 3 foot tall ferris wheel.  I don't know that I am creative enough to put this little story into a small sentence to tweet it, but lets try...

#youmightbeanautismparentifYour child prefers to line up Advil boxes to playing with a 3 ft ferris wheel.

I have since disassembled the base of the ferris wheel because it was upsetting him, he wanted the orange sticks to line up.  The wheel part is still together and he was been playing with the rest of the sticks. 

For some reason, these setbacks don't seem to stop us from trying to find the things that will make our children happy.  It feels like we are searching for the preverbial needle in the haystack.  Some days are great and I feel like someone has given me a magnifying glass to help me search.  Other days are killer, it feels like someone has blindfolded me and tied my hands behind my back while I am searching.  But the searching goes on!!!

 Random picture:  Winter sunrise this morning.  Bbrrrrrr!!!!