Plenty of people in our lives remind us how quickly life passes by and I assure you, I’m not in any hurry for my children to grow up. “Enjoy them while they’re young,” many say. “You blink and they’re all grown up!” Far too often we hear the refrain from—no doubt well-intended—empty-nesters saying, “You’ll miss this.” I don’t disagree. I’m just in the throes of the latest temper-tantrum over who gets to play with the red car, the six-gazillionth cup of milk spilled within a hairs-breadth of my smart-phone, and the veritable boxing-match that is bedtime. “You’ll miss this,” is not entirely helpful and is, in fact, rather irritating.
Yet even in the most difficult of days, I’m not eager for my kids to get older. The world can be an ugly place and childlike innocence is the first casualty of growing up. I love the childlike wonder at the world, discovery and awe at things adults take for granted, and the subtle pleasure of enjoying a vanilla ice-cream cone. Those are the things I’ll surely miss, and I don’t need the reminders.
Kids simply grow up too quickly. We have dear friends who sent their daughter to Kindergarten just this year. Yet in that very kindergarten class, their daughter needs to suppress her love of Elsa and Anna because “Frozen isn’t cool” amongst cliques of 5-year-old girls. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, but you can’t argue with a 5-year old.
Peer pressure at a young age kills things like Disney movies, playing with toys, coloring, singing silly songs, and laughing at stupid jokes. Maybe that’s natural. I remember the pressure to stifle my own love for G.I.Joe action figures and Looney Tunes. Natural, maybe, but it doesn’t make it any easier as the parent. I’m not in a hurry for my children to grow up.
But for us, this fear of kids growing up goes deeper than the predictable transition of children through adolescence into adulthood. It’s that we have a child with Autism who will very soon be a teenager with Autism, and not long after that, an adult with Autism.
Something happens, and I’m not sure when, why or how, but society’s perception of the special-needs person changes as they age. Children with Autism are quirky and adorable. Adults with Autism are sad and unpleasant. Children with special needs warm our hearts and garner our compassion. Adults with special needs make us wish they would go away.
As a society, we do a decent job of tolerating special-needs children. Sure, there are horror stories of judgmental types who criticize and mock as if they’ve worn my shoes. In my experience, however, those are few and far between. Special-Needs children are treated, by and large, with a little more patience and compassion. Special-Needs adults, it turns out, are seen as sad and kind of pathetic.
My son is only 8, which means he is still a little charming even if he is a little quirky. Developmentally, he’s a toddler. At the age of 15, developmentally he will still be a toddler. Someday he’ll be a toddler trapped in a 40-year-old body, and society will certainly not view him then as society views him now. That’s the thought that keeps me up at night.
Somewhere between childhood and adulthood emerges a stark change in society’s perception where there is simply less acceptance. I actually witnessed this firsthand a few months ago. It involved a painful exchange of question and answer between two adult women—one neuro-typical adult and the other bearing all the hallmarks and diagnosis of mid- high-functioning Autism.
In a group of people, the woman with Autism asked a question that was not inappropriate and not out of line, although it was out of left field. Her neuro-typical peer, someone who has in the past showed my son a high level of compassion and tenderness, made enough subtle and not-so-subtle cues which shouted at this Autistic young woman, “Hey Weirdo! Back Off! Can’t you see I’m talking with regular people?” Terse and discourteous responses were given to the questions which were tame but, admittedly, out of context within the conversation. Tenderness and compassion were replaced with sarcasm and disregard. There was an audible change in the tone of voice, from jovial to indignation. Verbal and non-verbal cues all translated as, “You’re strange and I don’t really want you talking to me!”
This is only one case-study in the treatment of special-needs adults, but anecdotally, these types of encounters between neuro-typical adults and their Autistic counterparts are the rule, not the exception. I wish someone would do an actual study to prove me wrong — I’d gladly eat my words. I only fear such a study would confirm my suspicions.
When I see an exchange like that, I don’t just see two women having an uncomfortable conversation. I see my son in a dozen years. I see him doing something similar — working hard to fit in, trying to be included in a conversation even if he has difficulty doing it. I see him wearing her shoes and fear him being treated with the same sarcasm, disregard, and downright scorn. I fear him being indirectly told, “Get lost, weirdo!”
What is it that happens between childhood and adulthood that moves a special-needs human being from innocent and vulnerable to pathetic and weird? Or, probably the better question: what is it about growing up that makes the rest of us less accepting and more insensitive? Why is it that we — who should know better, who should be leading our children by example — grow increasingly weirded out and intolerant of special-needs peers? Maybe in the experience I shared, the person who subconsciously (I hope) acted in incredibly insensitive ways, genuinely did not know the other party in the conversation was an Autistic woman; perhaps she would have acted differently if she had. Should that even matter?
This is what keeps me up at night when I think upon my aging children. I would hate for a clique of girls to steal my daughter’s love of Olaf, Sven, and the rest of the Arendelle gang. That would be a sad day. It will also be a sad day when my two other sons are “too old” for toys and cartoons. Getting old stinks, but I have every reason to believe those three kids will grow up to be well-adjusted adults where the default from their peers is acceptance. But the older Matthew gets, the less cute and endearing he becomes. What happens when the community no longer sees an adorable and charming smile, but a weird, impersonal social misfit? A toddler trapped in an 8-year old is still somewhat harmless and lovable. How will the neighborhood react when he’s a toddler trapped in a 40-year old’s body?
The older I get, the more I believe this is what the concept of “awareness” is all about. I used to think the sum total of “awareness” could be boiled down to simply being aware that a thing exists. That is a necessary and obvious first step. But true “awareness” means recognizing the way things are and then adjusting your life accordingly. Awareness is a deliberate pursuit to recognize the special-needs people among us and a purposeful effort to respond in appropriate and respectable ways. Awareness is coming to the conclusion that adults with Autism are no less entitled to the same dignity, value, and respect as anyone else. And awareness means taking intentional, sometimes difficult, steps to show dignity, value, and respect in how we treat the grown-up version of the “least of these.” Awareness means fielding a question from an Autistic woman from out of left field, and cutting her some slack; it means responding with kindness, not with sarcasm. It means maintaining the same level of compassion for a 40-year-old toddler as you do for an actual toddler.
You have been made aware. In your awareness, help make society a safer place for the 40-year old with special-needs. Someone’s dad is worried about what might take place when his adult with special needs meets you. His child isn’t weird, sad, or pathetic. His child is created in the image of God. When you meet his child, treat that person the same way you would treat anyone else — with dignity, respect, compassion, and patience. Someday, that child is going to be mine.
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