Spring Concert for the Twins

The twins will have their Spring concert this Wednesday.  I'm looking forward to it, and at the same time emotional about it.  Mikayla has been singing leprechaun songs and bunny songs for a month now.  Michael is getting a bit fed up with her singing all of the time in the car.  The little songs have stuck in my brain, and you can often hear me singing in the kitchen, "Oh the leprechaun is smart and clever, he wears green and is rarely seen!"

"Oh, a spring concert!"  You say to yourself, "It must be such a darling thing!."  For me it is wonderful, and at the same time scary.  Last year as I was watching the twins, Mikayla was situated right in the middle, knew every word, had her eye on the music teacher, had fun with her classmates and was right at home with the whole "concert process."  Then there was Michael.

Normally I don't notice his autism.  Most of the time he is just like any other kid, with a little bit of unusual speech patterns, but nothing majorly stands out.  As I watched him at the concert last year, he was on the top row, all the way to my right.  He stood about 2 feet away from his classmates, had a look on his face like he was lost in a fog.  Sometimes he'd remember where he was and I could see him trying to form the words with his mouth.  He seemed to be a step behind all of the others (slow processing speed coming into play here), and not quite with it.  Sometimes it looked almost comical, especially the way he would turn to the side facing into the curtains on the stage.  Other times tears just came to my eyes because of the realization that he was acting quite like the others.

For some of the concert he pulled up his striped shirt exposing his belly. Other times he was sucking on his thumb or banging on his head with his fist.  For some of the concert he looked like he was going to run off stage. I was half laughing, and half crying from what it appeared to me as a very autistic kid.  Perhaps because of my special education background, I just have "eyes" to see all of these unusual behaviors.  I hoped that nobody else noticed the things I was seeing.  Maybe all of the rest of the parents just kept their eyes on their own gleaming child, and didn't pay attention to the kid on the end in the top row.

I'm hoping that this concert will go smoother.  I'm hoping that Michael will pay attention, not lift up his shirt, want to escape or suck his thumb.  We shall see.  I love this kid with all of my heart.  I know he is different, but maybe he can blend in for just one hour?   I'm always terrified that he will be made fun of or bullied because of his differences.  Wednesday is three days away, another day in our lives, another day for a mom with a child "Somewhere Over the Spectrum."