Thinking With My Heart

It has been so fun to watch Asher continue to grow and develop, especially with his speech!  I think he's still a little behind with that and his comprehension, but he leaps and bounds ahead of where he was 6 months ago.  The thing I've been trying a lot harder to do is get him used to playing with other kids.  With him being an only child and not going to daycare and I don't know a ton of people in this area, it's been slow going to find other kids.  But visiting teaching has helped because one girl I visit has twins his age and one of the girls that visits me has a little girl, so he does get that interaction.  And he absolutely loves going to nursery!  It took a few months for him to warm up to the idea, but now he tries to leave Sacrament Meeting early so he can go play.  But the most interaction he gets with other kids is when we go to the park, which we go almost every day.

Asher loves it when other kids are at the park!  He is so fascinated by them and follows the other kids around and tries so hard to be included.  I love that he wants to find new friends, but this is also where my motherly heart interferes with what I know in my brain.

Most of the kids that we see at the park are between 5 and 10 years old.  To Asher, this makes no difference at all and he wants to do whatever they are doing!  But kids don't like having a tag-along that talks gibberish at them and doesn't understand when they tell him things.  From my perspective, Asher is being so nice and friendly and is trying to talk to them, but doesn't have the words quite yet.  And when the kids talk back to him, he doesn't understand that they don't want him to touch their toys, he just thinks it's great having someone to have a conversation with and gets confused when they get mad.

There's been a few instances this past month where I've seen Asher get excluded from playing with other kids, and it kills me every time.  Asher doesn't really seem to notice yet, but I'm afraid he'll start  understanding what's going on and get upset about it.  I want these kids to see what I see!  I want them to see how nice he's being and how he just wants to be included in their play!

But this is where my brain tries to tell my heart what's going on.  It tells me that Asher is 2 years old, and 8 year olds don't want a "baby" messing up their games.  I'm sure I was the same way when I was that age, just like everyone else.  It tells me that Asher doesn't understand, but when he gets to be their age and does understand things a little better, he'll be old enough that they will want to play with him.  It tells me that it's hard for these kids to play with Asher because it's harder for him to communicate.  That he doesn't understand their games or most of what they say to him.  It tells me that when he's around kids his age, he looks like a giant compared to them, but that they're much closer developmentally and he actually really gets along with kids his age.

David doesn't understand why I get upset when Asher can't keep up with the big kids, and tells me all the same things I already know.  I tell him that I know these things in my brain, but my mommy heart just doesn't want my son to know any pain.  I know other people go through much worse things than this, but for some reason this has been a really hard lesson for me to learn.  I just keep telling myself that I can't control what other people do, but I can let Asher know that I'll always be there for him.  I won't leave him behind, and I'll always be his friend!