Every weekend that Nat is home — and we are now starting to wean ourselves from that pattern, to prepare Nat and ourselves for Post-22 November — there is tension.\u00a0 This is not to say that the tension is Nat’s fault; it is no one’s fault.\u00a0 It is a dynamic.\u00a0 Maybe I shouldn’t say “there is tension,” using the passive voice.\u00a0 Because the thing is, it is I feeling the tension.\u00a0 I am, and maybe Ben.\u00a0 Nat and Max:\u00a0 birds of a feather, ducks with water rolling off their backs, or some such foul analogy.<\/p>\n
I feel the tension because I know Nat so well.\u00a0 I know what he is looking for when he runs upstairs and then runs back down.\u00a0 Well, actually, I don’t know why he runs upstairs first; maybe to burn off some of that high-octane energy of his.\u00a0 But I do know why he runs down:\u00a0 to check on everyone else’s routine.\u00a0 I have written about this many times.\u00a0 Nat gets very focused on what others are doing given a particular time of day, and he repeats to them what he believes they should be doing — over and over — usually until they do it.<\/p>\n
We have been schooled over the years not to give in to this kind of behavior.\u00a0 This may seem high-handed and centered on us and what we want, rather than on what Nat wants, but it actually is not, because giving in is sometimes actually escalating to Nat.\u00a0 Nat often craves the safety of a firm remark, the closure of crisp, stark-edged reassurance:\u00a0 “Nat, I will eat my eggs after my workout, and you have to stop talking about it now.”<\/p>\n
I feel tense as I wait for Ned to finish whatever he is doing on the computer at any given moment, so that he can deal with Nat.\u00a0 The tension happens with Ned because I usually anticipate Nat’s anxiety and I structure some of my routines around avoiding that.\u00a0 I am a a wimp and I have failed Behavior Modification 101.<\/p>\n
Ben also feels the tension.\u00a0 He used to run away or capitulate at once, running to put on his shoes the minute Nat said, “Ben will put on his shoes.”\u00a0 Even if Ben wasn’t going out.\u00a0 I get a creepy feeling when I think about Ben feeling forced to do this unnecessary thing just to keep the peace; kind of like someone being forced to dance when a bad guy shoots the ground, saying, “Dance.”\u00a0 Or a hostage who has to give the criminal all of his stuff.\u00a0 I hate seeing loved ones humbled.<\/p>\n
Now Ben makes faces at Nat when he is being bossy.\u00a0 Or he mimics him.\u00a0 I have such mixed feelings when I see this.\u00a0 On one hand, I am so glad that he is no longer a victim, that he stands up to Nat, who is a foot taller and very strong.\u00a0 But on the other hand, I feel bad for Nat who may be confused as to why Ben is shoving his angry face into Nat’s face.\u00a0 Does Nat feel bad, like he is being harassed, or teased?\u00a0 Is this just, that Ben should do this?\u00a0 It makes me very uncomfortable.\u00a0 I often say, “Ben,” with a little bit of exasperation in my voice.\u00a0 And he’ll say, through gritted teeth, “But he’s SO ANNOYING!”<\/p>\n
Nat just looks at him and blinks, but what does he think of that?\u00a0 And what does Ben think — that I feel bad for Nat and no compassion for him?<\/p>\n
The other day, however, I thought of a new thing to say:\u00a0 “Ben, does it ever help to remember that he does stuff like that because of his disability — that his neurons have grown together kind of wrong, and they are making him really anxious?\u00a0 What does that feel like to you, to think that way.”<\/p>\n
Ben’s voice was rough and quiet:\u00a0 “Uh, it makes me feel really sad,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Oh,” I gulped. Oh. My. God.<\/em> “Yeah, I know,” was all I could say, because my heart was in my mouth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Every weekend that Nat is home — and we are now starting to wean ourselves from that pattern, to prepare Nat and ourselves for Post-22 November — there is tension.\u00a0 This is not to say that the tension is Nat’s fault; it is no one’s fault.\u00a0 It is a dynamic.\u00a0 Maybe I shouldn’t say “there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pSTth-vb","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1933"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1934,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1933\/revisions\/1934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}