Ethan has just finished organising our medicines into little
boxes which he’s labelled cold remedies, painkillers, creams, hay fever and
miscellaneous. The anal ordering goes against everything in my chaotic,
free-wheeling nature. It also gives the impression that we have nothing better
to do with our time than categorise household medicines.
I’m over-reacting, I know. Probably half of you reading this
blog categorise your medicines. And much more. It just highlights once more how
different Ethan and I are.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Aspergers isn’t
necessarily a bad thing. Just a different thing, that sometimes needs to be bent
and shaped to a certain extent if the person wants to fit in to particular
social situations and build friendships. But then I need to be willing to bend
and shape my natural instincts too.
The main way that Ethan and I are different is that I care
too much about what people think and Ethan doesn’t care enough. For instance,
last weekend, Ethan was camping with a couple of friends. One of them had
forgotten his wash bag. He asked Ethan if he could use some of his shower gel
and Ethan said no. It was nothing personal, just practical. Ethan didn’t think
he’d have enough for himself if he let this other guy use some. It didn’t enter
his head to just use a bit less on himself, to put himself out a bit in order
to help someone out and therefore build a friendship.
At the same time, I was staying with the kids at a friend’s
house. On the Sunday morning, after only 3 hours of sleep (having shared a room
with kids all night) I was meant to be leaving by 9am to get home in time for
church (I had the all important biscuits for the children’s clubs). By 10am I
still hadn’t left – I was too busy helping tidy up and chatting with my friend
(I didn’t want to offend her by just getting up and leaving). When I did
eventually leave I felt so torn that I wasn’t watching my friend’s kids in
their fun run that I phoned church, saying I was really sorry I wouldn’t be there
in time with the biscuits (and feeling guilty about that), then stood in the
rain for an hour trying to keep my kids occupied whilst watching my friend’s kids
run around a field. When all I wanted to do was go home, put the kids in front
of the TV and go to bed!
Ethan would have done just that.
Somewhere there’s a happy medium!
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