Thursday, July 19, 2012

Kissing in the park--#NaBloPoMo

Our older son kissed a girl on his 11th birthday recently. Yeah, boy, he liked it.

It freaked her out, and I don't blame her.

He was standing in line at a local amusement park with his brother and me that day, waiting for our turn on one of the rides when the birthday boy caught sight of this girl. She was a tall brunette with a kind smile, a girl next door. Very nice choice.

That's when he put the move on her.

He's no dummy. He understands that he has a communication gap with the rest of the world, and he understands that the rest of the world treats him like a baby because of that. There are many times when I catch him playing that fact to his favor, boldly going for what he wants and then walking away smiling and babbling like a baby. He gets what he wants, and other people excuse him for it because he's disabled. They don't think he is capable of intent.

Our son plays his own autism card.

During his life, I've admired this skill, even when he directed it toward me. I would chuckle, shake my head and count my blessings for the intelligence it takes to pull off something like that. It was often funny, always sneaky, yet very cute.

However, it wasn't all that cute last summer when he applied that skill to his newfound interest in groping women's breasts.

I. Could. Have. Died.

How does one talk to a low verbal child about such things, particularly when the child has limited focus and attention? And, well, I wasn't really sure how delayed he was regarding all that...stuff. If his brain operated in a "Teletubbies" world, I sure wasn't going to turn it into "Penthouse".

So, I did what any other irrational and ill-prepared mother in my shoes would do. I hoped it would go away. Which it DID!! For about a year. Then he began finding a pretty girl or two in Target with an arm that needed kissing...

...Ugh.

The next thing I know we were celebrating his birthday at the amusement park when he saw this brunette and budged through the line with razor-sharp focus. When he reached her, he took hold of her face with both hands and planted a kiss right on her cheek.

I could see the shock in her eyes.

I love my child, but I was scared for this girl, and I understood that I had a hand in this entire event. Last year, I buried my head in the sand. This year, he's kissing strange girls at amusement parks and walking away like he knew no better.

Wait a minute. No. He was not going to walk away!

I grabbed that boy who was too big for his own britches, and I made him face this girl once more. She was uncomfortable. Looking at people wasn't exactly his favorite thing. I'm pretty sure neither of them wanted to be standing there. Frankly, I didn't want to be there either. It was one giant, uncomfortable mess. However, this girl needed a truckload of reassurance, and if we didn't start planting seeds with our son now, where would he be next year?

Don't answer that.

You know, I was certain that the infant years of our older son's life were going to go down as the most challenging time for me as his parent.

Yet, as I completed my Proper Public Touching 101 lesson for him, complete with profuse apologies to this girl, I sighed reluctantly.

I think that notion might have been a bit premature.


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NaBloPoMo July Challenge. Blogging every day. No excuses. Can't even use a doctor's note. So, just suck it up and do it.

8 comments:

  1. I'm sorry, but I had to snort a bit. I could totally see this coming...he *is* a charmer, though! I miss getting my cheek smooches. :-P

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    1. Uuuggghh! I know. My "Deny" mose is juat such a comfortable place to be...

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  2. OMG...I am afraid I was beyond the snorting stage! Full out giggling here!

    I know you have to address this behavior and I do feel sorry for the unsuspecting girl next door type, but seriously he IS interacting with someone he didn't know! Isn't that sortof a good thing, inappropriate, but kinda good? No? Oh, well, then carry on Ms. Deny and tackle this one like you do everything else full steam ahead.

    The breast groping is way worse than a check kiss, btw.
    Eleven is a good age to begin noticing females are soft and fun, but not really toys. You got this!

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    1. Well, true. There are positives. Normal onset of shift in hormones. Increased social interaction. Clever display of intellect. All very, very good for him. He's really doing well lately!!

      Autism and sexual awareness. Holy bleep. I don't even like typing the word "sexual". It sounds lewd. Anyone who knows me is going to get a full-on belly laugh over my new role as sex counselor for this household.

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  3. We use the same parenting techniques (wishing things away). HA! Hey...like you said, sometimes it works or at least it gives a little extra time to regroup.

    I keep telling my husband these types of issues are his to deal with. You know...father-son bonding stuff. LMAO...like THAT's gonna happen.

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    1. I can just tell: the buck stops here.

      This is completely laughable because I become embarrassed over the slightest off-color discussion. And now, I'm going to have to have frank discussions time and time and time and time again.

      Yay!

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    2. I hear ya. Social stories perhaps??? I was given the name of a book about this uhhh subject. See I can't even write about it. Tee hee. I looked through it and it was very good. It was called "Taking Care of Myself" by Mary Wrobel in case you want to check it out.

      Oh BTW...I have tagged you for the Liebster Blog Award/Shout-Out. Pop on over to get it when you have a minute.

      http://ouradventureswithriley.blogspot.ca/2012/07/the-liebster.html

      Diane =D

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    3. Thank you!!

      Alrighty. I purchased the book on line. Thanks for the reference. Some of those topics are ROUGH! lol.

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