As most of you know, our son, Hunter, was diagnosed with autism at three years old. And since then, my husband and I have learned so much about neurodivergent parenting.
Lessons from Hunter
Hunter has taught us more than I could have ever expected. He’s such a joyous, bright light in our lives, with so much to share with the world! When we first received his diagnosis, my initial reaction was relief. Relief that I finally had answers and actually wasn’t making all of this up in my head. But then, I remember this feeling of relief morphing into being terrified that I wouldn’t do right by him. I knew instantly that he deserved the world, just like any other child, but giving him the world was going to take a little more work.
Since then, I’ve spent a significant amount of time learning more about autism, how it shows up specifically for Hunter and how our entire family can play a role in helping him out. Today, I wanted to share an update on Hunter’s journey and our journey as a whole family. It’s so important to be open and honest about the truth of neurodivergent parenting.
The beginning of our journey…
It’s hard to look back and realize that Hunter has had his formal diagnosis for exactly 2 years now. I shared a ton about the process and diagnosis in episodes 4 and 5 of the podcast, but I want to give y’all an update on where we are now — both Hunter individually as well as our family.
So a quick recap on where Hunter was when we started this: lots of tantrums, unexplained meltdowns, lack of communication and ineffective attempted solutions. I was stressed out and feeling like a bad mom.
Life isn’t without its challenges
Now, Hunter is almost thriving. I say ‘almost’ because of course he still has bad days and struggles. Changes in his routine are tough — like the start of summer, the start of school, vacations, and a new baby arriving. Summer, in general, was really rough because I’m sure a lot of y’all feel the same way in that summer has much less routine to it overall. He has a dichotomy of excitement and anxiety.
We’ve learned that 3-7 days is a good amount of lead time to tell Hunter about most things that will be happening. For example, we told him 3 days in advance about going to the dentist. We told him about the trip to San Antonio with my parents 6 days in advance. Depending on how big of an event it is and how many questions I think he’ll have, that’s how I decide when to tell him. This was something that took me a little while to figure out what worked best for him. Some children on the spectrum do better with no lead time while others need tons of lead time, we’ve mostly found the sweet spot for our Hunter.
Are we doing therapy?
As of right now, Hunter is actually not in any therapy. We had him in a social skills class that was supposed to have 4-5 kids in the group. Only 1 other child was showing up consistently, and the class was at a horrible time, so we really didn’t feel it was the best use of our time and money.
Sports at the playground have been tough for Hunter, but he asks us to sign him up each season. For now, we’re honoring that request and teaching him about being part of a team. It helps that Chance is able to be a parent coach and direct Hunter and keep him focused as needed.
Our family is trying hard to find the balance of helping Hunter learn ways to cope in the neurotypical world while also being advocates for those who are neurodivergent. We want to raise kind children who are welcoming and understanding of everyone out there. But we know at the same time that not everyone is being raised that way and that unfortunately, the world cannot only cater to Hunter.
We diligently practice Hunter’s communication skills, explain euphemisms to him and teach him not to be so rigid in how things ‘have’ to be. He’s very literal, so I have worked hard on speaking to him in a way that is clear and not vague. For example, I can’t say “Hunter please go put your shoes by the front door,” when I mean to go put them on the shoe rack up front. The time I said this, Hunter literally put his shoes in front of our front door.
Now, I say “Hunter please go put your shoes on the shoe rack that’s next to the front door.” Yes, it annoyed me at first to have to be this detailed and explicit, but it’s how his brain operates. It’s not his fault, and technically he listened and did what was asked of him. We can do all the explaining in the world to him about ‘what we meant,’ but I’m honestly not sure it would do any good.
Hunter’s just like every other kid!
We’ve had a few instances now that he’s in ‘big kid’ school with him saying that friends weren’t being nice to him or playing with him. It’s hard to get the full story from him with some of his communication challenges. We just use these times as an opportunity to remind him that not everyone will be nice to him or want to be his friend. But it’s about quality over quantity and sticking with your true friends.
We encourage Hunter to read, learn and tell us all of the facts he wants to! We know he’s going to have a job where he is doing research on something super complicated – I can totally see Hunter curing cancer – he’s THAT smart. He won’t have a ‘people job’ so to speak, but he will contribute amazing things to this world!
Putting it all out there like that shows me just how far we have all come!
Our favorite resources for ND parents
If you’re a parent of a neurodivergent child, I would love to share a resource with you. Especially if you’re at the beginning of your journey as family, it can be hard to navigate the new routines and understandings you’ll have of the world!
We have a downloadable PDF of the books my husband and I love on our autism journey! The best thing about this resource is that it also includes books for your neurotypical kids who may also be figuring this whole thing out in their own way.
They won’t just teach you how to navigate parenting, but give you so much insight into what’s happening inside your children’s minds, especially when they have trouble vocalizing their thoughts and feelings. I am a different person — and quite frankly a different (better!) mom for Hunter — because of many of these books.
