Wee!- Translation: Wii!

PHOTOGRAPH FOR TIME BY STEVE LISS

I was going through my blog feeds and stumbled across a very interesting article from a lady that goes by McEwen. She is the mother of two austistic boys, as well as two normal children. Her blog was entitled "Get with the programme mother." It discusses the physical and emotional issues of raising autistic children. In this blog's case, potty training. Her article focues on how as a mother of both normal and autistic children, the emotional factors of understanding her autistic children can be trying. She tries to understand them, and always wonders if they will have the motivation to do certain things. She describes how she translates certain things so wrongly sometimes and it makes her seem like an impatient old bat. Her children both had issues potty training. They would seem like they got far and then would regress. She wants to do everything for them but knows that she mustn't or else it would reverse everything that she has worked for in achieving a new skill.

My cousin is autistic. He is around 7 years old now but I remember it took forever for him to start potty training. When he did start, it took him forever to get it right. My aunt and uncle were patient though, and they did pretty well in raising an austistic kid. Some of the things that McEwen was talking about though, with the mistranslations, I saw with my aunt and uncle. I can only imagine how discouraging it could be for any parent. Just as a bystander with my cousin, I witnessed a lot of the same things.

In the end of the article, McEwen tells how her son started saying " I need Wee!" She eventually got him into the bathroom and he got his trousers off, but then walked into the living room pointing at the t.v. He said again "I need Wee!" Translation: I need Wii... the video game. It is amazing how even autistic children are affected knowlingly by technology.