Resilience Lessons from the Mother of An Autistic Daughter
Writing about resilience isn’t something I find easy because I feel it’s been used as an excuse thrown at me and others when my expectations of awareness haven’t been met by some schools when dealing with Lillie. So often I’ve seen children not treated fairly because they are ‘being taught resilience’. Well for me this is all wrapped up in privilege and I don’t have the space to write about that here! So instead here is what resilience DOES look like for us in our family. I’m not attributing any of them to any one of us or even saying whether they happen or not but I am saying this is resilience in our house!
What does Resilience Mean For You?
- Running across the school field but stopping at the gate
knowing when too much isn’t worth the anxiety - Missing people you thought were friends but knowing a new school is the better option
- Changing where you sit at dinner because an extended family member has sat in your seat
- Letting your sister choose the way to walk, again
- Sitting up until 1 in the morning because the prospect of school for your daughter is so terrifying
- Wearing a new T-shirt
- Taking a tablet to help you sleep
- Not throwing teddies away but having them in your room because you know the affect it’ll have on your sister
- Taking your brother in to a different room and reading to him when the environment is too overwhelming for your sister
- Moving your whole room around in stages because you know a big move would be too much
- Changing your lock down timetable because school have changed the work they’re sending even when you’ve hardly slept because it felt too big
- Sitting in a different seat in the room rather than not entering the room at all
- Practicing the piano piece you’ve been struggling with
- Asking for help when you don’t know how to do something and then giving it a go
- Talking, writing, singing or drawing about how we feel, even when it’s difficult
- Hanging on to each other when it feels like there’s no one else in the world who really understands
It’s actually felt quite helpful to personalise what can often be a difficult concept for me. Why don’t you give it a go? What does resilience look like in your household?