There is nothing I like more than the moments when one of my girls plops down on the couch beside me just because. It brings me a deep joy to connect or reconnect in this way, when we are sitting there together not quite talking. Eventually we may, but when one of them first joins me, I relish the simple connection that brings us together, this parallelling that this autistic family enjoys. Eventually, if there is a reason that has brought one of my teenagers to my side they will reveal it at some point, but the silence that precedes it, I’ll take it. In fact, I embrace it.
For a long time, when I looked back at my childhood, including my own teenage years, I assumed my awkwardness was for more of a universal experience than it apparently was. For a while through my 20s and 30s, I believed I was simply an introvert who needed time alone to recharge and didn’t draw the same energy as an extroverted individual who enjoyed time spent in groups or at parties. For too long I questioned myself and studied myself through a more neurotypical lens, my social awkwardness, my difficulties navigating friendships and other relationships, my over-analyzing every situation and conversation and measuring myself against the neurotypical world’s standards. Every time I did this, I came up wanting.
Of course, as we have raised our two girls, and their neurodivergent awesomeness began to shine through, I began to see all of the similarities between them and me. Suddenly, my life seemed to make a whole lot more sense than it used to. And this idea of parallel connection brought a new clarity to the ways I tend to relate to the people who matter to me. Mind you, this is not the only way I relate to others, but the comfort I feel when my husband and I are working on creative projects side by side or when we are both reading together in the same room makes so much more sense on a deeper relationship level.
This is also how I sometimes relate to my daughters, and I love it. I love that we can be all together in the same room, each of us working on something that matters to us and there is no pressure to perform or to behave in any particular way. In other words, there are no expectations and I love this about how we experience life together in this way. I love that we come together in quiet moments with a creative project or when we play games on our devices across the room from one another. I love that we can feel connected and sometimes we don’t even need words to do so.
Perhaps it is because I tend to find a sweet, simple joy in the mere presence of my teenagers. All too often I see posts about teenagers and too few of them are a celebration of the relationship. I see parents wondering how to connect with or how to motivate a teenager. I see parents asking the Internet and wanting to commiserate with other parents about how hard the teenage years are. Sometimes, I read these posts while one of my awesome teenagers is settled beside me or near me and I cannot help but look over and smile, my heart overflowing with delight and gratitude.
Again, when I consider my teenage years, I feel like my parents, probably more so my mom, experienced more of the hardness of the teenage years I see parents posting about. Of course, we didn’t realize my own neurodivergent brain or its differences back then and I’m fairly certain my perceived sensitive nature and my reticence and my awkwardness that manifested in withdrawing from my family and hunkering down in my bedroom seemed more like typical teenage behavior. Oh, the irony.
As I watch my girls, I see so much of me in them. And that provides me the motivation to draw near to them and to connect in these parallel moments, sitting on the couch, hanging out in the same room where we are but a few feet apart but none of us feel compelled to speak, to talk about the day or even to share whatever thing we are working on. Truly, I feel like Esther, as if indeed I was made for such a time as this. For these parallel connections and this solidarity and this relished joy.