The One That's Been Banging Around in My Head & I Finally Let It Out

I am interrupting my 30 Days of Truth to share this with you. Its been banging about in my head for a few days and I decided to let it out.

I follow lots of bloggers and I think of each and every one of you as friends. I follow writers such as Brian from Waystationone – who is an AWESOME writer. Give him a topic and ask for poetry or story and he will give it to you, sometimes in 55 words or less. There is Marv at the Old Silly Free Spirit Blog, another awesome writer. You should stop over and see him and his blog hopping book tour. Fabulousness!

I follow mommy bloggers such as Blogging Mama who writes about raising kids and baseball from the mid-west. There is Amber from Airing My Dirty Laundry – One Sock at a Time; she puts the funniest spins on daily living with two kids, one who is Aspergers with a touch of ADHD – AND her husband is stationed in Korea for a year.

I read some humor bloggers such as Barefoot Foodie who is planning to say I (Still) Do in December and invited all her followers to follow her to Vegas! In my list of must  reads is Sincerely Jenni.  She writes about her life as a mom and all that encompasses.  She is the blogger who turned my onto the 30 Days of Truth.

Another category of blogs that I follow are ones about experiences with raising kids on the Autism spectrum. With Jakes being on the spectrum, I need all the help I can get with raising him. I have followed Teen Autism for a while now. Tonya has lots of good links and info for raising our AS kids.

My most recent addition to my blog family is Lynn from My Life as an Ungraceful, Unhinged, and Unwilling Draftee into the Autism Army. Her post on the Anniversary of Diagnosis really touched me. By the end of the post, I was crying, for her and her grief and for me, in my exhaustion of fighting this war to get the best of everything for my Jakes.

I have been in this war for about 5 years now. Plenty of time to have dealt with the grief process and accept the diagnosis. And long enough to have battle fatigue. With all the problems and stress I have been under with Jakes behaviors of late, I have been extremely tired and patience-less in dealing with most everything in my life.

Lynn’s post reminded me that this war is not about ME. Its about getting the best of whatever our kids need to function in this world. My Thought for the Day email reminded me also.

“Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. – Satchel Paige”

Children make us aware of how tired they are by sitting down and crying. As adults we don’t have that luxury. We have to be grow-ups, responsible. Instead of sitting down and crying about it, we need to find another way. We need to learn how to ask for help. Help with the problem or with daily chores if necessary. We just have to ask.

I have been doing a lot of sitting down and crying like a child. I have a child who needs ME to be responsible, to fight for HIM, to ensure he has everything he needs to function in the world.

While I have been crying like a child, I HAVE been asking for help. We have been seeing a therapist, who has not been helping enough. Unfortunately, instead of recognizing this, I sat and cried when I should have been asking for help. Actually, maybe I was asking for help of the therapist and she wasn’t listening. It doesn’t matter. After our world crashed, I asked for help from others. People who have helped in the past. People who I have high hopes to help us again.

In the future, I will try to recognize when I need to ask for help, even if I have to change who I am asking. But I will never give up and cry. I will hold my head up high and dig deep for the strength to fight for what Jakes needs.

Lynn, Thanks! I needed that!