Susan Senator

We’ll raise our children in the peaceful way we can,
Its up to you and me brother
To try and try again.
–Allman Joy

It’s not that Nat isn’t ready to go. It’s that I am not ready for him to go. We went from zero to 60, just like that. Yes, last summer was hard, so hard, with all of his outbursts, so inexplicable to us. So much would bother him. Ben was so afraid of him, no matter what I did. If I said too much to explain things to him, it would only serve to invalidate his feelings. I don’t know how much fact sunk in. All I know is how he grew to hate Nat, to hate just about everything in his life, to mistrust us, to withdraw into sarcasm, goth clothing, gaming, cynicism, tears.

I am not blaming Nat. I would never see it that way. I don’t blame autism. That is a condition of nerve cells, like a part of his body; it would be like blaming my own belly for having cellulite, or blaming humidity for causing rain. You can see connections and causes, but you can’t blame. It is apart from him, and yet, deeply connected to him, so how could I blame autism? Autism, to me, is not a capitalized word, like some Being. I blame myself, more than anything, because I do not know what to do to provide balance and safety for all of my children, and that is my primary job as their mother.

Why are we created to fail our kids? Why can’t we figure them out? Why can’t love overpower all the mistakes, all the hurts? We are too complex for our own good. And so it twists and cuts so much to watch the repercussions of our inadequacy.

I realized at some point, in my mind, that Nat had to go. He was old enough and could learn more about how to be with others, from others. I had to focus on Ben — and Max. Ben was crying for help. Max, well, no crying, but — I always worry. Is he quiet and accommodating, like Ned, or is he this way because he had to become this way? He was always this way. But is it okay? Like Ned, he seems happy, but like Ned, I always wonder about someone who handles things so internally, so unlike the way I do.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and sometimes it is much, much more. Still waters, and all that.

With Nat’s school, we now had a place that I could trust, which is saying a lot. I don’t trust easily. It has taken me years to get to know his school and how they do things. I know their flaws and I know their postive attributes. Teacher after teacher seems to fall in love with him, and why wouldn’t they? He’s bright and beautiful, laughs easily, and he’s so funny.

Oh, God, I am going to start crying again! I was just in his room, straightening for the cleaning women (such a strange thing we do, clean so that they can clean). Looking around at the toys, from 18 years of life, the class photos, the art, just sucked my heart downward. The abortive attempts to teach him this and that: sentence-generation puzzles; construction toys; piggy bank; baby doll; math fact flash cards. The toys he used to like, but that now are dust magnets: Funny Bunny (tattered gray rags shaped vaguely like a rabbit); books on tape; Disney CDs.

Nat, Nat, Nat. Baby pictures of you, preteen, chubby 9 year-old. I know, I know, here come the strains of Sunrise, Sunset. Ned says I am just a big pile of sugar. But I’m just saying: it all happened way too fast.