Peace Out

Tonight was the last night the kids and I will spend together in this house. Tomorrow night they'll spend the night with a friend to be spared at least a bit of the chaos of moving, so tonight was it for us. We planned pizza and a movie and baking cookies for our bus stop friends. Simple, but perfect.  But certainly not easy.  Not tonight.

I had misread the school lunch calendar this morning and packed Ben a turkey sandwich when he would have strongly preferred the hamburger on the menu. I ordered our pizza from the wrong place. And even after a frantic correction, I ordered the wrong kind of pizza from the right place. Ben's favorite Wii game had inadvertently been packed.  The first movie the kids selected had technical difficulties. But more than anything else, Ben was convinced he would never see his bus stop friends again after tomorrow. It was all a bit too much and he just couldn’t hang. Crying, screaming, hives and a touch of destructive behavior ensued. Lucy and I did our best to stay out of his way and to be quiet. At its core, autism is a language processing disorder and when Ben has "passed the point of no return," the fewer words the better. Every time we spoke he screamed at us to stop talking. Lucy and I started making cookies that we planned to give our bus stop friends in the morning, but even our whispers bothered him. Then Lucy started to cry. “This was supposed to be our special night, mommy.” Oy.

I got a movie without technical problems rolling, served the pizza – the correct half of it - and began bagging up the cookies for our bus stop friends. Lucy was helping me put our notes in the bags and we were being very quiet. Eventually, Ben noticed what we were doing and came over to help. I silently handed him a bag of cookies and our note. He took the bag, put the note in and zipped it up. I smiled at him and he smiled back. I handed him another. And our night was back on track.

After the movie, I asked if there was anything else they wanted to do for our last night in this house. They both said they wanted to read together and Lucy, of course, wanted to sleep with me. Then they started coming up with all sorts of silly “last night in our house” things that we should do. Lucy wanted to do back walkovers in the living room one last time. Ben wanted us to watch a Lego Guy Wipe-Out round. And they both wanted me to carry them to their rooms for bedtime in whatever manner they chose.  (Super.  Thanks for not choosing anything too physically demanding, guys. Oof.)  I carried Lucy upside-down and Ben cradled in my arms, “like a baby.” We read together as we do most every night, exchanged tummy blows until our stomachs hurt from laughing and said our good nights.

After a rocky start, the last night in this Heagler House turned out pretty perfect after all.

Peace out, 17507 North Park Place.