Autism Changed our Marriage

"Your son has autism." 

These words were a sledgehammer to my chest. 

These were the words that changed our lives.

These were the words that changed our marriage.

Neither one of us wanted to accept it. We didn't want our son to have a lifelong struggle. We wanted his life to be as easy as we were able to help make it. 

Dom didn't want to accept it at first. He didn't want to believe that anything could be wrong. He wanted to keep believing that Nathan would be fine.

I on the other hand dove into the dreaded INTERNET. This was the worst thing that I could do to myself.

I would read the worst of the worst about autism and cause myself such anxiety and stress. I would cry all day long. Dom didn't want to hear any of it. He would get so angry that I would "intentionally" make myself cry. 

I began keeping what I would find to myself. I felt like I couldn't talk to him about it. 

With Autism comes anxiety. Nathan's anxiety would increase. 

He would have meltdowns over the smallest things. 

He would wake up in the middle of the night and have night terrors and cry for hours. Neither one of us could get him to stop. 

All of this would cause us to turn on each other. We would start to blame each other for whatever we could. I would say hurtful things. 

It was like autism took a hold of me as well during our fighting and I couldn't control my own thoughts and emotions or the words that would come out of my mouth.

Autism had officially changed our marriage. We never fought the way we fight now and over the smallest things at that.

Before Autism we were best friends.

The stress gets to us no matter how hard we try to not let it. 

It's like Autism takes hold of us in those moments and doesn't let go. 

After a fight we end up feeling defeated. There was even a point where we felt like the only way to get through it all would be to divorce.

We started marriage counseling and that seemed to help a little bit. We realized that divorce is not an option and that Nathan needs both of us to be able to help him. It would just confuse him if he no longer had both of us in the house. He loves his daddy.

Plus we love each other. We took that vow almost 8 years ago.

As Nathan is getting older and he is learning to communicate with us a little better, it seems to be getting easier. We still fight. I still allow Autism to take hold of me and I get mean. But I'm working on it daily.

I can't let the stress get to me. I know that God has a plan for our family. Nathan is going to do wonderful things and we are going to look back at these moments and learn from them.

I'm not gonna lie, Autism sucks...it impacts every aspect of your life, every hour, of every single day. But I couldn't imagine going through this journey with anyone else. 

I love my husband, til death do us part.