JULY 2018
Page 9
MOM’S CORNER
JOY IN THE PEANUT BUTTER
“M
om! Mom! Mommy!
Mama!
Ma!
Mum!
Mummy!” My 7-year-old son is
delivering these words as he wakes
me up in the morning. He says them
at least a dozen times before 6 am.
Every morning. He wakes up early
and is ready to start the day with a
smile. Me? Not so much. He isn’t
being ‘bad’ or trying to annoy me.
Actually, he is excited to wake up.
He wants direction on things to do
to keep his precocious little brain
stimulated all day. You see, my little
boy is on the Autism Spectrum and
needs attention to keep him on task
and out of “trouble.” His mind works
in a different way, and he has a curi-
osity he wants to satisfy. Let’s just
say he wanders off the path of the
typical. He has a lot of quirks. Sleep
issues have always been a part of his
life. We have to constantly supervise
him or keep him busy to ensure min-
imum harm or mess.
This week my sweet little darling
decided to paint his body with pea-
nut butter and the week before there
had been a lot of rain and mud. What
little boy could resist? However, we
finally had to put a stop to it after
my husband had carried him to the
shower to be hosed off more times
than I want to mention. I can see
how the wheels in his brain were
working. He connected the color of
the peanut butter and the color of the
mud as he touched it and decided to
use it to form a Mohawk on the top
of his head.
vaguely similar to the thick wet dirt
and he liked the cool and smooth yet
sticky feeling on his skin. He cre-
ated a design on his face similar to
a warrior’s face paint. I was a little
surprised because sometimes tex-
tures are an
issue
for
him. Then I
realized the
lines were
created
using one
of my nice
camel hair
paintbrush-
es, instead
of his cute,
pudgy little
finger. As I
gazed at my
boy, in exas-
perated dis-
may, he gig-
gled at me
and tried to
run with the
paintbrush
in one hand
and the jar
in the other.
Grabbing the soap and the remnants
of his impromptu costume change, I
headed into the bathroom to begin
the cleaning process. As he sits in
the bathtub, I check the temperature
and grab the supplies in preparation
for the battle between the butter and
the bubbles. I feel a little irritated
and inconvenienced. I did not want
to be woken up before 6 am during
I assume that the texture was Summer vacation to clean this mess.
Not this mom. I want to wake up to
see my children clean and dressed,
getting along, sitting on the couch
reading Bible stories to each other
or better yet, doing chores without
being asked or something else equal-
ly unrealistic.
To be honest, the usual Summer
morning
scenar-
io looks
more like
a
scene
from
a
wrestling
match…a
b u n c h
of guys
running
around
in
their
under-
w e a r ,
exchang-
ing ‘lock-
er room
humor’
( a n d
smells),
and physi-
cal rough-
h o u s -
ing until
someone ‘taps out.’ But I can dream,
right? By this time, my little boy
has forgotten about the sticky mess
he got himself into and moved on
to imaginary confrontation between
superheroes and villains. Plastic fig-
ures are doing swan dives off the
faucet and creating twelve inch high
splashes complete with the little boy
sound effects. I use the warm water
from the shower sprayer to start to
wet down his hair. He makes me
smile.
I can see that he doesn’t realize the
chaos and havoc that he created. He
has moved on to his next adventure.
I have to admit, that even though I
am frustrated to have to get up early
and clean up peanut butter, I am glad
that I get to have this special moment
with him. A moment to show him
that even though I’m not happy
about his actions, that I still love
him enough to take care of him. His
sweet face turned up towards me,
and he says, “I love you, mama.” My
heart melts, and I tell him I love him,
too. I finish getting the gooey mess
out of his hair, his little ears and the
rest of his body, as he chats and tells
me a hundred random facts about
Pokemon and My Little Pony char-
acters. If he hadn’t been naughty, I
would have missed all of this time. I
would have missed this little glimpse
into his heart.
These moments are limited.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a way
to stop time. He is growing up and
won’t be making the mischief that
little boys do forever. These are the
moments that I savor. The moments
with my older boys that I wish I
could have back. I have to remind
myself that he’s just a little boy when
my tolerance level runs low. I have
to tell myself to have joy. But, during
this moment, I found joy in the pea-
nut butter.
By Laura Hansen
The Metro Times
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