‘I think it’s probably best if we try another day.’
But the woman just wasn’t giving up.
‘I know, why don’t you give it a try for just an hour and then if you don’t like it, we can call Mummy? How’s that sound?’ And then she did the one thing she shouldn’t have done.
She took his headphones off.
The next few minutes felt like a lifetime for Nancy, and yet everything seemed to happen so quickly.
The first thing was the rapid movement of Jack’s arm swinging at the lady, catching her square on the chin as he flung both arms up when he felt his headphones being removed. Nancy couldn’t move quickly enough to stop the connection of his fist hitting the lady’s face. The woman recoiled in surprise and screeched which caused Jack to let out an almighty wail as he struggled to take in the sudden commotion around him.
‘Jack, no! It’s OK!’ Nancy called to him, reaching out her hands to try and stop the swinging of his arms as he became more panicked and unsettled. But in moments like this, Jack had an unbelievable strength that would challenge the world’s strongest man.
Nancy frantically tried to calm him, making shushing noises and reassuring him that everything was OK, but he was already in the meltdown zone. His anxiety had been building the whole time they had been at the kids’ club and the woman removing the comfort blanket of his headphones had tipped him over the edge. Nancy knew he was too far gone now to be pulled back easily. His face contorted with distress, bright red with a look of fear spread across it. He was holding his ears as though someone had hurt them, and it broke Nancy’s heart. She was so angry at herself. If she had said no at the start, then none of this would be happening. Instead, her little boy was frightened and distressed and it was her fault. She felt sick with frustration.
‘Nancy, what do you want me to do?’ Harriet called to her, but she barely heard her, her focus was now purely on trying to calm Jack down.
‘Here, Jack, have your headphones back.’ She held them out to him, but he batted them away with his hands, dropping to the floor and squirming around as his cry became a wail.
The woman who had started all this was standing open-mouthed, staring at him as she held the area on her face where he had whacked her. She looked from Jack, to Nancy, then back to Jack, unsure of what exactly was unfolding in front of her. She didn’t understand, nobody understood. It was an incredibly lonely place to be when you were parenting an autistic child.
‘I need to let him get it out of his system,’ Nancy said to Harriet, pleading with her eyes for her friend to not judge and just be there. Harriet had never judged her, but the scars from those who had were still raw. Harriet, true to form, just nodded and smiled, showing her unwavering support and this meant more to Nancy than anything she could have said. Words were nice, but it was the comradery of support shown in Harriet’s actions that spoke the loudest. She had her friend by her side and she was going to get through this. She hoped.
‘What an earth is going on out here!’ Another member of staff had joined them from inside the kids’ club and her gaze instantly went to Jack on the floor writhing about in distress. ‘Oh dear, does somebody not want to come in today? He’ll be fine once he’s in, Mum, go on, off you go and we’ll take little man in with us.’ The woman began to kneel down to Jack who instantly kicked out and just missed making contact with her face. She jumped back in surprise and made a comment about being unruly under her breath. This made Nancy’s blood boil because it was the conclusion that so many people came to without knowing anything about the situation. So many children were branded as misbehaving without anyone looking into why they were behaving in that way. Not only did she have to deal with the pressure of watching her son clearly distressed and inconsolable, but she also had to listen to people who thought they were child behaviour experts pass judgement on them.
‘He’s not naughty!’ Nancy found herself throwing the words back at the woman although she wasn’t sure why she bothered. People like that were never going to understand.
‘Oh no, I didn’t say that ma’am.’ The look on her face said different.
‘Come on, Jack, let’s go.’ Nancy said, trying to be more authoritative when inside she was feeling totally helpless. She just knew she needed to get both Jack and herself away from this situation. But as she moved towards him he lashed out at her too, grasping tighter at his ears, practically ripping them from his head. He was pulling at them so much they had turned a deep shade of crimson and looked so sore. ‘Jack, stop it! Stop pulling your ears and put these on!’ She shoved the headphones at him, but he couldn’t seem to concentrate on anything except stopping the feeling that was making him so uncomfortable. His wails became sobs and he curled up into a ball, rocking.
‘Hari…’ Nancy sobbed, looking to her friend. Generally over the years, Nancy had built up a good coping strategy for dealing with Jack when he was like this. However, being in a new environment, she found herself panicking and becoming stressed a lot quicker than she would do in the comfort of her own home. Seeing Jack in a state was proving too much for her. She was so grateful to Hari, who instantly went into leader mode and took control of the situation.
‘OK, what needs to happen right now ladies,’ she addressed the two kids’ club staff members, ‘is that we need you both to step back and give Jack some space. I’m sure we don’t need both of you out here so if you wouldn’t mind…’ She nodded towards the second woman who had joined them and indicated that she return to the crèche. The woman didn’t appreciate being told what to do but the receptionist surprisingly backed Harriet up and said, ‘Perhaps you should go back inside, I’m fine out here.’
‘Right, Nance, put the headphones next to him on the floor so they are there when he calms down.’
Nancy did as she was told, sniffing back the tears that were now falling down her face.
‘And just FYI,’ Harriet addressed the receptionist, ‘Jack has autism, so this isn’t just a child having a tantrum, and we would appreciate some support as opposed to the judgemental looks.’
The woman looked away, half embarrassed and half fuming at being addressed in this way but Nancy didn’t care right now, she just needed Jack to calm down. She was annoyed at herself for failing to cope in Jack’s moment of need. It was day one of their holiday and already she had crumbled. She couldn’t help but wonder if she was more wound up about this holiday than she realised. She knew Jack would struggle but she had coping mechanisms in place at home and she thought she’d be able to cope with anything he threw at her. But for some reason, she’d struggled today. It could be tiredness from the travel or worry about what might happen. Either way, she needed to get a grip on things if she was going to make it through this holiday with her sanity. She needed to refocus … and then she needed a drink.
***
‘Here, I think you need this, hey?’ Harriet passed Nancy a glass of sangria and watched as she gulped down half the contents in one swift movement. ‘Are you OK?’
Nancy exhaled, her gaze fixed on her glass. ‘Not really.’
Harriet felt incredibly sorry for her best friend. This last year had been so hard for Nancy, and she’d watched her friend slowly but surely lose her identity and a little bit of her sanity since Jack’s diagnosis and her marriage break up. Harriet tried to be there for her but there was only so much she could do and with work getting increasingly