With hair hanging over his eyebrows, Nick tossed his head
in the manner of Justin Bieber. No matter that he pulled it off nicely, I was
concerned that he would end up with whiplash!
Time for a trip to the Barber shop.
In the *old* days, just the thought of driving to the
venue used to fill us with dread. Woe betide us if the regular girl wasn't there. Do you know that feeling of when you walk into a room and your heart sinks because *IT IS NOT THE SAME* as it was last time.... and the time before? Each
part of a haircut experience was (dare I say it?) a nightmare. Nick would sit on my lap, screaming for Africa, as I hugged him tight and tried
to deflect any blows landing on the poor girl behind the scissors.
We tried singing, counting, music, TV, cross voices and
calm voices. We tried different towels around his shoulders. We tried clippers,
scissors and a combo of both. I tried deep pressure, music therapy, head
massage.
It wasn't pretty.
During this period of time we started working on the RDI concept *same but different*. Simply put, we added teeny tiny variations to
anything and everything to do with Nick's day. Gradually he came to realize
that it was okay to drive a different route to get home. He felt comfortable
eating off a variety of plates, not just the same old one. He didn't become
stressed if his daily schedule changed. We phased out his picture schedules because they were no longer needed. Slowly but surely, his world began to expand.
With each little variation in all aspects of Nick's life,
he became more accustomed to changes in his environment. His stress levels
dropped dramatically, as did mine! 'Same but different' is not the only
component of Nick's increased resilience, however, it was a great starting
point for us. It is also a concept that I still apply today.
Way back in the *old* days we headed home immediately
after a traumatic haircut. It was all too much for Nick and the safe confines
of home was the only remedy to help him feel secure again. Frankly, I also left
the Barber shop feeling wrung out and gasping for a cup of tea!
Fast forward to today........
Nick was in the garden, swinging away merrily and
stimming on his iPad.
I called out, "Time for your haircut".
By the time I had organised myself, he had come inside,
put on his shoes and was heading to the car! When we arrived at the Barber
(same Barber shop), we noticed that there were two new girls that Nick had never
met before (different). I explained briefly that Nick was autistic and didn't
talk. Kudos to the stylist, she treated Nick no differently from any other
customer. She clipped and cut, manipulating his ears and neck. He also got a
good old drenching from the water spray bottle. While this was going on, Nick
and I took a photo and created a sentence on the iPad using the Abitalk app. No
sweat!
Before returning home, we popped into a local restaurant
for a cappuccino and milkshake. I also remembered that I needed to buy some flour
for a playdough mix, therefore on the spur of the moment we also went shopping!
A not so regular mum and her not so regular teen doing regular
stuff. I don't know about you, but I would call all this regular stuff a very
big WIN.