On Wednesday, Jude will start Preschool. He will spend four days a week at school. The process leading to this decision was more complicated than most preschool placements. Meetings, assessments, checklists and other tedious paperwork that all regurgitated the already known facts. Jude is non-verbal, autistic and in the one percentile in every domain. The information that was gathered led the IEP team to make the decision that Jude's ability to learn and develop would be best in an all day resource room. Before this process started, I knew this would be the placement. Yet, I still felt stressed when the decision was final. He cannot share with me his thoughts and experiences, so instantly I am worrying about how I would communicate and connect with him after a long day. Scared to think how someone else would react if his g-tube was dislodged. And an even more overwhelming thought, would someone stay dedicated to his feeding process or would he lose the skills, we have worked so hard to obtain. My anxiety created a dark cloud over my mind and a perception that made it hard to deal with the idea of Jude going to Preschool.
A few weeks later, I was listening to "The Obstacle is the Way" by Ryan Holiday while feeding Jude lunch. Three minutes and twenty some seconds into the thirty-sixth chapter, I was enlightened by the author's explanation on how the ordinary people, he wrote about, overcame great obstacles. He says they all "First see clearly. Next act correctly. Finally, endure and accept the world as it is." Those words echoed in my mind. I stopped and sat back in my chair. Instantly, I recalled the day that Jude met his future teachers. The teachers and aides sat in the family room discussing Jude. Halfway through the conversation, Jude walked right in the middle and started hugging everyone of his teachers followed by a slight pat on the back. Almost parallel to the words of Ryan Holiday, he saw the situation clearly, three new people to love him and acted correctly by hugging every single one. Then, Jude endured and accepted the world as it is, by giggling, smiling and running around all of us. In that moment, sitting in the chair and hearing those words, I realized that I was looking at it all wrong. Jude will give every situation everything he has and overcome by exercising a positive perspective.
Wednesday, I will drop Jude off at school and I don't doubt for a second that he will flourish. My stress and anxiety have turned to hope and excitement. Even though, everything is not the way I had expected or intended, Jude will overcome and be stronger for facing obstacles that come his way with a positive perspective and that unbelievable smile!
