I've mentioned this before, but in case you didn't know, Michael has been diagnosed with being on the Autism spectrum. It's not a severe case of Autism. He's very high functioning, so a lot of people might not even notice, but as a parent, you can't help but notice - and worry about it.
As a parent, you can't help but notice how different his brain works. Yes, different - definitely different. A few months ago, I watched an HBO movie about an Autistic woman named Temple Grandin. Throughout the movie, Temple's mother would remind her that she was "different - not less". That's certainly true of Michael - his brain is "different" in many wonderful ways, but I also know that we live in a world where people who are "different" are not always accepted. There are times when Michael really amazes me, but there are also times when I'm terrified about the prospect of him getting by in the world. He's going to have trouble adjusting to certain situations. He's inevitably going to be teased. There are inevitably going to be moments when he winds up crying. As a parent, thinking about those moments hurts me to the core.
Anyway, back to Sunday and Michael "unique" brain.
I don't want to perpetuate the "Rain Man"/savant stereotype about Autistic people too much, but those of you who have heard me talk ( brag ) about Michael already know that he has a remarkable analytic mind. All modesty aside, I always considered myself to be really good at Math/Physics, but Michael has natural ability way beyond anything I've ever possessed. While we were playing in the backyard on Sunday, I noticed he was picking up balls of different sizes and dropping them side-by-side ( basically, doing the Galileo Leaning Tower of Pisa Experiment ). I walked over, and Michael asked me a question about potential energy. Given his curiosity, I decided that the time was right to introduce Michael to the concepts of kinetic energy and conservation of energy.
So, I go ahead and explain potential energy, kinetic energy, and conservation of energy ( I tell him all about mgh and one-half m v-squared ), and I illustrate the concept with an example.
I tell Michael that a roller coaster with a 100 foot drop reaches a speed of 50 miles-per-hour ( mph ) at the bottom of the hill ( BTW, the way, I'm ignoring all friction and air resistance in these examples. You may think think that this is over-simplifying things a bit, - but hey - he's only 6 years old! ). I tell him that in order for the roller coaster to go 100 mph at the bottom of the hill, the hill would need to be 400 feet high. I explain that this is because a roller coaster car going 100 mph has 4 times the kinetic energy as a roller coaster car going 50 mph ( because of the velocity-squared relationship ), and that because all the kinetic energy would have been converted from the potential energy at the top of the hill ( remember - no friction ), the hill would need to be 4 times as high to produce the speed of 100 mph ( because potential energy is directly proportional to height ).
Of course, you would think this would be an awful lot to digest for a 6-year old. To be honest, I really didn't think he would understand all of this on the first try, so I gave him a problem to gauge how well he understood the concept. I asked Michael how fast the roller coaster would go at the bottom of the hill if the hill was 900 feet high.
About 5 seconds later Michael told me the roller coaster would be going 150 mph at the bottom of the hill.
I was stunned, and asked him to explain how he arrived at the answer, just to make sure it wasn't just a lucky guess.
Michael quickly explained that 900 is 9 times as great at 100, the square root of 9 is 3, and that 3 times 50 is 150.
Wow, you can't imagine how proud I was at that moment.
It's nice to have those proud moments, because it makes some of the other moments a little bit easier to take.
A few hours later, we were in the house, and Michael was playing a video game on the laptop. At some point the game crashed, and a few seconds later, so did Michael's brain.
I don't think "tantrum" is a strong enough word for what happened. I know tantrums. I threw my share of tantrums as a child ( like the BATMAN tantrum - see item 4 in this post ), and watched my younger brother throw lots of tantrums. What happened with Michael on Sunday, was not simply a tantrum - it was a scary example of what can sometimes be so "unique" about his brain.
The best word I can think of to describe it is "irrational". Of course, 6-year olds can be irrational in general, but Michael's behavior would have been considered irrational for a 3-year-old.
...
I've been sitting here for a few minutes trying to decide how to describe this, but in all honesty, words escape me right now. It kinda reminded me of one of the night terrors Michael used to have when he was younger. There was a lot of physical thrashing involved, there was really nothing we could do or say to console him, and he most definitely did not want to be touched. It's rather heartbreaking when you want to hug your crying child, and he responds by kicking at you and swinging his arm at you. When he has tantrums like this, we actually get quite afraid that he might hurt himself. Once when he was 3, he had a tantrum like this, and intentionally ran headfirst into a wall. I know it was intentional, because about 30 seconds after he did it the first time, he wrenched himself out of my arms and ran headfirst into the wall again before I could stop him ( After that, I just laid my whole body down on top of him to keep him in one spot. He spent the next 30 minutes struggling to get out from under me, until he finally exhausted himself and fell asleep. ).
Thankfully, his tantrum on Sunday wasn't that bad ( he's come a long way in the last 3 years ), but it still scared me a lot nonetheless. Not only did he not want to be touched, but he wanted to get "far far away" ( his words ) from us. The next thing we knew, he was running out of the front door of our house. I ran out after him, terrified about what he might do to himself. He had stopped about 10 feet from our front steps. I walked towards him slowly, hoping to grab him before he started to run away again, He backpedaled into driveway, and next thing I knew, he started sprinting down the driveway towards the street. I sprinted as fast as my balky knee would take me ( the knee is still all "spongy" from my personal-best run ) and screamed out "STOP! DON'T YOU DARE RUN INTO THE STREET!" so loud that I think the entire neighborhood heard me. Michael did stop, and before he could move again, I grabbed him. Of course, he didn't want to go down without a fight, but despite his kicking and screaming, I soon had him back in the house. He still insisted on being "far way" from us, but we convinced him that his room far enough away. Thankfully, he managed to calm himself down, and 30 minutes later he was back to being the happy boy that he usually is.
So, yeah - it an't easy. I love my boys, but it's never easy
Rich
1 comment:
wow. what an amazing feat for a 6 year old! square roots?! really?! that's awesome. you've got to hold onto those proud moments for sure when those not-so-proud moments sneak in!
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