I’m looking for something which I’ve been searching for many years without success. It’s leading me to a couple of conclusions. Either I’m a hopeless sleuth and I’m looking for the wrong things in the wrong places, or what I’m looking for doesn’t exist.
I suppose there is a third option, which is that what I’m looking for doesn’t exist – yet. What I yearn to find is my Dancing Wombat’s special gift.
Often parents of kids with autism can be beguiled by the notion that while their child may have limited (or no) verbal skills, struggle with social interactions, be driven to distraction by change and fail to cope with different sensory inputs, they might also harbour a special gift. Perhaps they’re budding artists, or genius mathematicians. They could be piano prodigies or extraordinary sculptors. Photographic memory anyone? Maybe great motor skills lead them to sporting success. However, I’m still struggling to find our daughter’s special gift.
After reading an article on the talented and incredibly young Iris Grace recently (Iris Grace), I was reminded of the amazing Tim Sharp and his Laser Beak man drawings (Laser Beak Man). There seemed to be a common theme. Art! Maybe I just hadn’t tried hard enough, I thought. Perhaps I should try to awaken our Dancing Wombat’s hidden artistic talent with watercolours, or oil paints? Or … perhaps not. After all, fine motor activities are a labour of labour for her. They’re hard. Why would she want to spend more time doing them? (Then again, with better quality brushes…?)
Laser beak man and the old bags. Very punny.
I was reading about children’s special gifts on the AutismSpeaks.org blog (autismspeaks.org). It urged me to “encourage [my child] to follow personal inclinations, passions – even restricted interests. In this way, [she] can start to build a skill set.”
You know what, this seems like eminently sensible advice. Probably just the sort of thing I would say. I started to follow it. Restricted interests. Okay. Hmm. Here we go. In my gloomier moments, I feel constricted by the restricted interests. At the moment, these are building Lego Friends sets and then lining up all the little Lego Friends. Sometimes they get to sit down together. In a line. Or occasionally in a circle. But there’s not a lot of creative play going on that I can see.
The other restricted interest du jour (although I’m not complaining too much) is reading Women’s Day and New Idea magazines. At least they’re contemporary. And probably better for her than other things she could be reading. But good luck trying to engage her in conversation about anything she’s read. “Can you please go?” is the most common response! Typical teen, I suppose.
I like to think that I’m a fairly creative person, but I’m not sure what skill sets she can build from these Interests. I did have the bright idea (or so I thought) that perhaps, with my help, she could volunteer at the local library. She’s great at putting things in order, it’s a reasonably quiet environment with limited sensory stimuli and she’d also get the chance to be doing something in the “mainstream”. Bingo – it ticked all the boxes. Plus, we could walk there – exercise. How good is that? I thought.
Too good to be true, as it turned out. Unfortunately, 21st century bubble wrap living put an end to my grand design. The librarian was sympathetic, and agreed that working in a library would be perfect for someone with ASD, but explained that under the council’s insurance policy, it wasn’t possible. Go figure.
What’s the likelihood of Dancing Wombat injuring herself or others putting books away? Her biggest issue would be stopping to read all the blurbs on the backs of the books.
Paper cuts must be a much greater workplace hazard than they used to be. Yes, I know. Cue some sort of campaign directed at the local council to get them to change things, but I’m too busy cutting lunches at 6am and putting Littlest Wombats back to bed at 10pm and now – crazy lady – writing a blog – to work out how to do that. I’ll need to get Freerunning Wombat onto this one for me, as my chief digital director!
So, back to my daughter’s gifts. I’ve outlined my gloomy day scenario. When I’ve woken up on the right side of the bed, I can rejoice in my Wombat’s glorious sense of humour, her love of a good pun, her determination – even when she’s saying “I can’t”, her willingness to accept being exposed to new things (eventually!), her love for those who love her. Surely, surely I can find a special gift or passion in all of that? I mean, really, have I just not tried hard enough?
The answer to that is, of course, no. It’s impossible for us to expose our children to every experience in the world in the hope of igniting a passion or uncovering a hidden talent. For many of these incredibly gifted people you read about, the talent quietly shone through, or maybe even leapt out unbidden. There are some quite extraordinary stories which are truly inspiring. I think if my Dancing Wombat were in this category, I might have had an inkling by now. Train Wombat’s passion was certainly obvious from before he was two – and he hasn’t deviated from it in over ten years.
But then again, I could be too close to her to see it. Maybe I’m missing the obvious. Maybe I’m not thinking sufficiently “outside the box”?
And yet, why should she have a special talent? After all, not every neurotypical person has an extraordinary gift. We might have things we are drawn to, have a natural aptitude for and – if we work hard enough – could become rather skilled at. It doesn’t mean, though, that we’re prodigies, or the next Monet or Mozart. We are all special. It doesn’t mean that we’re all specialists.
So I keep on searching. How do I develop my daughter’s special passion or find her hidden gift? I honestly don’t know. But I live in hope that she’ll drop a hint about her interests, so that we can help her to develop these to a greater degree than she has already. If you have any suggestions, I’d love to hear them!
