Thinking Too Much

Isn't it funny how a simple conversation can send your thoughts into overdrive and try as you might, you just can't manage to clear your mind, or listen to your body telling you that you are exhausted and need to sleep? Recently, I had, not one of these conversations, but two and I thought I was never going to find my pillow. My son had been home from school for several days trying to fight off a fever and a bad case of "seasonal allergies." Feeling miserable as I was tucking him into bed and telling him goodnight, he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, "I made a big mistake mom." I immediately thought, "Oh No… do we have another trial sized bottle of something shoved into the toilet again, did he try and fix something he shouldn't have, clean the sink with his dad's toothbrush, or are there ketchup packets under the toilet seat waiting for the next victim of a "squishy"? I pushed my frantic thoughts out of the way, and asked him what he had done that was such a "big mistake."

"You know all of those times that I tell you I love you? I think I should never tell you that ever again," he replied. My heart dropped like a rock and I asked him why he felt that way. I love hearing him say that and I would really miss it (He didn't talk until he was 4 and I don't think he ever said he loved me until he was five or six). His theory was, that he must have used all his energy telling me that he loved me and didn't have enough left to keep him from getting sick. I tried to reassure him that those powerful "I love you's" had nothing to do with him being sick and it had more to do with the time of year. My son was right in his thinking, they are very powerful words and do bring with them very strong feelings that can make a person feel good and bad at the same time, just not this time.

Right after this conversation with my son, the phone rings and it is my mother who lives in another state. It is obvious from the tone of her voice that something has really ruffled her feathers and she tells me about a news clip she just saw about a kindergarten teacher in Florida that had the students in her class vote on whether they should let a child stay in the class or if he needed to be removed. This boy just happened to be autistic and had some behaviors that were often disruptive to the class.

Needless to say, the kids voted him out. Mind you, these are kindergarten age kids who are deciding the fate of a classmate with a disability. What point is this teacher trying to make and what does she hope to accomplish? Acceptance? Diversity? Kindness? Ignorance?

My head is really spinning now, I have a son with autism, who thinks his love for me has made him sick, a child in Florida that I don't even know, being voted out of class by his peers because of his disability and all I can do is play the words of Charles Dickens over and over in my mind as I cry.

"We need never be ashamed of our tears." -Charles Dickens