Mud-Slinging

Above you will see a picture of my son, Nathan.  He is laying almost on top of Logan.  This was a particularly trying day when they were at their Nana's house.  Logan was really active and Nathan tried to keep  him occupied.  I found out from Nana later that they finally just collapsed on the ground and then she took this picture.

It's hard to be the sibling of an autistic child.  You give up a lot.  When your friends come over for the first time, they realize something is different about your little brother/sister.  Your autistic sibling might say or do strange or even embarrassing or offensive things.  Sometimes you can't have friends over because the addition of a new person into the environment is just too much on a given day.  Your personal belongings will get manhandled and sometimes lost or broken.  There are things you have to deal with that a regular child your age will sometimes never encounter.

Well, it takes its toll.  Today Nathan was playing in the backyard with a friend from down the street.  Logan was in the backyard also.  So was an enormous mud puddle.  I could hear Logan starting to protest and yelling "No" and I walked to the back door and peeked outside.  Nathan was kicking mud on his little brother.  Needless to say, the friend from down the street was sent home and Nathan came inside.

"Why did you do that?" I asked him.  This may seem harsh and strict to you....after all, they are just brothers, and brothers do things like that.  Little boys in general do all kinds of stuff.  But we've talked.  And talked.  About what can agitate Logan, what can tip his moods from great to sour, and we've talked about not provoking.  Hence the question, why did you do that?

"Well, I knew he was going to throw mud on me."

"Did he throw mud on you?"

"Well, I just knew he was going to."

"Answer the question.  Did he actually throw mud on you?"

"Well....no...."

"But you kicked mud on him because you were sure that he was going to do that to you."

"Yes."

Ah.  A preemptive strike. I know you're going to hurt me, so I'm going to hurt you first.  I totally got it.  I even understood it.  And given what Nathan has had to deal with, I couldn't blame him for trying to handle a potential situation.  But.

Remember that movie a few years ago, with Tom Cruise?  It was called "Minority Report".  The premise was that three psychics could foretell the future...they could tell you who was going to commit a murder, or steal something, so the police would come and arrest the potential offender before they actually did anything.  The offender was then placed in a room and forced to watch their would-be crime over and over again.

How often do we do this, to each other?  We decide that someone is going to do something or behave a certain way, and we judge them ahead of time.  We take action before they can.  Is this good, or right?  Is this self-protection?  Or will our actions actually push someone into doing the very thing we are trying to circumvent?

Of course I talked to Nathan and pointed out why he couldn't handle things this way.  As the oldest sibling he always tries to step in and take care of things.  I understand, being an oldest sibling myself.  But I also pointed out that had I not come outside at that moment, Logan may very well have started slinging mud...but only because mud got kicked on him first.  People often rise to the occasion.  Or give you exactly what you expect, and children, autistic or no, are never an exception.