Dear Addie,
This week I was reminded of one of the more unpleasant aspects of autism - meltdowns.
To an outsider looking in on these unfortunate events can often be mistaken as a child (or adult) throwing an epic tantrum and most certainly in need of a time-out!
While both tantrums and meltdowns generally have a fair share of crying, screaming and perhaps even throwing oneself to the ground, the truth of the matter is tantrums and meltdowns are two very different things.
You see Addie, a tantrum is something that children, roughly up to the age of 5 developmentally (that age range is from a number of experts and not my personal timeline of what age I think tantrums should stop - just so we’re clear), do over an objective of getting what they want. For example, they may see something they want in a store and throw a tantrum of screaming and crying in hopes that their parents will become weak and cave into their demands for said object.
This only has two outcomes, “nice try” or “well played” kid.
A meltdown however has far less control and unfortunately is never outgrown. Autistic individuals like yourself often have a hypersensitivity to emotions of others, themselves or the assault of sensory stimuli present in your environment.
**This is interesting because it's a common misconception that people with autism lack feelings or understanding of such - when in actuality they may be more tuned in than one would think. Now emotions are pretty self-explanatory, but stimuli of your environment can be a number of different things and classified as noise, the behavior of family members, a sudden change in routine, words spoken or sounds you may hear, things you see or even feel physically just to name a few.
Another big difference between tantrums and meltdown, tantrums usually end if a child is perhaps lucky enough to get what they want or they have endured the consequences of their behavior (time out etc.) Meltdowns however can last minutes, hours, and God forbid, sometimes even days. They are an emotional storm that lacks capability of rational thinking.
Sometimes I wish as parents it’d be nice if we got a message - Warning: system overload!
Nope instead we just have to be vigilant in looking for the signs. If I’m being honest, usually we are pretty good at recognizing potential meltdown scenarios, but life sometimes can come at us fast and we may miss this along the way, we are all only human after all.
This week we had a meltdown because... I washed your blanket.
What was I thinking?! Well...
It all started when I woke you up that morning. The smell hit me like I was sitting on the wrong side of a porta potty on a breezy Saturday afternoon soccer game. Ah yes, urine. You had wet the bed and from the 3 bottles of Gatorade you smuggled into your room that were now empty and scattered about your bedroom floor - that poor pull-up never had a chance.
You were wet from head to toe as was anything in your path, including your beloved blanket.
I promptly put you in the shower and went on to strip your bed. It was a working day for mama so I thought I could throw it all in the wash and dry it when I got home - ha ha ha, wishful thinking mama!
I went to put everything in the washing machine only to realize a load I had washed 2 days before was still sitting in there and surely pungent with less of a fresh fabric softener and more of a mildew aroma by now. I never even opened the door to give it a smell test, I piled your bedding, jammies and beloved blankie into a pile and ran the cycle again.
To add insult to injury we even have a smaller drawer washer - that realistically could've only handled your blankie from the Mt. Pee Pee piled high on the laundry room floor, but yes that too had 2 day old laundry in it. Not my finest week baby girl.
Mt. Pee Pee was going to have to wait until after work. I closed the door and assisted you in getting washed up and ready for your day.
Fast forward to getting home from work and life takes over.
With our back-patio door acting more as a revolving door with kids and dogs opening and closing it every 5 minutes, the pollen from NC’s most recent pollen apocalypse was now taking up residency on everything in the screened-in porch and creeping its way inside the house. I had suddenly forgotten all about Mt. Pee Pee and thought ahead to the sneezing, sniffling noses and tissues that could come from this! I saw a future of auditory assaults for you (and us suffering your wrath of screaming and hitting!). Cleaning the porch became my new priority.
The porch, sweeping, vacuuming, dinner, before I knew it it was time for you to get ready for bed. Crap! It was 7pm and Mt. Pee Pee still stood tall in the laundry room - ugh!
Ok, no worries! I can just run everything on an extra hot, quick 15 min cycle and it'll be washed and dried in no time at all! Perfect!
I opened the washer of my “re-washed” clothing from this morning...Seriously?!?!? Gel beads everywhere! Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! A rite of passage for many parents, I had washed a pull-up. Not once, but twice!
This load was about to run on 3rd time being the charm. I fished the culprit pull-up out and begrudgingly ran it yet again.
Now Addie, you could do with perhaps some baggy, illfitting sheets, but no beloved blankie - that wasn't even a possibility! No way, no how! It was only now that you even realized I had removed it from your room in the first place and all hell was about to break loose.
Now it's fairly well known that structure and predictability are an important thing for many autistic individuals. For you, your blankie had been with you since the day you were born. It has shared a similar bond as that of the well-known Charlie Brown character Linus had with his beloved blanket.
You used to take it EVERYWHERE, but in the last year it has taken strict residency in your bedroom - only leaving on your accord (rarely) or if I happen to sneak it away to wash it while you're at school. It is a staple to our nighttime bedtime routine!
On this day you saw your blankie, wet, stinky, sitting at the top of Mt. Pee Pee and OUT OF YOUR ROOM! Surely you were thinking - what was going on here?! You were tired and ready to snuggle into bed with your blanket, but unfortunately you were now instantly agitated as you stood looking at it out of place!
Unfortunately, I was about to take it a step further. You see Addie, this wasn't just pizza sauce, dirt, or marker...this was urine. I let a lot of things slide, but this was gross and needed to be washed. With round 3 happening on the top washer, my only option was the drawer washer who quickest cycle was 39 min.
As you stood clenching the ammonia smelling lovie with a look of anger and betrayal towards me, I had no choice but to take it back for the next 39 mins.
Deep breaths.
You being tired worked to my benefit to free it from your grasp, but as the washer locked and I pushed the drawer in you became unhinged.
You hated me. You started sobbing ”a blankie, a blankie, a blankie” frantically trying to pull the drawer open to free it from what to you seemed like its demise!
You grabbed my hand and pulled me toward it trying desperately to get me to open it. I knew this was going to be the longest 39 min ever. It was heartbreaking.
You collapsed to the floor, next to the remaining pile of Mt. Pee Pee and I knew we had to get out of here before you found yourself thrashing about in that gross bedding (the laundry room isn't that big). We made our way to the hallway and I locked the door.
**yes, we have a chain lock on our laundry room because you are very observant and can run loads of wash on your own. Awesome right?! Except it’s generally alarm clocks or magic wands that you choose to wash and to add more fun to the mix, you've taken a liking to the taste of laundry soap. Addie, STOP EATING THE SOAP!
Now back to the hallway...
You repeatedly pushed me to the door, lifting my hand toward the lock almost pleading without words for me to open it and rescue your blankie.
You cried, screamed, fell to the floor, drooled & snotted everywhere while repeatedly trying to bust down the door.
I tried breathing exercises counting down from 10 to 1 - that worked only once and you were back at it sobbing where you left off. I literally couldn’t even trick you into counting and breathing second time. Any sort of redirection at this point from songs, to toys, or snacks made it worse. We just had to wait this out.
I’ve never been so excited to hear a laundry cycle finish as I was when it did that night. I pulled the drawer open and popped the lid where you promptly removed your precious blankie. You held it tight and made your way downstairs still sniffling and catching your breath from crying so hard.
I guess it was safe to say I wasn’t about to get that thing in the dryer - nope! Not a chance mama!
I followed you downstairs, you were exhausted and still somewhat agitated, with no energy for words you handed me a bowl. Luckily for you I knew what you wanted, popcorn. You sat with your wet blanket scarfing down popcorn faster than I could give it to you. Your body somehow was feeling a need to refuel after such exertion.
You cried over anything and everything until finally falling asleep at 11:47pm that night. I sat that night after you went to sleep for 30 minutes on the couch in silence. I kept seeing your little face looking at me as if I had betrayed you. It hurt.
I just felt so bad that it got to this point. I too was spent.
Addie I am so sorry you had to go through all of this. These episodes can be so hard on you and all of us, but you know what? We got through it, together.
Breath in, breath out. Blankie was all fine in the end.
I love you baby girl.
Love,
Mom
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