The boys came home around noon today and Elliott was in a mood from the moment he walked in the door. Visits are a mixed bag for any kid but when you factor in the complexity that Autism brings to the party, it’s even more so.

A mixed reaction to a visit with his mom doesn’t necessarily reflect a bad visit. It’s just a very difficult thing emotionally, to navigate and transition struggles are expected.

That being said, he did eventually sit down and talk with me after he had a pretty big emotional outburst. Elliott doesn’t like talking about his feelings and I can understand that, but we have to know what’s going on in order to better help him. It’s absolutely a work in progress but progress is being made.

Elliott is upset about a quite a few things in regards to the major changes in his life. I’m not going to get into the specifics but I do want to talk about one thing that is really difficult for me personally.

Elliott’s relationship with his mom has been seriously impacted by her decisions and actions. It’s frustrating for me because I have zero control over what other people do. I can’t fix this. I can’t even manage to promote healing because the things upsetting him don’t seem to be changing.

This evening, we were talking and he opened up about something that I knew was a problem but didn’t realize how much it was upsetting him. Elliott is terrified that I’m going to walk out on him. I knew both the E’s were worried about that to some extent but Elliott said he’s afraid to trust me because there’s no way to prove that I won’t hurt him like his mom has. I’m paraphrasing but those are his words.

That’s absolutely fucking heartbreaking for me as a father. I can’t imagine what it’s like to feel that you can’t trust your own parent or living each day just waiting for the other shoe to drop. I just can’t imagine. 🙁