Cleaning up messes you cannot control..

Today is a hard day. While cleaning and going thru toys and rooms to make potential room for another (no I'm not pregnant) a job that should have taken an hour took 3. During this time I felt so defeated and so helpless. My son is only 4 and still acts like he is 2.

Cleaning up mustard and ketchup messes twice while stopping what I'm doing is do not how I wanted to spend my day. A day I finally just wanted to cry about. So I did..

I'm not a patient person, and a bit of a yeller..with a child with autism this is not acceptable...but it's who I am and who I'm trying not to be. It's so not his fault, and he so cannot help it, but in that moment I felt anger and frustration. Not only am I cleaning up a mess of a condiment I cannot stand, I'm trying to clean up this house from his tiny tornado of a mess. In moments like that I just want to scream, so usually I do. And his tiny little voice said to me, "mommy stop screaming" and I just lost it. This tiny little person who used to NEVER communicate with us asked me to stop. He asked me to stop and take a second to reassess what was going on. In that moment I prayed. I asked God to change me, and make me better. To make me stop and take a breath before I yell. And in that moment I failed.

But it's the moments after I realize I failed that I was able to learn from my mistake and hopefully do better. In that moment after I was able to hug him and let him know I'm sorry. And in that moment he just loved me.

So no matter how much feel like you're failing, those little minds still love you. And they still want and need you. Even if you yell, even if you forget to take that second before you act. Thank God for that moment.