Okeechobee Is Full of Stupid Idiots
“We’ve requested a harness,” his school bus driver tells me. It’s 8 o’ clock in the morning on a Tuesday, and I’m standing beside Charlie’s short bus wearing flip flops and a Black Sabbath shirt that smells like spring break and body odor.
The words “What the fuck are you talking about?” leave my mouth as a simple “Huh?”
“Didn’t the school send you a note?” She asks, with sincere concern. “Yesterday Charlie unbuckled his seat belt then crawled like a worm under the seats to the back of the bus. It took three of us 20 minutes to get him back in his seat. He thought it was funny.”
Picturing a gaggle of wobbly legged school staff chasing a child throughout a school bus isn’t just funny. It’s hilarious. But I digress to their concerns. This is why I like his caregivers. They are genuinely interested in my son’s well-being. But at the same time, a harness?
“You mean like a… body restraint?” I ask. This seems so extreme. Harnesses are used for horses and people attempting to physically harm themselves. Charlie is an unruly child. But I’ve seen “neurotypical” children do far worse things than run amok in a school bus. I imagine if it were suggested to those children’s parents that their child requires a full restraint system as a result they would be outraged. In the ASD world extreme measures are normal and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Earlier this week a video emerged of a 10-year-old boy in Florida with autism being arrested for scratching one of his caregivers months prior. “I don’t like to be touched,” he pleaded with officers as he was taken away to spend the night in jail. Why he scratched the caregivers, the context, the extent of their injuries (a skin scrape) weren’t considerations. Only the child possessing a condition which resulted in his “acting out” and something needed to be done. Why not throw an elementary school student in prison? In the ASD world extreme measures are normal and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Charlie made great progress during Spring Break last week. Despite months of pushing back, he finally took completely to his potty training. This is probably our biggest victory in the last year. In addition, he became extremely adept at his own self-care while he was off school. Waking in the morning, going downstairs, putting the television on, using the bathroom, feeding himself, requiring no support from either of us. We’ve been pleased watching him grow so much in such a short period of time.
He also had a lot of fun. He enjoyed two baseball games (Go Halos!) Easter egg hunts, a trip to the beach, trips to the park, and plenty of grandparent attention. For a child that has over 50 hours of schooling & therapy a week having free time for fun and progress in his home goals made the return to school difficult for him I’m sure. I hated going back to work and I was only off 2 days.
So to recap, Charlie had a great week, had a lot of fun, didn’t want to go back to school so he defiantly took his seat belt off and wormed his way around the bus which means he should now be placed in a full body restraint as though he were Hannibal Lecter in order to traverse the 20 minute drive to school.
I don’t agree with this course of action. It further alienates him from his peers, and I know one day Charlie will feel it was extremely unfair and I won’t have the moral high ground to argue from. On the other hand, district policy will state that Charlie on such-and-such day was causing a distraction that threatened himself and his peers and this is the only course of action should we desire to continue utilizing public school transportation. Rules are rules. Black and white. Complain and you’re being difficult or ungrateful.
If you’re looking for a conclusion to this piece, I don’t have one. Like many of these tribulations, the circumstances are impossible when trying to balance your parental gut rage with the practical limitations of the institutions we have available to us. The world around is unfair, and imbalanced to treat “neurotypical” children who act out as precocious and ours as a menace. What can you do?
