Last week while my son and I were out playing in our first big snow storm of the year; I decided to take some pictures because he was having so much fun. As usual when I grabbed the camera I prepared myself for 20 minutes of jumping around like a monkey to get his attention. I went through the list of funny voices he likes and songs from favorite TV shows; all the tricks I'd gotten used to using in order to hopefully get one shot of those beautiful blue eyes looking toward the camera. Responding to his name and making eye contact are two of the things that Autism took from him and over the last two years resulting in many a heartbreaking photo session. One year I just gave up and took a picture of him sleeping in front of the tree for our Christmas card! While it was a cute photo most people who received it had no idea the amount of tears shed that Christmas as we watched our son walk by all his presents showing no interest in anything Christmas related at all.... I digress sorry...
Back to the snow storm last week... I headed out back camera in hand, crouched down and said, "Zander, let's take a picture. Zander look at the camera." Just as I was about to start singing the theme to Disney's Special Agent Oso my son looked at me and the camera and smiled! I sat there for a second and almost missed the shot because I was frozen in disbelief. I thought no way, this had to be a coincidence. I did it again, "Zander let's take a picture, ready, 1, 2, 3", he looked at the camera again and again and again!
MY SON LOOKED AT THE CAMERA FOR THE FIRST TIME IN TWO YEARS ON HIS OWN!!!!!
I can only imagine what my neighbors who can see into our back yard probably thought. Here's this crazy lady blubbering uncontrollably and laughing and cheering at the same time knee deep in snow snapping photos of this poor child over and over again! I'm sure they think I'm a total nut ball!
It got me thinking about how something so small can be so precious. Zander's had a few moments like that over the last year. Moments that most parents don't really even think about... moments that my husband and I will never forget!
There was the day he wanted to go on the swings at the park after two years of screaming anytime you tried to go near them and the day we started to see the emergence of "pretend play" where he was butting his dinosaurs together and making them roar.
He's had days where he's just made us laugh so hard; like the first time he ever got himself a snack. He walked out of his room, through the living room & dinning room, into the kitchen and the next thing we know he's walking back by us carrying a box of cheez-its and back into his room like it was no big deal.
One of the best days though was the one where we pulled up next to our friend Oliver X on the street and when he poked his head in the car and said hi to Zander not only did Zander look right at him, he reached out to him with his hand to say hi. (Z knows good people when he sees them) and then there was the day where he hugged me out of no where, just walked up to me and hugged me after months of pushing me away. The uultimate day though was when he put his hand on my face looked me right in the eye and said Maaaaaahhhhm (mom) after not hearing mom in over a year.
There seems to be something new like that every month or so now which tells me we are moving in the right direction, slowly but moving is moving right?
Sometimes it's just the littlest of things that make the world go round!
