Autism Hurts. It just plains hurts. Like I mean literally hurts. Physically, emotionally, psychologically, painfully HURTS!
A few weeks ago, as part of our ABA Therapy plan during church, I was told to ignore negative behaviors. Our 8 year old with autism was acting very wild, trying to jump over the chairs, poke his brother and myself, and so forth. So I turned a bit to the side to ignore him, and next thing I know, I feel a huge steamrolling head-butt to the side of my face. One of my first thoughts was… I am not going to be okay. I’m going to have to go to the doctor and/or the dentist about this… I removed our son from the main sanctuary to the back of church and we spent the rest of the time there.
And end up at a doctor, I did… a week later the pain was so bad, I went to a local emergency room where they did a CT scan. Everything showed up okay, but the dr said it must have been a very hard hit, and seemed maybe a bit surprise that nothing showed up on the CT scan. He told me if I was still having problems in a week, to go see my family doctor. So after a week, I had a dentist appointment and he pointed out how swollen my face still was. He said if I wanted to follow up with a dr, he would recommend an ENT, or an oral surgeon. So I saw an ENT who felt the area and said there is likely muscle bruising / pain / damage, and nerve damage. He said to see him in another month if things are not improved. So we’ll see.
The emotional sadness I feel from this is beyond belief. When your own 8 year son hurts you, and you are afraid of him, life is tough. Painful and tough. The tears come just thinking about it. Autism hurts. It just plain hurts.