This evening our son came over to the house around 7 pm.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I was polishing silver.\u00a0 He said “Hi” and I said “Hi” and he wandered around in a vague sort of way.\u00a0 I asked if he’d eaten supper yet and he said yes, he’d had spaghetti and meatballs.\u00a0 I finished the spoons I was working on, put them away, and went back to my study to get some work done until Richard came in from the land, since M- hadn’t said he wanted anything and he often uses Richard’s computer (it has broadband.\u00a0 His house doesn’t.)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I heard our son leave, and then come back in a few minutes later.\u00a0\u00a0 I went back out; he was moving aimlessly about the kitchen.\u00a0\u00a0 “Did you come over for anything in particular?” I asked.\u00a0 “No,” he said, ducking his head.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Then he asked a series of questions about whether my mother had done this or that with me, and what had I said, and that led to some family history.<\/p>\n
Finally I noticed the relevant point–he was wearing a purple shirt (school colors.)\u00a0\u00a0 I asked if he was wearing a purple shirt for any particular reason.\u00a0 “Football,” he said very softly.\u00a0\u00a0 Well, it’s Friday night.\u00a0 But I haven’t been to a football game in years (when Richard took him, it was a time I could write like a banshee, alone in the house.)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So I asked if there was a home game and he began to perk up, like a drooping plant that’s gotten water.\u00a0 “Yes.”\u00a0 I asked if he wanted to go.\u00a0 “Yes,” a little louder.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I asked what time the game started.\u00a0\u00a0 “7:30.”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It was then 7:34.<\/p>\n
I\u00a0 told him, on the way to the high school (something over a mile away and there’s no safe walking route) that I’d have taken him when he first came in if he’d asked then<\/em>.<\/p>\n It is still hard for him to ask directly for what he wants even when it’s something that we do every week.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Which things give him the most trouble are variable, but usually whatever’s most important to him is the hardest to say.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He had no trouble telling me he wanted to be picked up at 10 pm.\u00a0 Yesterday he had trouble (but did manage to say) that he wanted to go ice skating.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He told me he felt brave for saying it.\u00a0\u00a0 Why, I wondered.\u00a0 Because he thought I might be annoyed if he asked….but I’ve never been annoyed when he summoned the whatever-it-takes to ask directly for something.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This evening our son came over to the house around 7 pm.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I was polishing silver.\u00a0 He said “Hi” and I said “Hi” and he wandered around in a vague sort of way.\u00a0 I asked if he’d eaten supper yet and he said yes, he’d had spaghetti and meatballs.\u00a0 I finished the spoons I was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,26,10],"tags":[13,8],"class_list":["post-89","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-on-the-spectrum","category-parenting","category-socialization","tag-communication","tag-social-skills"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=89"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90,"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89\/revisions\/90"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=89"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=89"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.speedofdark-thebook.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=89"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}