{Shop if you Dare}

I love this time of year and especially love my favorite sport {or at least I think it should be} shopping but since we have had Michael it is more like being in the Iron Man race{not my idea of fun}.

Yesterday Michael and I were home and all of a sudden he sees a commercial for the mall, he started frantically saying “DRIVE” and doing the sign for it. I asked him “you want to drive?” he said “yes” then points to the commercial. I say “you want to go shopping?” he said in a sweet soft voice “yes”. I knew at that point I was facing a huge decision.

Michael along with the other myriad of things going on has sensory issues. Imagine yourself standing in the middle of the freeway during rush hour. It would be scary and quite overwhelming.

Knowing this about him and the “consequences” it could bring I tried to divert him to another subject, I say “do you want to color?” Mike says “NO!” not just a little no but a big NO. It is at this point I would give in and go or face an afternoon of “drive, drive, drive, drive, drive.”

So the process starts…
I have mastered getting ready start to finish shower, makeup, hair, all of it in 30 minutes or less {another sport in my opinion}
All the while Michael is saying “drive” and with his new found use of putting two words together {PERFECT MOMENTS}, he was saying “mom drive”. This I did not mind as it is a new milestone for him to put words together.
I finally got done with the marathon of getting ready, got him dressed, in the car and thought I might be able to just get away with driving not actually going in anywhere.

{Someone had other plans}

Wouldn’t you know being the genius that I am rather than choosing one of the thousands of rural routs I could have pleasantly driven as we live in beautiful Oregon, I choose to drive downtown. {Uggggg}.
Needless to say Michael saw the mall and the parking garage {he has an extreme fascination for parking garages} and the sign for “want” started rapidly happening from the backseat along with “ahh,ahh,ahh”.

My heart sunk down into the pit of my stomach. I was scared really if you want total honesty. Usually when we go into large public places Michael becomes very excited, and screaming is not out of the ordinary. {Picture the movie Rainman when Raymond and Charlie are in the bathroom running the water and Raymond freaks out over the hot water and Charlie has to calm him down} Yep that’s me and Mike. Along with the many {if looks could kill} stares I get from other adults.
I suffer from anxiety so when this starts to happen not only is Michael standing in the middle of a freeway during rush hour but I myself feel like I have joined him there.

So all of these past experiences are going through my mind as I’m driving and listening to “ahh,ahh,ahh” {scream} ahh,ahh{Mike starts biting his hands}. I decide at that moment to just go, I have things to get so we will just go in.

I didn't know it but I was about to be very surprised, first it took us like 10 minutes to get parking {how on a weekday in the middle of the afternoon I do not know} he held it together the WHOLE time!, we parked, and then walked into the sky bridge, I give Michael some loose change out of my purse and he happily put it into the Salvation Army bucket, the bell ringer thanked Mike, he did the sign for "your welcome"and we headed in. {I’m telling myself deep breaths Sharlene}.

Michael sees the elevator, I hear him say, “up” so, we went down as we were already up. I actually got the things I needed in the first store. We managed to have only one outburst {along with an adult death look}and one hand bite. I ask Michael “do you want to drive?” thinking he has had his fill of shopping, he says “NO” I then say “OK do you want to shop more?” “Yes” he says. {OK Lord this ones on you now I am working on borrowed time here}. So we move onto the next place, we ended up going to TWO more places, I got sushi and I even got to stop by the jeweler and get my wedding ring cleaned. {Blessings from above a perfect moment}.

I was soo pleased with his behavior, he was a different kid.

I realized then that it isn’t always going to be like standing in the middle of the freeway during rush hour. Over time it is going to be more like standing on the freeway but with only a couple cars driving by.
He will learn to get out of the way of traffic and learn to start directing the traffic himself

{in his mind}