How to conform goat cheese.

I really do my best to avoid controversial subjects. I dabble in them occasionally, but do my best to not stay long enough to get things too stirred up. I seem to have hit one of those subjects, and I felt that it warranted a little bit more than what it was currently getting.

So, last night on a friends personal page they made mention of something, I replied to it, and a handful of other people did as well. One person started making tons of replies. In the end she probably had 100+ comments. She belittled everyone who disagreed with her. She used a term with me that I had never heard of before and was forced to google it. Come to find out it was a slang word. She was essential telling me to "eff off". I decided that instead of engaging this kind of person I was going to just tap out and not say anything.

Around comment 120+ or so I finally commented again. I had seen that in previous comments out of nowhere the "odd duck" would say things like "I have autism", "I have the aspergers autism" "I have an IQ of 170"....All of these comments were ignored by the person she was currently verbally assaulting. He ignored them because they had nothing to do with what they were talking about, and he consistently did not talk to her in the same tone as which she was talking to him in. My comment, was directed specifically at my friend, and did not mention this other person or anything from her conversation with the other person.

She then latched on to me. I replied with just "I wasn't talking to you". She then began to inform me that it didn't matter and went on a tangent. I said "That has nothing to do with what I said". She then informed me that well at least the other person had been intelligent and that I was being very rude and hello...she has autism.

Now, this really got under my skin. This person was being a total jerk to everyone and then saying they have autism to keep people from being mean back to her. She very clearly knew she was being a jerk, and abusing her "disability".

*Insert rant/convo from Tylerism's*

Ok. So here is why it bugs me. I have to fight for Tyler to get services. Services that he needs just to get his class work done. It makes it all the more harder for me to throw the word autism around for why he needs services when people are out there using it as a reason for them to get by with being a total butt to the general public. I make my son apologize for saying things he shouldn't. You know, those truthful observations that you really shouldn't say. I teach him that even though they are true that you shouldn't say them anyways. Calling people names and picking fights for no reason has nothing to do with autism. Calling people names is not those factual truths that you shouldn't say.

"Your child has to learn to conform". This is something that has been known to get under my skin. Why? I don't know. That pesky little word "conform" does it every time though. Why? Why does he have to conform? Why can't the public at large learn to deal with it? Here's the thing. He doesn't have to lose himself in order to conform. No one (better not be) is asking him to stop being Tyler. However, you can't do certain things. As I look around my house, as I look at my husband and myself... We are living our very quirky lives, and we conform where need be. My husband works from home, and he doesn't tell the people he's forced to talk to just how stupid he thinks they are.

We teach our kids that you can't do those things. We teach our kids that they are MORE than autism. We teach our kids not to hide behind their diagnosis. To go out there and BE something. To rise and triumph. To, dare I say, CONQUER it. And in order for our children to do these things, the adults have to stop using it as an excuse. It is NOT ok or a symptom of autism to call people names. It is not ok or a symptom of autism to use it as a shield to see to it that you do not receive the same treatment that you dish out. Those are very deliberate actions. Actions that are not acceptable.

In the big picture I do not care about anything this woman had said. I do not know this lady. And once this conversation dies away that will be the end of it for me. What I care about is people (she's not the only one) who water the word autism down - who only make it harder on the community. On top of it making it harder for everyone in the community what kind of awareness do you think that message is sending? If the other people in that conversation didn't know what autism was...what do you think they learned about it from this woman's behavior?

I have autism, so I'm not so good with people. I have autism, so I have to work a little harder at it than others. I have autism, so I find it hard to picture things in my head that I can't see in front of me. I have autism, it does not have me. This is the message I teach Tyler. I do not ever make it ok to say: I can't do that, I have autism. You're stupid, I have autism.

As I sit here thinking about new modifications that Tyler needs in his IEP, I can't help but wonder how much damage bad advertisement does for our community. We all want progress. We all want better services. We all want a way for our kids to learn how to rise to the occasion. We can't do that if the message is: Autism is a free ride. No one wants to give services for that. No one is saying that you can't have autism and be the person you are, just that you can't have autism and use it as an excuse for bad behavior. Especially once you're an adult, but that is a lesson learned in childhood.

Here is a link to an article shared to us in the above linked conversation. It's a good read, and she probably says it better than I do.

The dysfunctional house that Thanksgiving built....and other holidays.

First and foremost, Happy Thanksgiving to each and every one of you. Holidays and family dysfunction. What's new right? A quick look through facebook and you will see a wide range of meme's on the subject. Same on any other social media. It's like the glue that binds everyone. Most all people can relate to having some family dysfunction on some level or another.

My inlaws have a Thanksgiving tradition of toasting and giving one "I am thankful for...", so last night I laid in bed thinking about what would my toast be this year? What is it that I am thankful for above all else this past year? On my personal page I have been doing the traditional month of thankfulness. Most of which has had something to do with that particular day, but this is like the honorable mention. What is my prized blessing this year?

So, as I laid in bed thinking about it my mind turned to the past, as it most always does. I thought back to my childhood Thanksgivings. Whereas I could say that I could recall times of all day turkey cooking, I could not recall a single time of eating with my family or spending the day together. In fact, when looking over all other holidays, things just kind of came and went. We were not close. We did not spend time together. We did not celebrate. I never even had a single birthday party growing up. Not for any reason that I could explain. We were not poor. Our religion did not dictate against it. We just didn't do things together.

All through my childhood I dreamed of having my own family and how I would do things right. I prized myself on coming out of my dysfunctional family as being "normal" (ha, there is nothing "normal" about me). I had idea's though as to what "normal" was. The ideas one get's in their head are usually as far from what happens in reality as it can get it seems. At least, any time that I have ever dared to imagine.

I didn't really start "celebrating" things until after I had Hope. After moving to Texas and being around my mothers family we began actually having a little bit of a hooha over the holidays. After I married, my husband and I would make the rounds for the holidays (all manners of dysfunction here). After I divorced, I spent one round of holidays back with my mothers family, and the next round with friends from church. The next round of holidays I spent alone with my then boyfriend (whom I now mostly act like that was a relationship that never happened). Then I met my now (and forever) husband, and began spending the holidays with his family.

So, as I am preparing to start working my bread dough.... I'm not sure my toast will come out all that great, I'm not so hot at talking in front of people (not even people I know). It always makes my stomach bottom out. In the event that it doesn't come out right....I am thankful for chances. Seconds and thirds. Even fourth and fifths. Do-overs and selective memory. Whiteout and erasers. I'm still working out the details on how to do things, BUT that's when those chances come in handy.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. May you each be blessed with giving and receiving chances. Be quicker to forgive, and slower to anger. Day to day life is promised to no one. Mistakes of the youth are often by an error in thinking that there is always time, and mistakes of the old are often by an error of thinking it's too late. May each of you feel loved today, and every day.

Blonde Eyes...Life with a teenager.

This meme says it all! (I found this ages ago circling the interwebs, I have no idea where it came from, other than that at the bottom is says WeKnowMemes. Not my picture, but it was obviously a free to circle the net pic)

The above meme has been a joke between Blonde Eyes and myself ever since we first found it circling facebook months ago. 

In my family there is a group of kids that were all really close in age. Three of them fell September, November, December all in the same year. One just a year older. I had a big hand in raising these kids in their younger years. Changed their diapers, babysat, and at different points each of them lived with me for a time.

I don't have the prettiest family story so let's leave it as:
 <insert gap of time of not talking to anyone even remotely related to me>. 

I have recently gotten in touch with the other three kids (as the fourth was my own). I have a close relationship with these kids. When each of these kids lived with me, I raised them like they were my very own (one of which even told me I was the best mother.ever.) I would gladly take even of them back. In.a.heart.beat. I hope I impacted their life just as much as they impacted mine. Looking at the teenagers they have turned into under the direction of their parents (which, even if I don't agree with everything they are up to these guys are still the amazing kids they were when they walked out my door), causes me to reflect more on my very own Blonde Eyes.

Last night on my personal status message I put (I am one of those annoying people who in the month of November throws up something I am thankful for every day): Day 15: I am thankful for Hope. She's not perfect, but she's a good kid. Of all the possible outcomes, I'm glad she's only a mildly annoying teenager :) ♥

Napping on the couch with the dog...

And here is the shake down of it. I get really annoyed with my daughter. She's not stupid. BUT she has always had a bad tendency to be L A Z Y. She would rather work really hard to get her grades barely afloat, then put forth half the effort to just keep them good to start with. So, she would things like, goof off the first three weeks (lose papers, not turn stuff in, turn in half finished work....), and then the next three weeks run around in a panic trying to get her grades up enough to pass.

Then, at home....rinse and repeat. You want her to actually clean up after herself? UGH, that's for lesser folks! You tell her to go clean her room, what you get is her going to her room and going to sleep. 

Napping on the couch....

She does a whole lot of the UGH and eye roll crap. Gosh, I swear I could just choke her sometimes.  Then, a week before school started she ran off like a complete crazy person with not a single lick of sense. We just refer to this as a momentary break of sanity.

High school started and she has actually gotten much better. Her and I are thick as thieves, and she loves being in Color Guard so much that I *almost* don't have to worry about her grades being too bad. Color guard has actually turned her into quite the beast. Lazy? Do you have any idea how many extra hours this child spends at school WORKING her butt off? I don't even keep count. She almost lives up there. There are weekends that she's up there working or traveling around with the band. Last night she came home with her thumb being a lovely shade of purple.

Watching t.v. on the couch...

And my lovely child who always does nothing but complain and whine? She gets physically assaulted on an almost daily basis and the teacher says she NEVER says a word about it. She comes home and does a kiss my boo boo bit and that's the end of it. o.O 

Chores? She's on it. I asked her to choose one night a week to cook to help out around here and she picked TWO nights.

In her Color Guard jacket.

So, Blonde Eyes might be pretty annoying and frustrating, but it's really only because I know she could be so much more if she WANTED to be. Overall though, I didn't draw the short stick with her. She doesn't party, she doesn't do drugs, drink, smoke, and isn't sexually active. Do I still worry that at any moment someone could pressure her into it? Hell yes I worry about it. I'm the mom of a very pretty teenage daughter who likes to make people (and especially peers) happy. 

But she has something she loves, and it keeps her busy. And right now, I'm happy with what she does in her down time. :D

At camp (before changing her hair color).

Criminal Intent

Mama (how many of my blogs start this way?) was telling me about a comment on a post of hers and asked me to check out a link. So, I go over and I read it. Right away I see what she was talking about. The provided link was to a post talking contrary about seemingly EVERYTHING that Mama and I think about autism. It was very strongly written. To me most of it was in a very defiant manner. Not only daring you to defy her, but almost begging you to.

The question at hand was....Why would this person want me to read this? There is nothing here that is anything like what I tell my readers. So....what was the meaning behind drawing my attention here?

The first thing that came to my mind was self advertising. As a page owner that happens all the time. Ohhh I love your page! Come check out mine. And then the page doesn't even follow your page. I'm thinking, same thing but with blogs. Then there is the possibilities of swaying people to come around to that way of thinking about autism.

PWAS then tells her well...maybe you're missing the point behind it. Mama then decides that she should not be so quick to anger and look for a silver lining in the message. Which all leads us here...

I then told Mama that here is the problem. When you don't know someone you then have to try to determine their intent on your own. You have no basis for making your decision either. When you don't REALLY know someone you get to decide for yourself if you want to put malice or love into their words.

Some people naturally like to jump to seeing bad in people others are hopelessly trusting and seeing nothing but good. I don't think many can just place themselves in neutral. What are the options left then? Well, I suppose you could jump to being offended and or retaliate/arrange dinner with your new BFF. Where possible you could consult a neutral third party who knows you both and ask for an interpretation. Or, you could go straight to the source. Hey, what did you mean by that? or Hey, this is what I got from that, is that what you meant?

My husband often tells me that the problem with  the written word is that you can't always tell what context it is meant to be taken in. I don't think that's true, because to me anything you say at any time in any fashion can be taken out of context if the person wishes to do so. I prefer the written word. I can formulate what I am saying. I can add things in, edit things out, and make sure that what I am saying is as to the point as possible.

I keep myself factual in my writings. I rarely attach feelings to them. I try to just say, HEY this is the way it is...no big deal. And I assume that being straight forward and to the point with an absence of feelings will lead to clarity for every reader. But next to no one who reads my blogs truly knows me. Knows me well enough to know my intent. I just hope that the words I say are taken the way they were intended. 

So, what was this other bloggers intent for Mama? I have no clue. The social aspect of people tends to be lost on me. It's why I stay in my home a lot. It's why if I venture out I don't go without my husband. But I could guess that most people's intents are not criminal in nature. Some might be selfish or misguided...but honestly....I just don't understand people.

I'm not a jerk. Hopefully this other blogger isn't one either. I would just say to each of you, be careful how you judge intent. You cannot always judge intent of the person based off of your feelings. In the end, I respect Mama's chosen response to the situation. She was angry. She consulted a couple of friends. And then sat her feelings aside. She decided that just because she doesn't agree with this person that it didn't mean they had to be enemies.