A childhood mourned for.

A childhood mourned for.

In April and we’ll a lot of the time really we hear of parents mourning the child they wished they had. It is an issue with ranging responses. Some understand it. Some rail against it. And that makes sense.

I’ve been thinking about the loss of my own childhood. I missed it in multiple ways. But the way I’m thinking of is the missing out on an autistic childhood.

Being able to kind of pass as not autistic meant I never got that autistic authenticity. I feel my heart longed for this.

As a consequence my childhood was that of a target for bullies but more importantly a childhood of trying.

Trying to be like the others.

Trying to do it right.

Trying to cope with sensory onslaughts.

Trying to fit in.

Trying not to talk at the wrong time.

Trying to do relationships.

It was all very trying. So very trying. And most often failing. But only just. Not failing enough that I would be taken somewhere to try and help or work stuff out. Just failing enough to be told to try harder or to be labelled useless or worthless.

Yes it was very trying. And it was exhausting. It takes its toll trying to be what you are not. Utterly exhausting.

So I mourn the loss of an authentic autistic childhood. One where my stims and my social difficulties were not problems but just the way I was, which could then have been understood.

So I mourn the childhood that wasn’t a never ending experience of trying and failing to do it right. And being alongside others that seemed to get it right so effortlessly.

That’s the childhood that I think we can mourn the loss of. Not some childhood that was never going to be.

I suppose if I could whisper in the ear of my mother or my doctor I would whisper a few things some more prominent than others but I would certainly whisper the word autism. I would whisper it again and again and again until the seed was planted and beginning to grow into finding out about me and chipping away at the wall of me just having to try.