Additional Needs

Parent's Day

Posted by Zowie Kaye on 23rd July 2018 Additional Needs, Advice & Support, Disabilities

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“Cameron do you think I’m a good mum? Do I make you happy?”

“You are the BEST mum I have ever been born from! – I love you”

I have many moments as a parent where I feel that I fail, that I am not enough or that I neglect my child.

The above comment though made my heart burst!

We are full time working parents and the normal hustle and bustle of everyday life makes me feel often that the weeks, months and years are passing me by.

My son will be going into his last year of primary come September and the memory of his first day at reception seems like a few moments ago.

During a working week by the time we are home in the evening I greet my child, ask about his day which is always minimal conversation on his part.

From there I must check his journal as during this year at school he has been struggling with some aspects of his behaviour and in order to address this I have been asking for a daily update.

This is a really challenging task emotionally for the both of us, Cameron is high functioning and conforms extremely well so I am quite firm with him that some of the things he has been reported as doing (ie: banging his pencil on the table or huffing when he is asked to do a piece of work he doesn’t want to) – are not acceptable and I will not tolerate them.

He knows that his evening treat or electronic device time will be in jeopardy.

It is difficult because I want to make him aware of his actions and that they have consequences but then on the flip side I feel that these are the by-product of his condition the few precious hours of the evening we have as a family are then tainted as I must discipline my child.

Something happened last week that gave me mixed emotions.

We have just been on a two-week holiday to Corfu, private villa where Cameron could be his loud quirky self and pure 24/7 family time.

When we returned home, Cameron said to his grandma “mammar you know what, I was pleasantly surprised on holiday – I thought my mum would tell me to use my inside voice a lot more than she usually does but she was really calm and hardly said it at all!”

Initially I was sad that my son must think I shush him a lot or get on at him for being quieter and using his inside voice, and the fact that he actually noticed I was more calm and relaxed.

I do not give him enough credit in the emotions and body language that he picks up on, when I have thought for so long with his autism it was one of his areas of weakness.

It made me so happy thought to know that he enjoyed our holiday and family time, that he felt relaxed and that he could just be himself – ultimately though that he felt that I was relaxed which in turn will have made him more at ease.

I know that there is not a manual and 10 years into being a parent, I myself am still learning everyday.

We need to be not so hard on ourselves because our children love us and happy children equal happy homes.