![\"a-letter-to-the-other-mom1\"](\"https:\/\/blog.mops.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/a-letter-to-the-other-mom1.jpg\")
<\/p>\nYou know me \u2013 I\u2019m That Mom. The one you look at, wondering why she\u2019s not doing A, B or C about her child\u2019s behavior \u2013 silent judgment on your face. The mom who stands tall and fights back tears when you look at her disapprovingly. Or worse, when you look at her like you feel sorry for her because her pride simply can\u2019t swallow your pity on top of it all.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m the mom whose child is climbing the window washer\u2019s scaffolding, or has picked all the leather off his brand new school shoes, or obsessively pinches his own hands with the clothes pin she reluctantly allows him to carry because it keeps his hands busy (and off your kid). The mom whose heart sinks every time the school\u2019s number flashes across her phone. The mom whose boy is brilliant, sweet, thoughtful \u2013 to the point that he tries to understand the entire world all at once, and the enormity of it all periodically crushes him.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m the mom whose child doesn\u2019t want her to come to the school Art Walk because his butterfly sticks out from the other third graders\u2019 butterflies, like a kindergarten piece mistakenly displayed in the wrong class. The mom who tells her son that his butterfly is beautiful and she loves the colors he chose and it\u2019s so special just the way he made it \u2013 only to have him look at her in tears saying, \u201cI don\u2019t want my butterfly to be special, Mom. I just want my butterfly to be like everyone else\u2019s butterfly.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m the mom who hates herself for the embarrassment that rears its ugly head when her child\u2019s impulsiveness causes people to take notice because she knows in her heart he can\u2019t help it and wants so badly to be like other kids. The mom who isn\u2019t sure what\u2019s worse: feeling embarrassed \u2026 or feeling guilty about being embarrassed.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m the mom who holds my little boy at night, listening to him explain things she doesn\u2019t even come close to comprehending \u2013 nervously visualizing the long road ahead, worried the world may one day eat him alive.<\/p>\n
I know you know me because I used to be you. I was the Other Mom looking at That Mom, wondering what she must have done (or should do) because her child doesn\u2019t fit the mold of the \u201cnormal\u201d kid. I was the mom with no idea how much of herself That Mom put into weekly therapies, behavioral counseling, social group therapy, school conferences, learning plans \u2026 the list is so very long.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been given the gift of humility as I now move through the pages of life as That Mom, humbled, remembering what it was like to be you. Other Moms, please know we\u2019re acutely aware of the challenges we face, we really are doing the best we know how and at the end of the day \u2013 when we\u2019re holding our kids just like you \u2013 we don\u2019t wish them to be any different. Because they\u2019re exactly who they should be.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s good enough for us.<\/p>\n
#autismspeaks<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Hilliary Holyoak is a single mother of three, spanning ages from preschool all the way to high school. Living in the spectacularly beautiful corner of America known as the Pacific Northwest, Hilliary is an avid environmentalist, animal rights activist and community event supporter. She also happens to be known as mom to an incredible 9-year-old boy with Asperger’s Syndrome. Hilliary discovers pieces of herself in the moments she spends learning about life, both within and outside of motherhood \u2013 and these moments often manage to transcend into words on paper. You can connect with her via her <\/em>Facebook<\/em><\/a> page or email her at <\/em>hilliaryholyoak@gmail.com<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" You know me \u2013 I\u2019m That Mom. The one you look at, wondering why she\u2019s not doing A, B or C about her child\u2019s behavior \u2013 silent judgment on your face. The mom who stands tall and fights back tears when you look at her disapprovingly. Or worse, when you look at her like you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":3153,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_seopress_news_disabled":"","_seopress_video_disabled":"","_seopress_video":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas_manual":[],"_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable_all":"","_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas":[],"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[102],"tags":[426,185,427,428,56],"class_list":["post-3152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-relationships","tag-aspergers","tag-autism","tag-autism-awareness","tag-autism-speaks","tag-motherhood"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3152"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3152\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}