An Ugly Side of Autism

Yesterday M-Boy had a real bad day. Sometimes I don't like to talk about autism on my blog because every person with autism is different. Just because M-Boy acts in a certain way, it doesn't mean every autistic individual does. People with autism are unique, their own person just like 'normal' people in the world with various personalities. Sure, they may have similar characteristics that define their disorder but still, no two cases are the same. So if you don't personally know anyone with autism, please understand that M-Boy is just one of millions and my stories about him won't always relate to other autistic people. Some may but not all.

Yesterday M-Boy and Little Man were fighting over their TV in their room. Little Man wanted to watch cartoons and M-Boy wanted to play his Playstation. I was in the kitchen making dinner and could hear the argument getting louder. When it reaches a certain level they ALWAYS come running to me to sort it out. I never have to intervene without them asking. M-Boy came down first yelling and pleading his case about the TV. Little Man was a nearly a full minute behind M-Boy (rare for an argument). He came hobbling into the kitchen gushing blood from his leg. He fell on a piece of glass from a broken mirror in his room last week that I thought we had gotten all cleaned up. I immediately tended to his leg. BUT M-Boy didn't want to wait for a decision about the TV. He kept going on and on about the TV. I said "just a minute! Your brother is bleeding." M-Boy wouldn't stop. He claimed "It wasn't fair if he didn't get to play playstation because Little Man had watched TV earlier". I snapped at that point. I know empathy is hard for autistic people (some, not all-remember my warning) but his callousness towards his brother's wound was really getting to me. It wasn't a scrape. It was gushing!

I yelled at M-Boy. I told him to just wait a darn minute. His brother was bleeding and he acted like it didn't matter. He tried to say something else about the TV when my husband came into the room and took over yelling at M-Boy. It got ugly. The husband took away the TV for 24 hours and berated M-Boy for caring more about television than his brother. This did not go over well. M-Boy cried, claimed we hated him, cried some more, wished he was dead, cried even more, etc. It took a good hour to calm him down. We told him we understood that his sense of justice was severely trampled on but he failed when it came to responding to an emergency situation. He tried to get us to give back his TV privileges but I wouldn't budge. I felt so sorry for him. I really did. When he finally calmed down I hoped that his punishment would help him to TRY to think about others the next time an emergency rose. It is hard for him to switch gears once he is doing something. It is called 'transitioning'. M-Boy has to do almost everything in a ballistic manner. Once started it must go until complete. So probably if I would have said "yes the TV is yours" he could have switched gears and helped his brother. Who knows.

The ugly part for me was at midnight when he was going to bed he came into my room and said "Mommy, I want to make sure that I get to go first with the TV tomorrow. It wouldn't be fair if [ Little Man ] goes first." I wanted to cry. He didn't learn anything at all.