Try, Try Again.

Is it easier the second time? Maybe, but not much. Leaving your special needs “child” (he’s 19) at home alone doesn’t seem natural. I don’t want to leave him. We won’t know if he can be responsible for himself until we try. It’s like a band aid that been on your skin a long time, you just have to pull it off quickly, endure the short lived pain. We have to go for it.

How could I change the routine without warning him several times a day e, for several days like I always do? Quickly changing the schedule works when the change is something he really want , to be alone, and in this case something he also really doesn’t want, to take his sisters to school. I spontaneously (that’s a word I don’t use often in a sentence with Patrick) decided this morning to leave Patrick at home alone for half hour while I drove his sisters to school. Most mornings, I get up about an hour before everyone to get ready for my day wake up my daughters and they get ready for school. I prepare Patrick’s morning juice (fortified with a b complex cocktail), his bagels and his lunch. I wake him up with just enough time for him to get dressed and eat/drink his breakfast before it’s time to take his sister’s to school. Their school is 15 minutes away. He goes with me, unless for some reason his father is home, most mornings he’s surfing. When we return he brushes his teeth and his retainers and shaves. With whatever time remains before the bus is scheduled to arrive, we take the dogs out for a walk. He rides his 3-wheeled tricycle. We get home with five minutes to spare. Long enough for him to put his wallet and cell phone in his pocket and get outside for the bus. He doesn’t much care for taking his sisters to school, but he does it.

When we started to make his daily schedule on the whiteboard this morning, I suggested he stay home by himself while I take his sisters to school. He said “ok”, which is about as excited as a kid with autism gets. We listed his morning duties of shaving , brushing his teeth and retainers, which takes him 15 minutes. After his morning duties, he was to empty the dishwasher, that usually takes him about 10 or 15 minutes. After that I added making his bed, which takes about 10 minutes because he gets on the bed while he’s making it and it ends up taking a long time. I knew it would take him more than half hour to do all of those things. So we were set.

I didn’t print a sign of Staying at Home Alone Rules this weekend, so we listed them together on the board. When I initially asked what the rules were for staying home alone, he drew a complete blank. We went through it again, do not answer the door, do not answer the house phone, you can answer your phone, (that way if something happens and I need to call him he will answer), only call Mom if you need anything. Again, he likes to call people. I am thankful that he can use the phone. But he doesn’t have the ability to judge who can help him in any given situation. Many times he calls the wrong people for the wrong thing. Obviously everyone on his phone list knows him and wouldn’t be stunned at receiving a call. But, he doesn’t need to call his grandparents at 7:30 am to tell them he can’t find the toothpaste, which is possible.

He knew the stakes were big. I told him if he stuck to the chores on the board and this went well, we would do it again. If he got onto the computer or did anything else, we would not. Out the door I went. This time the traffic was not so bad. I was home in half an hour. He was still emptying the dishwasher. Sometimes it’s bonus that he’s so incredibly slow. He didn’t have any idle time to get curious. It worked so well, I think we’ll do it again tomorrow.

I feel pretty safe leaving him when he’s busy. If he had nothing to do, I don’t think I would leave him alone. There will come a time when something out of his routine will happen and he have to make a decision or indecision about something. It’s not something his brain does. He’s unable to rationalize. The only response to situations is what has been programmed over and over in his brain. Sometime he’ll be faced with situation for which there is no preprogramming. I don’t know what he’ll do. Maybe I should simulate more and more unexpected things as he gets more comfortable being alone. Have some neighbors come over or something. There’s so much to do.