My Bestest Friend!!

Let's take a ride down memory lane. Can you remember all the way back to Elementary school? What do you remember? Do you remember who your Best Friend was in 4th Grade? Do you remember the games you played on the playground with your friends? What about your neighborhood friends? Games of Hide-and-Seek, softball, or playing dolls? What about Junior High? Who was the one you ran to when your mom was just being mean and unfair? Whispering about boys? Did you have friends that took your back against a bully? How about High School? Some of my best memories of high school were from my friends. Hanging out between classes, going to football games, running the mall. etc. Now, imagine if all of those friends weren't there? No one held your hand when you were upset. No one to talk to about that hard math test. No one to talk to. Sure would change alot of those happy memories, huh?

Children with Asperger's have a very hard time making and keeping friends. They lack the social skills needed to maintain these relationships. They lack the communication skills to maintain appropriate conversation with their peers. The sad thing, though, is they deeply desire these relationships. They just don't know how. Hopefully, in life, they'll find one or two people that will understand their quirks and see past that, but, often times, children don't.

This has become more of an issue with Hayden. Gone are the days of toddlerhood and preschoolers where these can easily be hidden or written off. Back home, there were two kids Hayden and Kaitlyn played with all of the time. They were approx the same ages as them. Hayden didn't know how to communicate or play with them. They learned to just ignore him. Often times, they would be upstairs having a blast with Kaitlyn while Hayden's downstairs playing alone and completely content with this. Afterwards, he would come back to us declaring how much fun he had playing with them even though he wasn't even on the same floor as them. Since we've been up here, it's been harder. Hayden attempts to play with the neighborhood kids but, as usual, the kids learn to ignore him cause they don't know how to respond to him. As a parent, it's heartbreaking. I stand there and watch him run over to the other kids, blurt out some random sentence, then bend over playing with a toy completely oblivious to the fact that they've walked off and gone somewhere else. The worst, though, was listening to a child yell that he hates Hayden and never wants to play with him. He, now, completely ignores him. Hayden, though, lacking the skills to interpret body language, still declares all of these kids as his bestest friends and runs to them when he goes outside. It's a never ending cycle that will only get worse as he gets older. I'm not sure which is hardest to watch, the kids leaving him out of everything or his complete lack of noticing this. I know as he starts Kindergarten, there is just more of this to come. Hayden will be in a typical Kindergarten classroom with approx. 10 kids total. Of those 10 kids, I just hope and pray he has 1 friend. 1 friend that can talk about rockets and space ship toys all day or who can recite Toy Story 2 in its entirety right along with him. A friend that understands the "rules" of every toy and doesn't mind being told loudly that he's "playing with it wrong." A little boy or girl that is okay with playing in solitude and isolation from the rest of the class. A child that isn't afraid of his random, loud screams of pure joy. Just 1 kid that says, "Hayden I know you're weird but I'm okay with that."

 Hey, a mom can dream, right?