It's exactly six weeks until Lauren turns 16. As soon as my daughter was the legal age to get her learner's permit back at the end of last summer, we went and got it. She and I tried a handful of times to go out together but I was too much of a "Nervous Nellie" and got her so stressed out that she was convinced she was a bad driver. Her dad has been taking her out as many Sunday afternoons as he could. I really appreciate him doing that while I got over all my anxiety about her being behind the wheel. This past Friday, I decided to bite the bullet, put all the anxiety behind me and let her drive home from school. I told her that I would try not to grip the side of the car, yell out or do anything else that might have really distracted her. I put my arm up once, but that was it on the 20 minute drive back to our house. I'm happy to report that she did amazing!! Her father taught her well. It's hard for me to remember back to when I first learned to drive, it's been over 30 years ago. I do know that I flunked the driver's test twice, once for not being able to parallel park and another time because I couldn't do a three-point turn. I did get it the third time, so I guess three times the charm! A lot of her friends are in the same boat, they are all trying to get the required hours needed for their license which is a lot!! It seems like I am always in the car running her around somewhere, so I'm looking forward to letting her be my "chauffeur" for a while!
When Dominic was diagnosed with Autism at 2 1/2, I went to our local library and took out every book I could find about Autism. Sometimes I would bring back 20 books. This was 2006, so a lot of the information was very "dated." I guess I was looking for a book that would tell me what I should do next, like a "manual." Autism doesn't quite work that way! The saying is, " if you know one person with Autism, you know one person with Autism." Every mom to an individual with Autism follows their own "path." I think as moms, we judge ourselves much harder than anyone else does. I was 41 when I had Dominic. Did he get the diagnosis of Autism because I was an older mom? because I drank a lot of pop? I could sit and think about that every minute of every day. I am pretty integrated into the Autism community around Lansing and have told more than one person that it took me about two weeks to come to terms with Dominic's diagnosis. It is so incredib...
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