Autism and adolescence

We have talked about Autism and Adolescence before but it is a topic that especially touches me and sometimes I like to be selfish and talk about what I really live at some point..

I was reading a post and at the end of it they asked us what radical changes had taken place in the stage we were living as parents of teenagers. Evidently in this time of pandemic, the things that seemed normal to us have not been, and the complicated ones have been simple, being locked up, when we were put in quarantine the first thing I thought, "to be locked up for a month without going out? (When we thought it would be 1 month). And we have been in that situation for a year now, but for my pre-adolescent son, now a teenager, it was not a problem, "it was the perfect life" according to him, nobody would kiss him, Nadia would talk to him, nobody would visit him" and so it has been things that have been beneficial for him to the extreme..

But he still misses his soccer games, or street games with his "friends", placed like this, because they are a group of kids who only look for him because they are interested in the fact that they are missing a player, nothing more.

The stage of adolescence is traumatic and hard, full of physical, mental and all kinds of changes, and having autism does not make it easier or bearable, because it is an important stage in the social development of the human being, it is where you apply everything you absorbed as a child to give it and execute it..

But ... are they capable of doing it? Well, my dear reader, NO, because on top of everything described above, we put that there is no place around them where they can download what for us at some point was so simple, "going out with friends", parties, cinemas, eating, interacting, and so on..

How many of us don't say that our high school or college days were the best! Today, more than 30 years later, I still have my high school friends, those with whom we lived together day by day and who were such enriching experiences and bonds that become a bonding experience..

I think my son will not have them and that will create a void and a bad taste of what must have been the best time of his life. But it's still early, maybe I'm wrong..

Adolescence is the time of falling in love, of beginning to make mistakes and learn, of making choices, of so many experiences, and watching you is very painful as a mother to think about it.

Every day I read more, I ask more questions about adolescence in autistic people, although I confess that I often feel hopeful to see it unfold among us..

We have handled physical changes very well, we have explained each change in his body like any teenager (taking into account that he knows everything ... typical at that age), maybe this confinement is good, but it is about time it ends, so he can develop and experience this stage that is so difficult, but is one of the most important for the development as adults and that will make us walk in the rest of our lives with the strength or weakness that we experience in our adolescence..

Read, ask, research, share but never be in doubt, you are your child's best therapist. Have a great week