The before and after

The before and after 

The memories will always haunt me. The time before I knew. I was the happiest I’ve ever been. I had no idea my child was different. I expected he’d live a normal life. There was nothing to suggest otherwise. When your child is diagnosed Autistic it means there is a before and an after. And after, life will never be the same. 

The grief is incredibly heavy and I will carry it always. I would liken it to a wound which is covered by a plaster. Every now and then it is ripped off and it is agony. The tears come, I am capsized and I wonder how I will go on. Then back goes the plaster and numbness returns. But the weight I am carrying remains. 

The plaster is ripped off when I see the other boys his age doing things he can’t. Walking to school together huddled around iPhones. Football tournaments. Play dates he isn’t invited to. Now the big one, secondary school. 

They will walk one way and my son will walk another. 

It’s not ok but it has to be. I am not ok but I have to be. 

When I took my baby home from the hospital he was the same as yours. And now he isn’t. That’s the bottom line. And in between there is a broken version of me who has just about survived. 

Some children have mild autism. That is not my son. Autism has stolen so much from him. We used to say he had mild Autism because he could speak. How little we knew. How much we have had to learn. 

I am not the same mother who welcomed the health visitor into my house back in 2016. Who sat there while she pointed out signs of autism. 

I am not the same mother who walked into a paediatrician’s office in denial. Instead I’m the mother who has seen the years pass and the gap between her son and his peers grow and grow. 

I’m the mother who knows how it feels to be the odd one out day after day. To have your child brought out screaming in front of all the other parents in the playground. 

I’m a worn down version of the mother who brought that baby home from the hospital. But he was always Autistic. I just never knew. 

The before and after exists only for me.