They Laugh At Me....

“They laugh at me when I cry. I can’t help it mommy and it hurts my feelings when they laugh at me.” Words I got to hear from Cam’s mouth last night at dinner. He and I had a mommy and Cam weekend away this weekend and we had so much fun. Yesterday we saw the new Lego movie, went to the Lego store because according to my son that is what has to happen after you watch a Lego movie, we played and laughed and the day was just perfect. We headed off to dinner at his favorite dinosaur restaurant and I made him keep his ipad in the car. I told him that we need to talk when we’re at dinner and not be consumed by electronics. This is a new rule I am implementing in our house too….electronics are great but they are taking over my house. He was great about it, no meltdowns at all. So at dinner I started to ask him little questions, what is his favorite dinosaur now, what is his favorite animal. It’s funny that I live with this little human being but feel like I don’t know him because he closes down so much when it comes to talking. Yes, I know my son, but I would love to be inside his little brain to REALLY know him and these questions were my way of trying to get in there. Then came the school questions and I found out more than I was prepared to at dinner. I was just asking him about his favorite subject and then asked about his friends. This is when a harsh reality hit me….”mommy I have no friends. No one ever wants to play with me. X tells me not to sit next to him at lunch any more because I am weird. They all laugh at me when I cry. I can’t help it mommy and it hurts my feelings when they laugh at me. They make a lot of fun of me when I cry for you too.” My heart completely sank and anger set in all at the same time. My son is opening up to me so I can’t say what I would like to say about these children…these bullies. Plus I am supposed to be the adult here so I can’t say the things that are going through my head. We talked more about things happening at school and though I wish I could say the conversation got better, it didn’t. But, what I was proud of during this heart wrenching conversation is that he finally opened up to me. I finally was able to see into his little world….even if it broke my heart into a million pieces.

Cam knows he has Asperger’s, he knows he will always be different and last night he let me know how much he hates his differences. He told me he wanted to be like everyone else so he wouldn’t cry, so the kids wouldn’t laugh at him and so he would have friends. Those who believe children on the Autism spectrum don’t care about others, you are very wrong. Cam is complete proof of that. Though he doesn’t know how to be a good friend, he so badly wants friends. Though he likes to be alone a lot of the time, he wants to have a friend who will play with him when he doesn’t want to be alone. He wants what we all want and that is to be accepted for who we are.

Though the conversation did not go the way I wanted it to, I was able to for the first time have a real conversation with my son. It wasn’t all bad and when I couldn’t take any more of hearing the bad, I changed the subject and we laughed the rest of the night. I didn’t want our entire night to be sad. I didn’t want his differences to once again ruin a day for him. When we got back to the hotel he told me how much fun he had with me and how much he loved me. Then he said words that I will never forget, “thank you mommy for loving me, even when I cry and scream.” My son sees his differences shining through and he is realizing he has no control over these differences sometimes. I tucked him in, kissed him goodnight and then went and cried the rest of the night. Now I realize if you’ve been reading any of my blogs you already know I am a crier, but last night was a sobbing, ugly cry. I knew there would come a day that he might get bullied, I just wasn’t ready for it to be now and I wasn’t ready for him to tell me.

I wish parents would teach their children that it is ok for everyone to be different and how mean it is to laugh at others because of their differences. I truly believe bullying starts at home. I wish they could look and see the damage that their children are doing to these sweet, caring children…what they are doing to MY SON! All of these children really just want to be accepted for who they are…not made fun of for who they aren’t. My son is SO much more than his differences and I wish with all of my heart that people would see that. My son knows his differences, they shine brightly and he doesn’t need others laughing at him, saying mean things to him and pointing them out to him. Hearing his words shattered my heart, so I can only imagine what his heart feels like every day when it is happening to him. I wish I had a magic wand to make his world easier and to make the bullying stop……