About
Raised by a single mom..blah..blah..blah. Daddy and abandonment issues. Same old song and dance until my late teens. My thoughts, actions, brutal honesty, and disregard for elders who were mainly child molesters or racists the backwards thinking of the townsfolk meant I never quite 'fit'.
I'll skip the early twenties (exploration, finding yourself, still believing in happy endings) and move on to 2001. I became isolated and depressed while pregnant with our first born, Xavier. This turned into undiagnosed post postpartum depression. We conceived Sebastian when Xavier was 4 months old. I had a boyfriend who was working full time, and getting his second degree. Money was tight, I wasn't on any medication, and was dragging Xavier to every doctor that would assess him, as I felt he was 'different'. Can't remember why, I just knew something was 'off', but everyone told me I was 'off'.
The day a random speech/language pathologist gave me a pamphlet on Autism was the best day of my life. This may sound strange, but when you are labelled as 'overreacting', this is a victory. It was also the last one of the last times I would ever let anyone question my judgement. At this point, I knew the world saw me only as a black stay at home mom, with no education. I was fragile, and naive about the way the world really operates.
The early Autism years were filled with a shit load of therapy, and support groups that I gave up on because I believed in something more than a group home after high school of progressive thinking. I didn't go through the initial grieving stages, just rolled up my sleeves and got down to business. That's what Autism is, a business....and I am Xavier's 'Momager'. My nervous breakdown came later, and came hard. Anti depressants helped me gain weight slip into a fairy land a bit until I tried to stop taking them. The good news is, that I know I could successfully detox from Heroin. Amidst this year that I believed was the worst ever until 2010 came joyful year, Sebastian developed an allergy to peanuts. Meanwhile through all of this, and after I had an IUD incorrectly inserted , I became pregnant with Nadia.
Wonderful. Fast forward past three more years of fighting a school system, morbid obesity, and sleep deprivation. Next stop, Multiple Chemical Sensitivity. Never before has anything prohibited me from existence. This radically changed the way our family eats, dresses, sleeps, where we go, who we associate with....everything. I didn't think anything could be more difficult than explaining High Functioning Autism. I was wrong. In isolation until I sort this whole mess out, I can't take the reaction to chemicals so I just throw things away am simplifying, constantly outraged at the decisions David makes when buying groceries, and continually looking for a conditioner.
