Ep. 15: 'tis The Season For Family Weirdness

Severe Autism Mom & podcast host Shannon Chamberlin shares some ways the holidays can negatively affect her family, along with changes they have made to cope with it all.

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Transcript

'tis The Season For Family Weirdness
Sat, Nov 26, 2022 . 7:43 PM
35:54
Owner: Shannon Chamberlin

SUMMARY KEYWORDSfamily, severe autism, presents, people, family members, decorations, birthday, happy, christmas, year, tree, kid, life, work, child, thanksgiving, loves, bought, grandmother, melt

Shannon Chamberlin

0:18

Hello and welcome to The Parenting Severe Autism podcast. I am your host Shannon Chamberlin. I'm so happy that you're here with me today. For more information about each of these episodes, you can head on over to psa.buzzsprout.com where you'll find the transcript, show notes, contact email, social media page, coupon codes, and merch as well as a link to support the show, where you can just buy me a coffee for as little as $1. And a portion of the proceeds from that program and from any merch sold will go towards helping other severe autism families in need, who may not be able to afford the sensory items, therapy items or specialty foods for their loved one. Also keep an eye out for my book, which is coming out very soon, there will be a link in all of the show notes once the book is published and available for sale. It is expanding on my episode entitled Hindsight, the best advice we never heard. I've added at least 10 other bits of insight to this book, and I think it's a great book to refer people to when they're trying to understand your life with your child. Instead of always having to explain everything over and over and over again, maybe they can just buy the book, and read it - get a down and dirty, nitty gritty truth about the lifestyle. And then hopefully they'll make decisions to be there for you and help you through the whole process throughout your life.

Shannon Chamberlin

1:52

Well, guys, tis the season for family weirdness, right? When you hear this, it'll probably be just past Thanksgiving, if you celebrate Thanksgiving. And so we're at the point of holidays, and I don't know, doesn't it seem like emotionally sometimes we just can't catch a break? It seems like in the summer, I'm filled with disappointment and a little jealousy, you know, because of all the things we don't get to do that I would really like to do as a family or as a couple or as an individual. And then once we get to this time of year, November and December with Thanksgiving, our son's birthday, and then Christmas, I guess I still feel some disappointment for all of the things that I'm not able to do anymore. Because I'm just trying to have an even keel in my house, you know, and then that's compounded by feelings of being judged and scrutinized, you know, and I'm sure that maybe it's just me, maybe I'm just a little oversensitive, because of all of the things that I have to manage as a mom with the severe autism hanging over us all the time.

Shannon Chamberlin

3:00

I wish it were easier for family to understand the struggle and the reasons that we do the things that we do, and the reasons that we don't do the things that we don't do. I think that would make it a little easier for all of us to relate and just be able to come together for the sake of family. People have weird quirks and weird ways of showing that they have an interest or don't have an interest in family and our son. And that's a very strange time all the time. But right now, I think I'm really feeling weighed down by things that have happened and not happened in the more recent past. Right now, I'm struggling, because last December was our son's 21st birthday and you know, he never was a regular teenager. And so being 21 doesn't mean to him what it meant to some of us, but it was a big deal to me, and I think it was a big deal to my spouse, just the fact that the boy is still alive and he's healthy. And he you know,  we've made it - we've kept him alive for this long. And you know, man, it was - it's been hard, right? And we were very excited for his 21st birthday. We celebrated it, I think I may have mentioned this before - we celebrated it just as a five year old's birthday, you know, he had big balloons, a number two and a number one. I blew those up and hung them on the wall and we had all these little decorations that are in the kids section of Target for birthdays, you know, and it made him super happy and that's where he's at and that's where he'll always be at, I think. But for us, as parents, with all of the struggles that we've gone through and all of the adjustments and every single thing that we've ever done to try to make this work, you know, it's just a big milestone just for us, that he's 21. And here's the point - Nobody cared. He didn't get one telephone call, video call, birthday card, nothing. And I was really disappointed in the entire family because nobody seems to care anymore. Just because he's not cute anymore. You know, he's - no one can relate to him, he's unhappy, he hates everything, and blah, blah, blah, just because of all of that doesn't mean that he doesn't deserve some love, especially if you don't talk to him all year, you could at least recognize that it's his birthday, and that he's officially a real adult. He's 21. So I'm really weighed down right now with the baggage of the feelings that are left over from last year. And you know, with his birthday being so close to Christmas, we always had this experience of family members coming over on Thanksgiving and sitting him down at the table with an iPad and shopping on Amazon and GameStop and stuff. And this was mainly his grandmother would sit him down and ask him to pick out games and movies on these shopping platforms. And I don't know how he felt about that. I don't like it when someone asks me to pick out my own gifts, you know, but I don't know if he thinks that way or not. I don't - I don't know how we felt about that, but it happened all the time. And that was just kind of the routine for about, I don't know, three, four or five years in a row. Just no imagination, no nothing except, oh, hey, why don't you tell me what you think I should get you to melt your brain some more on the Xbox or on the TV, you know, and with just our son looking at the games and the movies, he becomes transformed, because now he is in a different world and no one else realizes it. But he's just transported into that world, and it kind of messes with his head, you know, because we are still going about normal life. And once all that shopping is done and she's got, you know, a list of 30 games and movies, she finally shuts it down and goes on about life, which is normally to go have some pie and sleep for the rest of the day or something, and he is stuck in the worlds that he was transported to during the shopping session. And it was just always really hard, and no one ever thought about the effect that it had on him, having him do that. It wasn't making him do it, of course, he loves being on the internet. And he loves looking at game and movie DVD covers and artwork and stuff like that, because like I said, it transports him into that. And he has all those feelings start coming up in him. But he never comes out of it, and it's just very difficult.

Shannon Chamberlin

7:53

So that's one of the things that used to go on, and those 30 choices of games and movies would get split up between his birthday and Christmas. And I started trying to make sure that hey, let's just give most of these on his birthday. I don't want him to get confused. I want him to know that he is most important. I don't want him thinking that there's just two days in the cold weather when there's snow outside that he gets showered with gifts and not know why. I want him to know why it's important for him to get these gifts. And I don't want him to become an adult and think that when the Christmas tree is there, it means that he's going to get a bunch of presents. I just I want him to know things. I want him to be able to identify that This is My Day. This is my birthday, people are happy that I'm here, and it's important to them that I was born - and I just want that to happen on his birthday. I don't really care about Christmas, you know.

Shannon Chamberlin

8:53

And the other part of that is because it would make us go broke. We always had to go into debt to give everyone else presents so that they wouldn't be disappointed in us. And you know, finally we stopped that. We met some people who enlightened us about how wonderful life is when you just stop gifts at Christmas. And we were like, well hey, let's try that! And it's been great. So a couple of problems that we seem to run into around all of these holidays are,  I think number one is family coming over unannounced and too much and imposing their will on my kid. I don't like that. I mean we don't have any family coming around anymore at all, period. But when we did it was stressful because if it was at our house, they would come over and take over my son's bed and just go and lay down - and he had a twin bed. I mean, there's really no reason for a grown adult-sized person to get into that bed, and we had air mattresses and other ways that they can sleep but they would just go and get in his bed and he's an only child. There are no other things like that that happened on a regular basis, and he's very into his routine. He's very into knowing what's going to happen. But he also knows his family members who do that, and he loves them and you know, he's familiar with them. So I think that sometimes even if he was uncomfortable or disappointed, because he doesn't have his own space, because somebody thinks that they deserve to sleep in his bed in the middle of the day, he wouldn't throw a fit or say anything but he would act out a little bit later. So no one ever had consideration for him and his needs for privacy and solitude. And you know, that irritated me. And perhaps it irritated me more than it irritated him. I don't know, you know, but that was one of the things that always ate at me is that I don't know, I don't know how he feels about that. I know that he is not exactly comfortable, because it's not his daily routine. But I don't know if he likes it, hates it, or is indifferent. I don't know. But I'm just uncomfortable, because I feel like maybe it's affecting him on some level, right?

Shannon Chamberlin

10:58

Another thing that we always dealt with was, you know, the family after we moved away, they just kind of fell out of touch. Everybody has a life. I can't expect everyone to try to video call my kid every day. But they would go a full year basically without talking to him. And then as soon as they get in his presence, they start telling him say this and say that, and I absolutely hate it when they try to put words in his mouth because I want him to learn words for him. I don't want him being baby talked to when he's 13, 14, 15 and older. I don't like that.  I hate baby talk for even for children, even if they don't have autism. Baby Talk is stupid, in my opinion, after they're done being babies. But some of our family members don't see it that way, and they always treat him like a baby. And they'll just baby talk with him as soon as they see him no matter how old he is. And then they'll say, you know, "Oh, do you like that?" And,  "say I like that! Yes, I like that!" you know, and I just hate that. Don't tell him what to say! So that's a stressful thing for me when they come over. And he doesn't mind, he loves the attention, you know, but I just wish that they knew a little bit more about him, and that they cared about his development enough to treat him as if he's aging, because he is.

Shannon Chamberlin

12:09

We had some trouble several years ago, when he - before he got on these meds that have really saved our family, and it was not during Christmas or anything, it was actually right around the Fourth of July or so. And his grandmother had already moved out right in front of him and never told him what was going on, which is still a sore spot for all of us here. I begged his grandfather to speak with him and tell him what's going on. And they never did. They didn't give him any consideration at all, just because,  what? He's autistic? So he doesn't deserve to be treated like a human being? He's watching you take everything out of the house that you want to take with you, and you don't offer an explanation? Well, guess what happened. He stayed up every night on the couch watching the street and wouldn't go to sleep and was really exhibiting psychotic behaviors because he didn't understand and no matter how much I told him, she's not coming back, he didn't believe me. We kept trying to figure out ways to tell him, and finally my spouse told him that she left the herd, she is not coming back, she left the herd. And finally he stopped pretending to sleep at the front door and waiting up for her and it was just a mess. Well, while all of that was going on, she decided to come over unannounced with some family members from out of state, unannounced, and there was a storm coming in, there's a bunch of strangers in his space, and you know, that's completely inconsiderate. And it's unacceptable, and I wish that people would just stop and give him a little bit of consideration. He needs his space, he deserves to know what's going to happen before it happens. And you can't just spring stuff on him like that - it damages him. So he's running around like a basket case, I'm trying to fix it. He needed his headphones, which he hadn't used in a long time, you know, and I had to put him like in a dark corner with blankets and headphones and stuff and finally got him to stop crying and stop melting down and everything. And you know, during this whole time, of course, you're always trying to save face - put on a brave, happy face for the family that's never around and not let them know how bad it is. Right? I don't know why. Why do we do that? I think we should just let it out. Just let them know, "Hey, you know what? You're ruining everyone's life right now. Can you just leave?" That would be great. But we didn't do that. So during all of that, all of those family people are out there and I come back outside and the grandmother wants to know what's wrong with him. Why is he being like that? Does he have any hobbies? I still hear that question, almost every day, especially when he's acting up and I just think of her asking us if this boy has any hobbies. I mean, really? Of course not. We're just trying to keephim alive, you know? Of course he doesn't have any fucking hobbies.

Shannon Chamberlin

14:54

But right now we're dealing with something really strange because I think it is left over guilt on the family members who did not contact him for his 21st birthday last year. The grandmother has been trying to get in touch with him for, you know quite some time but at all the wrong times and is not aware that he became a runner, an eloper. Is not aware of the danger that he is in by his own design and keeps trying to show him off to her friends and family members, which he absolutely hates. He came home one day when we let him - years ago, we let him stay the night for actually a week or two with his grandparents. And I of course have to make all of his food ahead of time and bring it and give all the directions and make sure that, you know, you only feed him what I give you and blah, blah, blah. So we did that, and I felt okay about letting him stay for a couple weeks. And when he came home, it took him a few weeks to get it out. Like I mentioned a couple episodes ago, he doesn't get his thoughts out very well. But if you listen between his babbling, you'll figure out what happened, and it takes two or three weeks for him to come around to that. Well, he had been home for about a month or so, and he starts yelling at me, "I not special!" He doesn't say 'am' he says I not special. And he was just yelling it. So I finally figured out that something must have happened at the grandparents house while he was there that made him angry. And I asked him Is somebody calling you special? Did somebody say that you're special? And he said yes. I had to ask him Who? Who says that you're special? You know, and he can't really pinpoint, so I had to throw some names out there. And when it came around to grandma, he said, Yeah, grandma, and I figured out that she had been bringing him to church several times a week to show him off to her friends, of course, to show what a great, understanding, caring, patient grandma she is showing him off to the congregation or whatever, and saying how special he is. Every single time -  he's special, he's special. And he hates that. So I had to teach him - if I can teach him to speak anything, it has to be yelling at people because as I've mentioned, he doesn't really learn or feel an effect from anything that's not really punctuated. So it was a good thing that whatever it was made him angry, because I was teaching him to yell at people. And I mean, I don't care, you know, do whatever you got to do, just communicate. I - that's where I'm at with it. But I told him all right, well, hey, next time someone says Jacob is special, you can yell at them and say, I'm not special, you're special! And he loved it. So we work on that all the time. And it's been years and years now. But we still talk about it, because I know that it bothered him, it hurt him and nobody cared. And that's the type of shit that I can't stand. So when it comes time for family to come around on holidays, I started getting really nervous because of things like this. People do and say things that affect him negatively, they hurt his feelings, and they don't know it, or they don't care to even recognize it. And he's always in a bad mood, so he can't really show them that, you know, now you've made me sad, because he's never happy, you know.

Shannon Chamberlin

18:13

He's happy now that he's on the meds. And that's fine. But it was for a long time, he was never happy. And you could never tell a difference, no matter what you did in his life. So it kind of seems like he's not affected, but he is! Your child is affected, you know?

Shannon Chamberlin

18:27

So now what's going on is the grandmother is contacting us, and we're saying no, you cannot take him out with your mom and show her how special he is. And it's not based on that, on the principle of that at all. It's really because he's a runner, and there's no way that she could catch him or stop him in the first place. And it's just for his safety that he is not allowed to go anywhere without us and mostly without his dad, you know. So instead of calling us now, she's resorted to calling the child's grandfather because we live in his house. We have already expressed to him that it's not that she can't come over and see him. It's just that she can't take him anywhere. You guys can't take him anywhere without us, and that's just the way it is. So the grandfather takes this to mean that well, yeah, we'll just let her come over anytime, unannounced, at the last minute, and that's life, right?

Shannon Chamberlin

19:20

So now the past two visits have been impromptu. She calls him and says can I come and see him? And then he's like, yeah, and then doesn't - nobody asks us - What is your schedule? What are your plans with your child today? And they just force us to accept her visit and they don't even ask Jacob, and that's what's most concerning is that, what if he doesn't want to see you right now? What if he knows that you blew him off on his birthday? What if he knows that you never call him and you never stop by unless you want to show someone how special he is? What if he knows that stuff? Doesn't he deserve to be asked if he wants to see you? If you can come over and see him? I think he does. But nobody gives him the consideration or the respect that he deserves as a human being!

Shannon Chamberlin

20:07

When we were still hosting holidays at our home, I made sure that all of the food was food that he and I could both eat, because we both have special diets, we are both special needs people! And if relatives wanted to bring food, I would try to find out what they were bringing ahead of time, so that I could make something that matched it, but was a healthier version for us to eat. I mean, I can't expect them to make a healthy version, if they only know how to make something one way. So I was very accommodating, I just needed to know - if you're going to bring something, let me know what it is, so that I can make something that looks just like it so that he doesn't feel left out, you know? So that was one of the things, but they start coming over, and as he's getting older, he's getting more unhappy, more self injurious and a lot less fun to be around, but also a lot more misunderstood by the people who only see him once or twice a year.

Shannon Chamberlin

21:03

And there was a time when the only way to stop him from destroying things was to put him in, it was kind of a timeout, but it was more of a just a sensory block area, you know, and I found out later from a therapist that started coming to the house that I actually was doing exactly the right thing. So if you're not doing this, maybe it would help you - I had a chair in the hallway, and I would just have him sit in the chair and face the wall, put his forehead on the wall. So he had to lean forward a little bit, put his elbows on his knees, you know, I would make sure his feet were flat on the floor and he was in a comfortable position to kind of feel grounded, you know, and just put his head on the wall and tell him to close his eyes. And I would make him stay for two to three minutes. And if he started freaking out while he was in that position, I would add a minute and he would hear it on the timer. And you know, you can't really go more than three minutes at a time, but I just would do that to give him something to focus on as far as behavior and time and just stop all of the input by not looking at stuff and not having things in front of him.

Shannon Chamberlin

22:12

So it was working really well, but then the family didn't really understand or respect what was going on. And I started getting some really bad looks. He would just say stuff and give me mean looks, and I am with the kid every day all day - I know what he's telling me, you know? So when he would start throwing me those looks and that body language, I have to be as scary as possible and try to get it under control, you know, so I would just open my eyes real big and talk through my teeth and tell him things like, That's not nice. You're not being nice! You know? And that was all I knew to do, and the family starts looking at me like I'm this crazy bitch. And it's what he responds to, you know. So it's like, you develop this whole routine, and this whole method of dealing with the different stages of violence and melt down and all this stuff, and yeah, it doesn't seem great to other people, but you figure out what works at what time and during which emotional outburst or whatever it is that's going on, and you have to just stick with that, you know, because he comes to expect it.

Shannon Chamberlin

23:20

He knows when she does this, that means this, you know, just like when he does something, I know what it means. But you know, you just start to feel judged and scrutinized and then once you catch a look from a family member who's never around during something that you have to deal with every day, then you start noticing how many looks you're actually getting during the entire time and you start to feel like shit - and you've got to remember, it's - it doesn't matter what they think, because this is how your family has to work. When those people are gone, you still have the same problems. And if they don't like it, maybe they shouldn't come over. We have to deal with our kids the way that we have to in order to keep everyone safe. We have to do these things, you know, and so I talk through my teeth and open my eyes big. That's the only thing I know how to do that's scary. I just have to let him know where I stand with his behavior. And he adjusts, you know?

Shannon Chamberlin

24:16

Anyway, so that's a lot of the baggage that I have. And just recently the grandmother decided to come over at the last minute in the morning during the time when I'm making his breakfast. The kid hasn't even had food yet! And nobody asked any of us if it was okay to have an intruder. So that kind of stuff just really pisses me off. We are trying to survive. You know? I don't understand why nobody respects that and nobody ever cares to learn about our lifestyle.

Shannon Chamberlin

24:19

There are some other things that we have had to deal with. You know, in my family, growing up, Thanksgiving and Christmas were kind of a big deal. And it was just - it was a thing. It was a big deal. The food was awesome. There was a lot of it, there was a lot of good fun to be had at my family gatherings. And I wanted to try to bring that into my new family here. And it took about 10 or 11 years before I finally gave up. And I can't tell you how much happier I am now that I've given up. So if you experience disappointment, sadness, stress from the destruction of your decorations and the attitude that you get when you're trying to decorate the house and all of the you know, all of that stuff that just takes away your enthusiasm and joy during the most joyous season of the year - If you're going through that, consider just dropping it, it might work for you. My thing was that we would always have a big Thanksgiving dinner and then have a cocktail and decorate the tree. And that was fun, you know, because there's a lot of work that goes into the food, especially when it's all made from scratch and healthy and all that jazz. And now you have all of your family there, everybody's happy, or they should be because they have full bellies, they've eaten really nutritious, tasty food. And it's just a great time to build a memory bank, right? You've got all the family that's never around, and you can help each other hang ornaments, you can make new ornaments, you can do the lights different every year, do the garland different, put the other decorations in different places, let other people in the family pick the places... I mean, it can just be really fun. And you can bond with each other and enjoy each other. And then the next year when you pull out that ornament that you had your niece hang up and it was a really cute place that she hung it, you'll remember that stuff like that, right? It's just - you want those memories. I've always loved a big beautiful tree, it has to be fake because I'm allergic to regular trees. But I remember the last Christmas that we actually decorated, I had just bought a tree. It was a beautiful tree. It was the best tree I've ever owned. I had borrowed one that was better many years ago, but I didn't have a family back then, it was just - I don't know, just these people just thought I should borrow this tree, because... I think because my dad had died and they were trying to cheer me up. So it was a beautiful tree. But I have never owned anything like that. And you know, you spend so much money on family and stuff for Christmas that you don't really put a lot into decorations, I guess. I don't know. But we decided to tell the family you know, we're not doing gifts on Christmas, we want our son to remember that Christmas is about family and that his birthday is about him. And that's when he gets presents, we just wanted to make that distinction in his life. And the family didn't seem to like that very well. But I didn't care because I was going broke anyway, you know, with all the different people or all the kids, the other kids were grown, there's no reason to keep buying people presents, especially when you see them turn around and put it on Facebook marketplace and put it on eBay and trade it to their friends, or you come over to their house and the couple $100 bed set that you bought them is crumbled up in a different family members closet floor, you know, stuff like that - hey, if you don't appreciate what I'm buying you I'm going to just save the money and feed my kid. It is more important than you making money off of something I bought for you from the bottom of my heart. I was trying to help you. So we just did away with all that. And we just said we'd like you to come over for dinner and stay the night as many nights as you want for Christmas, but we don't want any presents given out. We only want our child to receive presents on his birthday. We're not buying presents for anybody. And we don't - we're not going to accept presents from anybody for Christmas. And I bought a really nice tree just for decoration. Because now with no gifts going under it, it can go all the way down to the floor, I don't have to remove any of the branches, I can just really have a beautiful tree and I love the lights. I like to sit and have coffee and tea and just have the Christmas lights on, you know, and the fireplace going... and that was getting ready to be my best life, right? So I had just bought that, I think the year before. And then every year as our kid has gotten older, the decorating has become less enjoyable. So the thing - the only thing that ever was enjoyable for us is when he would make his little arts and crafts at school or he would go through that little Christmas store that they have once a year in the gymnasium and he would pick out things for mom and for Dad, I would let him decide where to put all those decorations in the house. And he would pick some really weird and obscure places and I would let him put decorations there, you know, and those were the only decorations that he would tolerate. And even though he had all of that, he wouldn't really let me enjoy putting up my tree. And so the thing is that when the family realized we weren't doing gift exchange on Christmas, they stopped coming over and so now I have this big beautiful tree and I have all these brand new ornaments. I was really, really looking forward to this, and nobody wanted to come because there's no gifts being exchanged. So I just thought, let's just have some fun with this and let Jacob put the ornaments wherever he wants just like normal. And then he was just whining and melting down and all this crap - he didn't want anything to do with it. So I decorated the tree by myself, I put up all the lights all around the room by myself, I left that stuff up until February, because it was the only thing I had to enjoy. And then I took all of that stuff down. A few months later, we shut our business down for good. And we had to move into this house that we're at now with extended family. And I put all of that brand new, beautiful Christmas stuff in a garage sale that I didn't even attend.

Shannon Chamberlin

30:45

You know, we don't celebrate anything anymore. We've been here like six years, I think? We don't do a tree, we don't do Thanksgiving dinner, we don't do Christmas dinner, we don't do presents, it's just a regular day. Each of these holidays are just another day. We try to have a little bit of a different meal on Thanksgiving, you know, I've been doing - a couple years I've done garlic shrimp and rice. We'd have pancakes sometimes, a couple years, we've had pancakes for dinner on Thanksgiving. And it's really so much more enjoyable, not having any expectations of others or having anyone expect anything from us.

Shannon Chamberlin

31:27

So nobody comes over because they think that we suck and that's fine, my kid is happier now, because nothing is different, nothing changes, he doesn't have to put up with new decorations on the walls, he doesn't have to look at a tree, he doesn't have to deal with the lights, if they're flashing, he doesn't have to try to not make a mess or not run into something, you know, he's - he's just - he's happy. Whatever it takes, if he's happy, I'm closer to being happy. And so we don't do anything. And I highly recommend it. You know, I miss big cooking, and I miss family, but honestly not like that. My parents are both passed, I just haven't seen my family in at least a decade or more for most of them. You know, I love my family a lot, and if I can't spend any time with them on the holidays, and I have to spend it with people who don't respect my kid, I'd rather just not, you know? I'm just - I stay home, we don't do anything. We save a lot of money that way, too. And my kid is very happy. Maybe that'll work for you if you have trouble and you know, maybe just decorate your bedroom and stay in there when you want some Christmas spirit. Maybe that'll work for you. I don't know, do your kids hate the Christmas decorations or? I mean, my kid doesn't even like the presents. He doesn't care about any of it. He doesn't want to open presents and hold him up for the camera and you know, fake smile and pretend that he's happy when he doesn't understand what the hell is going on. He's never grasped the concept. He doesn't have a lot of comprehension, you know, he doesn't get a lot of stuff. He knows Santa. I remember when he was much younger, he chased Santa down and said, Hey, I want to talk to you. And that was probably the last time we had any fun around the holidays. He was probably like 10. And ever since then it has just sucked. Some of the family members got him stuff that he really did like but I mean, he likes it for like an hour. You know, he doesn't really like anything unless... I mean, he's just like a toddler, you know, the louder the toy is the better. And I'm done with that I'm not having any of that anyway.

Shannon Chamberlin

31:27

Also, just because we don't host and celebrate holidays anymore, that does not mean that we're bitter or ungrateful. In fact, I'm very grateful. And for many things. I'm really thankful for the person I have had to become in order to help my son through this life. And I hope that you're able to find solace and gratitude in that as well. I mean, look at you! Look at us! When I say you're a superhero, I mean it. You know, we are superheroes to our children, for sure. We put up with so much more than the average human being ever would or could. We are constantly finding solutions to the weirdest problems in the world. Within our children. I am so grateful for the patience. I was never a patient person. I now am a very patient person because you have to be when you're parenting severe autism. I now am more compassionate than I ever was before. I know now when I work at my part time job, I have been able to connect with people and I can tell when someone just needs to be heard or they just need to be seen, and I give them that. And I help people all the time just by being patient, gracious and understanding. Which, those are all of the things that become part of us when we're having to parent someone with severe autism, right? So I'm very grateful for all of the gifts that I have been given through this experience. And I hope that you can recognize that you are superior to who you were before. I hope that you can recognize that your worth and your value has shot up through the roof just by being the parent that you are to your child with severe autism. So when you're feeling the pressure, and you just can't seem to muster that attitude of gratitude, and you're at the end of your rope, and you just can't even find anything to be grateful for, try to remember to be grateful for who you have become.

Shannon Chamberlin

35:41

The human that you are now is the human that you need to be to help this helpless person through their life as far as possible. I'm pulling for ya. You hang in there. You're a superhero.