Twelve years ago when my oldest son was barely a few days old and lying in the hospitals incubator I knew he was different. I don’t know how, but I just did.
For years no one would believe me. Doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists and well meaning friends would tell me “don’t worry, he’s just a boy.” “He’ll grow out of it.” For the longest time my husband thought I was over-reacting and there wasn’t anything wrong.
My husband comes from an Eastern European background, and so he grew up in an entirely different atmosphere than I did. He came from a financially stable home with both parents. I grew up in downtown Toronto in one of the roughest neighbourhoods, just enough money to survive with just my mom and five siblings. Two different worlds that happened to collide, come together, and then collide again.
I won’t lie, Joshua was a very high needs, demanding child. As a baby he would constantly cry unless I was holding him, and even then there was no guarantee that he would calm down. He refused to eat anything but breast milk for the first two years, seemed to be sensitive to loud sounds but loved the vacuum, and by the time he could walk (which was pretty early at 8 months!) he was into EVERYTHING! He never seemed to stop. His obsession with vacuums grew to the point that he knew every single type of vacuum there is, he began stealing vacuum parts from friends houses and our own, and was taking things apart – with real tools – by the time he was a year and half. Typical boy? Yeah right – anything but.
How did a child like Joshua affect our marriage? In a big way. We constantly fought over his behavior and my behavior in dealing with him. He felt there was nothing wrong, but I did. Because my husband isn’t always home it was me who had to deal with the issues day after day after day, I was the one who had to drive him to endless assessments, and appointments. It was hard and yes – I got angry and upset. He would get angry because he felt it wasn’t necessary. There was never any common ground between the two of us. We were living in two different worlds in seemed.
Financially it became an issue because the waitlists are so long so we went private for assessments, and psychologist appointments. Very little was covered by insurance so the rest came out of pocket. Expensive? Very.
Finally after eight years Joshua was given a diagnosis of ADHD and Aspergers. After reading the assessments and talking with the Psychiatrist, my husband finally began to see that maybe there were a few issues and it wasn’t just my parenting skills or Joshua trying to get his way. Over the past few years he has been to some appointments is trying to understand, and is much more empathetic to Joshua and his needs. This is a huge step and one I am thankful for, as it has really helped when the diagnosis of Aspergers was given to our other son at age 4.
What about you? Has there been some issue involving your children that has caused major stress in your marriage? How did you deal with?
Until next time,
Chantel,momof8crazymonkeys
Great post Chantel. Like you, I just knew from day one and my husband didn’t really let it sink in until we got that piece of paper from the developmental pediatrician. Mother’s intuition I guess.