balance

Having a daughter with autism is remarkable for us. Having a daughter with autism that has a typical twin brother is amazing. I have a daily struggle going on as to what is "too much" for Oliver to understand or deal with; mostly I tell myself that being Violet's sibling is all he'll ever know.

Ollie is constantly surprising me with his ability to communicate and understand his sister. One of the things that's been a challenge for all of us is the differences in them; so often it seems like the things Oliver wants and needs to do are same things that terrify or "trigger" Violet into a meltdown. I try to deal with each situation as it comes up: Ollie can only play with loud toys in his bedroom, certain music we can only play when Violet is occupied with something else.

Christmas is coming with its own new compromises.

There will be no visit to Santa this year. Maybe a trip to see him with Oliver alone, but no photo. Violet is *terrified*.

We won't go see the live nativity, as we've done every year. It would be too much for Violet to not scale the fences to be IN the manger with the animals.

The tree is a work in progress. We got one- our first average-size-one that doesn't just sit on a table!- and we've put our lights and ornaments on. We're trying to teach "gentle" and "hot" and "no playing in the water of the tree stand!". We'll see.

But one of the things Ollie loves to do (and, admittedly so do I!) is turn off all of the lights in the house except the tree lights and sing "O Christmas Tree". We do it at night, before bed, and hold hands or snuggle in front of the tree. I know, it's totally sappy. But we LOVE it.

Violet DOES NOT.

"Mama! No sing!!" "Ollie!! NO!"

Finally tonight, I didn't have Ben here to distract Violet, so I was trying to sing quickly with Ollie, while holding Violet's hand to calm her. She was crying and yelling and I could tell a tantrum was coming.

Suddenly, Oliver's voice got quiet. I looked at him and his mouth was still moving, singing the words, but he was barely whispering.
He smiled at me.

He knew.

He knew what his sissy needed but also knew he wasn't about to give up on our nightly Christmas Tree moment. He worked it out. I smiled back at him, and whisper-sang too. I squeezed him so tight.

SUCH blessings.