This week, I had several “opportunities” to be in the car with my son. While we’ve had a few successes in trying to deal with his back seat driving, being in the car with Kai can still be stressful at times.
The other day, I picked him up after school to take him to his weekly swim lesson, followed by driving him over to his karate class.
His swim instructor arrived a few minutes late. He also must have felt a little bad about canceling last week’s lesson as he asked if he could keep Kai a little longer than usual. The result was a really great lesson – for the first time without wearing a noodle and using a kickboard, Kai swam a little bit with his face in the water and did a good job with his breathing. But, it also meant that we left the pool too late to get to the karate class on time.
Punctuality is vital to Kai and he always has anxiety about being late. So, during the entire drive, he was constantly berating me, saying “You’re a bad driver, Daddy.” I tried to explain that we were going to be late because we left the pool late, and there was nothing I could do, but that we wouldn’t be more than a few minutes late. Such reasoning doesn’t yet appear to have much impact on him, as he responded, “You need to practice your driving more.”
The bright side is that at least the anxiety about being late took his mind off the tightness of his seat belt.
This afternoon, we’re driving up to Wisconsin for our periodic visit with his DAN (Defeat Autism Now!) doctor. In the meantime, if anybody needs me, I’ll be working on my lotus position.
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