Why It's So Hard for Me

Our neighbors across the street offered a ride to the kids I usually take to school today and so I get to start my day at the desk early.

We let Mike spend the night again tomorrow night, notifying the worker for the boys to make sure she didn't have a problem with it. Gratefully, she is wise enough to understand that while he can be a negative influence on our other kids, that us modeling a lifetime commitment is more important. We have to talk to our agency today and see what they think.

We are making no commitments to MIke as to this being long term. He is sleeping on the couch and not allowed in other's rooms. It's just cold and he has nowhere to go.

The reason this is hard for me is that my very organized very black-and-white brain is made crazy by his impulsivity and lack of boundaries. I know that it is part of his disability and it was easier when it was younger. But now, when he is 18 and still as impulsive and disorganized and likely to "steal" as he was 10 years ago, it's so troubling.

Last night, for example, I had to go give someone a ride at 9:00. I left the house and Mike was in the middle of a TV program. I get back at 9:10 and pass him on the street as he races downhill at top speed on his skateboard, off to who knows where. I got home to find that he had told Bart he just wanted to skate a while.... but it's so disarming. One second he's involved in a TV program and then BOOM he's off down the street.

This morning, even after being told to stay out of others rooms, he comes out of Jimmy's room with his jeans on. Jimmy said he could have them, Mike reports, and they are too small for him. I explain to MIke that just because they don't fit JImmy doesn't mean that they might not fit someone else in the house who needs jeans.

These are small things I understand, and not really worth blogging about, except that they demonstrate a pattern. And the pattern is being predictably unpredictable. But the hard part is not knowing what will happen next. Last fall it was always something new that we never expected. Could we predict that last fall he was going to use our computers to deal drugs? Could we predict that he would try to sell drugs at church? Could we predict any of the crazy things he does when acting impulsively?

I distinctly remember a time when Mike was about 10 that perfectly sums up the whole unpredictability issue. He and John were just little guys -- physically as well as age-wise -- and they were messing around in the garage with the garage door shut. Somehow they had found some matches (not on our property) and were lighting them.

When they heard the door open, they threw the lit matches UNDER the van in order to hide them from me. I, of course, gently reminded them (NOT) that that was way too dangerous. And Mike looked at me with a deer-in-the-headlights look and said, "Well you never told us NOT to do that."

I have often thought over the years just how impossible it would be to think of everything he might possibly do and warn him not to. And it is this not knowing what he will do next that makes me nervous.

I stumbled upon this blog entry last night. i was too tired to get angry, but I simply thought, "If you were responsible for a child with FASD for ONE day your opinions about this would no longer be open for debate."