Raising a child with autism can turn ordinary experiences into adventures. Ezra has been taking a medication (unrelated to autism) that requires regular monitoring of his blood chemistry. As it happens, he’s also one of those people whose physiology makes drawing blood a challenge.
Once a month, I accompany him to a doctor’s office, where a nurse struggles with a needle to coax the blood from his left arm.
“How are we doing today?” she said this morning.
“Fine,” Ezra mumbled, looking down. It’s not that he was being unfriendly; these kinds of social exchanges simply don’t come naturally to him.
When she enters the room, he’s often in a giggly mood. Perhaps it’s his nervous reaction to stress. Instead of sitting upright as she requests, he lies back or even curls up in fetal position, chuckling about whatever is on his mind. (Today it was the next movie he’s eagerly anticipating.) Sometimes I try to see the scene from the nurse’s Read More
