Skip to main content

Daddy, I've been watching you

Today while driving in the car we heard these lyrics:

"He said I've been watching you dad, ain't that cool
I'm your buckaroo, I wanna be like you
And eat all my food and grow as tall as you are
We like fixing things and holding mama's hand
Yeah we're just alike, hey ain't we dad
I wanna do everything you do
So I've been watching you"

I started to tear up. 

I got to thinking about our little boy. 

Nathan is 5 and is non-verbal with autism. He can say some words when prompted but cannot hold a conversation.


When I heard the lyrics I started thinking that Nathan can't say these words to his dad. He can't tell him with his voice how much he wants to be like his dad.

But with autism we have learned that words aren't the only way to show love.

Nathan constantly tells his dad "I wanna do everything you do, so I've been watching you."

He shows it every time he puts on his dad's hat.

He shows it every time he grabs the hair clippers and pretends to cut his hair like his daddy.

He shows it every time he pretends to work on his power wheel while daddy is working on his truck.


He shows it every time he pretends to start his bike with his pretend keys.

He shows it in every little facial expression or in the way he focuses so intensely at what his dad is doing.

So while the lyrics to this song brought tears to me eyes, I also smiled. Because to see how much my little boy admires his dad makes my heart melt.

The words will come one day...we feel that, we know that.

He's got his hero, his role model, his daddy. Someone to watch and learn from.

And that makes this mama so happy.


Comments

  1. You're all so blessed to have eachother. Hold on tight!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

You can never be too young to advocate for autism

I usually post a picture of our family wearing shirts to promote world autism day. This year we didn't get the chance to do that. But we promote and advocate autism all year long.   This picture represents how our whole family knows autism, we live with autism and we work hard to make sure that Nathan knows he's more than just autism. See when we were about to have Nathan's little sister, Chayse, I was a nervous wreck. I was so worried that Nathan wouldn't adapt to her. That he wouldn't pay attention to her. Boy was I wrong. From day one he loved her. He wanted her near him all of the time. He made sure we never left home without her. He was her big brother. Now that Chayse is 3 years old she has surpassed Nathan in a few things. She can talk in full sentences. She can use the potty. She makes friends. But the one thing she does best is helping her big brother. She gets concerned when he's having a hard time. She goes to him and wants to help fix his "boo b...

Flirt like his daddy? - I never expected it

This week I asked Nathan's kindergarten teacher how he interacts with the other kids in his class. What she said surprised me... She said how Nathan is with the other kids, he probably learned from his daddy...Nathan is a little flirt with the girls.  I was shocked. She said that he is always trying to get this one little girls attention. And his teacher told her to say hi to Nathan...she did and I guess he just got the biggest smile. Fast forward to Sunday night shower. We got him all cleaned and I said to him, "you are such a big boy, you smell so good and you are gonna go to school and smell so good for [little girl's name]."  I will tell you he got a smile on his face. So we started doing the little teasing about her and I said is she your friend? He smiled from ear to ear. I got to thinking that I forget sometimes that even though he has autism and maybe his brain doesn't work quite like a typical person, his heart does and his feelings do.  It's always s...

Haircuts in the Autism World

"Nathan it's time for a haircut" is a trigger to a meltdown like no other.  He screams, he cries, he tries to hide the hair clippers from us. It is one of the worst tasks we have to do with him. We tried taking him to a barber a couple of times, but he would get completely overwhelmed. Over the Summer, Nathan and his sister went and stayed with their grandparents. His grandpa decided to try to take him to a barber shop to get his haircut. We gave the permission thinking, it's a whole new place, he's not with mom and dad, so maybe it will be a good thing. It went FABULOUSLY!!! They sent us picture when he was done and he looked so adorable. Fast forward to a few weeks ago. Picture day was coming up and Nathan deeply needed a haircut. It was so long. We would ask him if he was ready. He would say no. So the day before picture day, I put him in the car and took him to the barber. I was waiting for the meltdown...it didn't come. He walked in and sat down while we ...