STILL STANDING

Hello again after a very restless night I am ready to write.

 To tell you it how it is. 

To share & express my feelings.

To reflect on the past with grace & look forward with hope.

Another truth unfolded yesterday for our youngest daughter, after a 6 month painful journey of severe anxiety & school refusal.

A diagnosis of ASD & anxiety disorder, age 12 was finally decided yesterday.

It is the correct diagnosis & as I said to a few close friends & relations it is a bitter sweet relief.

 Our eldest daughter was also diagnosed, age 14 with ASD & chronic fatigue in October 2013.

We have some vitally important work to do in making sure our daughter now understands exactly what her diagnosis means & that she is no less because of it! It is not a label only a diagnosis.

  Encourage her to embrace her interests & support her with overcoming her difficulties with respect, love & offer appropriate solutions where possible.

Be her guide & mentor to help her to choose positive, healthy & safe friendships, where she can comfortably be herself without a mask.

Remind her of her strengths & weaknesses & to always view them with love & self-respect. 

Living with autism is often described as the glass jar effect. This beautiful photographic image helps me to visualise what we feel.

My family all live with this glass jar around us & we are  finding it to be increasingly more challenging to see through the glass to the other side of the real world right now.

 Our eldest daughter is struggling also & has been unable to attend her half day medical needs school since November. Her sensory meltdowns, mental health & total isolation are causing many traumatic days for her. There is no respite.  It is heartbreaking for us all right now.

Our hearts sit tight together in our glass jar & that is how we as "team Read" operate. We look out for each other. We are each others supports.

 It is both exhausting & rewarding at the same time.

Both myself & my wonderfully supportive husband & truely amazing dad, are now needing to see the correct educational provision for both of our beautiful girls.

We are going to ask for more intervention & support to help our loving girls.

As parents we are very much in this alone. We are a very small family with very little access to outside help or respite. 

My husband is greatly struggling walking into our glass jar, when arriving from his real world at work & I am struggling with the real world, as I live permanently in our glass jar.

It is work in progress & will all ebb & flow as our life stops & starts with the girls difficulties or struggles.

For now please let me thank you for reading our unexpected journey of living with & accepting autism.

Until next time, take care.

xx

All images were taken from Pinterest