When you are living with autism, you never know what a new school year will bring. So far, second grade has proved to be a wonderful land of math, science, and reading. Alec arrives home announcing that school was "AWESOME" and asking why he can't go to school on weekends too.
This year, he knows the names of many of his classmates, he has learned to swing by himself, he plays at recess (with other kids!!!!!) and he can actually tell me a bit about his day when he arrives home.
Wow! He has worked so hard for all of this. Every struggle of the past few years has been a step in the learning process of how to navigate our world. (Can you tell that I am so proud, I just might explode?)
The smooth sailing, however, can make it easy to forget how much activity is swirling below the surface. For Alec to manage the learning, the playing, and the daily requirements to follow instructions, sit in a classroom, and deal with tons of sensory input and social interaction, takes this little man lots and lots of energy. By the time the bell rings at the end of the day, he is done, burnt out, kaput. It is not surprising then, that the one area that has caused us trouble this year comes at the end of the day - the bus ride home.
Remember the school bus ride? Talk about a sensory/social overload! Mornings have been fine - likely because he is so excited to get to school. Afternoons are another story entirely. Many days he has gotten off the bus on the verge of full meltdown mode. You could see the anguish in his eyes.
I tried to puzzle out what might be the problem. The mommy brain automatically asks, were kids teasing him? DId he have a bad encounter with someone?
Um, yeah, nothing that dramatic needs to be happening. The bus itself is enough. Think of the sound of the engine and wheels. The rattling of the windows. The reverberating chatter of 60+ children. Add to that, the physical motion of the huge behemoth lurching along its route. Enough to give anyone a headache! If you have autism, well, game over.
Alec himself came up with the first possible solution. He jumped off the bus one afternoon and yelled at me "I want headphones for the bus!"
Well, ok!
I was so thrilled that he had identified a sensory issue and thought of a solution that I would have bought him a zillion headphones. Thankfully, Alec's teacher and therapists at school agreed with the brilliance of his plan.
First, we tried iPod ear buds. Conscious of the need to keep him from looking too different, we thought these might block sound while looking cool. Definitely cool. Blocking sound? Not so much.
A survey of friends and family brought lots of great recommendations. We decided upon the type that fit into your ears with a squishy piece that actually expands and molds to your ear canal. As a bonus, Alec likes them.
The earphones go on, and the cord gets tucked into his pocket.
Unfortunately, the meltdowns continued. The final straw was the afternoon when I had to climb on the bus to coax him off. It's not that he wanted to stay on the bus, he was just so thoroughly done with it and everything that he refused to move.
What were we going to do? While we wanted him to continue on the bus if possible so that he would have that skill and independence, how were we going to make it work for him?
That's when we realized that we weren't. It wasn't going to work for him - at least, not right now.
This wasn't a matter of not liking the bus, or wishing for a personal shuttle service provided by mom. Because of autism, Alec literally could not cope with the afternoon bus ride. If we continued to insist that he "give a try" the situation would have deteriorated to the point where it impacted his entire day. He does not NEED to ride the bus. What he needs, is to go to school and to be able to feel it is AWESOME.
When you are a parent of a child on the autism spectrum, you are constantly checking yourself. Is this exception, this adjustment, this accommodation necessary because of autism? Or, are we hindering our child's independence? While we want him to be able to do things like every other child - such as ride the bus - he is not like every other child, and riding the bus is one hurdle we don't need to ask him to tackle right now. The work of school and play is enough. That's the important stuff. If he never rides a school bus again, he'll be ok.