The little annoyances are often balanced out by his sweet reactions.

So much of my writing is devoted to the great things my non-verbal son does. Lucas is one of the sweetest kids ever and so many aspects of being his dad bring me happiness. 

I’ve also talked about some of the rougher moments. There are posts about handling meltdowns and late-night issues. No kid is all one thing or all another. He has substantial challenges today and tomorrow that I will help him through. They may not all be easy roads, but we will travel them together. We always have. We’re a team.  

I’ve even written about the underappreciated sweet things he does too. From holding the door when we come home to his evolving emotional empathy, that subject has been mentioned. 

There is another common thread among all parents, that hasn’t really been touched on too much here, though. It’s the little things my kid does that can drive me crazy. 

When my daughter was small, I talked about some of the insanity I endured. Neurotypical, as she is, many of these situations resonated with parents who have a similar child. I have a feeling that Lucas’s little moments will resonate with those who have a boy like him at home too. 

For instance, one thing I never anticipated was how every single place we drive to takes us five extra minutes to get out of the car.  Why? Well, several reasons contribute to this delay.

Many times he stretches and acts too exhausted to move from his seat. He’ll simply lean back and stare at me as if to say, “Come and get me, old man.” So I do.

I feel like it impresses him to witness my strength. Not sure how my 12-year-old adopted a prison-yard mentality. But he did. You have to earn his respect old-school style through brute force. 

That doesn’t happen every time though. He only does that sometimes. There’s only one thing he does every time. 

He gets barefoot. Whether we’re driving five miles or five days, he sets those piggies free. 

Why? Well, my son hates wearing shoes. No matter where we go or how short the ride, by the time we arrive, he’s Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka, with his little toes wagging around mere inches above the jagged pavement. We’re already late for the doctor and he’s doing the hippie dance of joy in my backseat. 

Lucas, of course, is happy as a clam. As I struggle to find his socks under the passenger seat, he’s laughing and kissing the top of my head. He doesn’t even have the courtesy to let me be mad at him for five seconds because he’s immediately adorable… and forgiven. 

That’s what makes today’s topic a bit of a paradox. The little annoyances he does are often balanced out by his sweet reaction to them. I try to explain how autism affects his personality in some truly unique ways. This is pretty much the central reason for all of that. 

Even when he understands the gravity of a situation, he’s ultimately unbothered by it. The best example of this is how I usually make him put his iPad down when putting on shoes or getting into a tricky pair of pants. While he complies with giving it up, it can be an issue. 

In his younger years, taking the tablet away was like a scene from a Lifetime drama about a mother handing over her baby. Lucas would dramatically fall to the ground and let out a long whine. Of course, he was much younger so it was cuter then. I hoped he would grow out of it before he was my size. 

For the most part, he has. Now, he relinquishes it right away with only minor objections and allows me to help him get dressed. But, as I am, he’s peering over my shoulder and trying to see the screen, which is paused, but has a still picture of Abby Cadabby on it. His body moves as he’s asked, but his sight is firmly fixed on YouTube Kids.

Come on, little man. Lift your leg. Your toes are stuck. You’re killing me. Come on. 

By now, he’s hopping on one foot and has no idea that I’m literally saving his life at the moment. Balancing the sole of my son’s foot in one hand, I’m keeping his massive frame from falling to the floor. If only he’d lift his leg more. 

And then he lifts it. 

No. Not his leg, his arm. I see it from the corner of my eye. He is hovering over me. Slowly, with his finger extended, he tries to quietly unpause the iPad over my shoulder. 

Dude, are you kidding me? 

I make annoyed eye contact with him and toss the device to the other side of his bed. He watches it sail away and suddenly, he’s a dressing expert. His pants and shoes are on in Guinness World Record time. He gives a short jump and victory clap before doing a four-foot dash to the pillow side of his bed, where his iPad is waiting. Abby is unpaused before the final shoelace bow falls to the ground. 

He loves iPads and he loves eating. My boy’s a bruiserweight who can go munch for munch with the best of ‘em. As he’s grown, I’ve balanced out his diet in my home better, and thankfully, he’s learned self-control when he’s here. There’s no more stealing coffees or diving on tables at Panera. In most cases, he can refrain from hamburglering. 

What he can’t do is eat without making an epic mess. It’s like magic. Last week, I gave him a Little Debbie Christmas Cake. You know the ones with white frosting and sprinkles? The tiny dessert was the size of my palm. I came back two minutes later and he looked like the Crow. 

Seriously, there was more on his face than the cake was made with. He multiplied it 40 fold like a bible story. I wish I had been videotaping him.  

So, I wiped his face with a wet wipe.  

And as I did, he opened his mouth and kept trying to lick it.

I swear. That’s another thing he does. For some reason, I always forget until I’m wiping his face with one. It makes me laugh harder than anything else on this list and he knows it. He laughs too and, at this point, I think he might do it mostly to get that reaction from me. 

At the end of the day, there’s only one Lucas and I’m so glad we have him. He’s still a kid, though. Kids can make us smile and make us scream. The trick is to embrace the abundance of happy times and then, find happiness in frustrating moments. 

And also finding his freakin’ sock stuffed into the cushions of my Jeep. 

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