Isaac and I sat at the kitchen table at my parent’s home in Texas. For the second time, I handed Isaac the red snakeskin leather photo album with the words “Isaac is going to Texas and then moving to a new home” written in black ink on an index card which I had slipped in the front pocket of the album. I don’t think I would have chosen red snakeskin leather, but I was scrambling my way through an impossible move and it was the only album I could find last minute at our local Walgreens. I had made a social story for Isaac to try and help him navigate the myriad of life altering changes about to bulldoze their way into his fragile world. We had been through the book once before we left Illinois. I am not sure how much Isaac had processed at that point. But now, we were in Texas and Isaac had watched the simple explanations in his story unfolding into reality.
1. We will put all of our toys and clothes in boxes (insert picture of boxes filled with things…)
2. We will put the boxes in a big truck (insert picture of a big moving truck)
3. We will drive and drive and drive all the way to Texas. We will stay at Grandma and Grandpa’s house in Texas (here, I had inserted a map of the United States of America with a dotted line from the middle of Illinois to the southeastern part of Texas where Grandma and Grandpa lived).
This “number three” was tricky. Amidst all of the change in Isaac’s life, Grandma’s house wasn’t even the same. My parents had remodeled their home since the last time we had visited. It was stunning. And also, so different than Isaac remembered it to be. Isaac has always had an incredible ability to recall places, lists of information, and mathematical patterns. The informational lists are safe. They don’t change. Farm animals will always include cows, chickens, pigs, ducks, horses, sheep, and goats. Violins and harps and cellos will never loose their spot among the ranks of the strings. Numbers….they are predictable, and patterns provide stability in their constancy. But places… places can change. And they do change. We have a history of struggle with this very type of change. I believe Isaac forms vivid memories from his experiences. Fundamental to those memories are the details of his surroundings when these memories are formed. If Isaac returns to the site of these memories and the surroundings are different than he remembers them to be, he struggles to reconcile these changes within the memory itself and it can be very troubling for him spurring confusion and anxiety.
Grandma’s house in Texas is a place of many a core memory for my boy. This change under the best of times would be difficult to process. But under the mounting stress of the move…I wasn’t sure what kind of impact it would have. The next section of his book included a series of pictures detailing Grandma’s home the way he remembered it to be. I then included pictures of construction workers knocking out walls and changing the space. Next, I included pictures of what Grandma’s home looked like now. Each section of photos had simple captions to explain the process. It was worth a shot. I had to try and help him understand what had happened to his grandmothers home, and what was happening to his once stable and predictable life. The next section of the social story showed a calendar. I circled the day of our arrival in Texas in red ink, and starred the day we would drive back to Illinois.
I have made many books like this for Isaac over the years. Every trip, family reunion, or change in school routine has been detailed for him in this manner—simple text, and photographs. Every story I have ever made for him ends with a picture of our home and the phrase “and then we will go home.” Isaac always smiles at that final page. There is something reassuring and calming about the prospect of going home at the end of a potentially overwhelming and confusing experience. But this red snakeskin leather book did not end this way. We were not going “home.”
When we got to the “new home” part in his story, Isaac looked up at me and said “Go to new home….and then, HOME.” I swallowed hard, and looked at his pleading brown eyes seeking for that familiar relief at the end of the story—the part where we go to his home. I said with a deep ache in my gut: “No, we will stay at our new home. We are all done with this home (pointing to the picture of our old home). Now we will have a new home. We will stay at our new home.” Isaac quickly said: “And then???….” Waiting for more information. I thought, and said: “And then we will have Halloween at our new home. And we will have Thanksgiving at our new home. And then we will have Christmas at our new home….” Silence. I tried to interest Isaac in his favorite pastimes. He wanted nothing to do with any of them. I tried to engage with him verbally. He had shut down. I felt my heart sink and my mind spin. He had no way to ask his questions or express his concerns. I had no way of knowing what his questions were. And even if I did, I would not know how to answer them in a way that he could understand.
We weathered our way through our three week stay in Texas between the closing date on our old home and the closing date of our new home. Isaac silently and solemnly bore the inherent difficulty of the changes in Grandma’s home. We had some happy moments—those were mostly at splash pads. We had many moments of confusion and dysregulation without the ability to work through the complexities of change and emotion. Often my efforts to connect with him through language spur further overwhelm. And so we seek sensory regulation and pray that understanding and peace will come over time in our new home.
At night in Texas, Isaac and I would take drives. Long drives. The windshield of our gray van would fog with the clash of hot humid air outside and the frantic AC, so we would often drive with the windows down and the AC off. The breeze brought some relief to the wet oppressive heat. On these drives, I had much time to reflect on my current reality. The profuse anxiety I felt surrounding Isaac and this move was often unbearable. I masked well for my children, but it buzzed through my body sometimes crashing in waves of panic. When the panic subsided, the buzz remained. Always there was the buzz. And this buzzing made it near impossible for me to feel other emotions. I remember a prayer I would often offer on these quiet drives would be that I might see a glimmer of light, feel a drop of His love…a sliver of hope. And that in these small ways, the reality of His care might pierce their way through the buzzing in my brain so that I might see and feel Him.
On our last Sunday in Texas, I was packing a bag to take with us to Church. With simple clarity, I felt to bring Isaac’s little whiteboard and some markers. I threw them in the bag and we left. As we sat through our Church service, I remembered the whiteboard and quietly pulled it out. It had been a long time since Isaac had wanted to engage with me. With all the confusing changes, he had retreated into himself. I longed to connect with him in some way. I pulled out a black dry erase marker and across the top of the whiteboard, I wrote: “Will you draw a sphere?” Isaac slowly grabbed the pen, and then drew a perfect sphere. He looked at me and said: “With the…” I knew exactly what he meant. He wanted me to make his perfect sphere into a beach ball. I felt a sparkle of connection with him, and made his perfect sphere into my very best beach ball. He liked it, and smiled. I used the hem of my skirt to erase the beach ball and wrote “Will you draw a cube?” Isaac took the pen and drew. And then he looked at me expectantly: “With the…” I made his cube into a present complete with polka dot wrapping paper and a bow. We went on like this through every three dimensional shape I could think of. With each shape, I felt sweet connection. A few minutes later, a “special musical number” was announced. Typically, special musical numbers in our Church involve voice and piano. Sometimes we will get treated to a violin or cello or flute. Today was different. Today, a young man hefted his tuba to the stand and played a beautiful solo rendition of “Redeemer of Israel.” Isaac was enthralled and elated by this shiny gold tuba bursting with sound. Before I could stop him, he was standing on the pews jumping up and down. I gently nudged him down to sitting. He quickly squeezed his way out of the pew and began running toward the tuba “EEEEEEEEEEing” in utter delight. I grabbed his hand and sat with him in the (thankfully) empty front row. Together, we listened to the tuba. This congregation was so incredibly kind. I sensed delight in their hearts as they watched Isaac’s uninhibited elation and my efforts to manage his behavior without quenching his joy. Isaac was happy. I felt so loved. And for a moment, the buzzing stopped.
A picture I snapped of Isaac at Church that very Sunday. I wanted to remember the joy.
By Isaac
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