July 3rd, 2009 | 
Author: During this journey with myself and Daniel and I have encountered a lot of things regarding family. Family can be your worst enemy sometimes. Mine has been off and on my whole life. Not in a really bad way, not like some families. However, there have been psychological issues mainly because I am an Aspie and many of them hold several traits as well or are just plain narcissistic.
It is kind of hard to write about this because my family has always been there.
They are good and loving people. However, there is a lot of family history and with that Daniel’s situation has been a bit harder. I read about other people who have very supportive families. They jump right in and do whatever they can learn everything they can about the AS and how to help. I am sure there are others that I have not found where that is not the case.
I hoped my family would be the ones who took an interest.
My mother has and it has brought much healing to us and our relationship. She has recognized that she too has many AS traits and that has explained a lot of the situations that happened while I was growing up. We understand each other now and it has helped us to understand who we are and why we do certain things. Now I understand why my mom didn’t hug me or had to have QUIET. I wasn’t supposed to talk to her when she got up I had to wait until after she had her tea. She had rituals that she did everyday from the time she got up until she went to bed and if they were disturbed it was not a good thing. She wasn’t horrible she just HAD to have things a certain way.
She still does but now we know why. (I do too)
Other family members try to understand as much as they can. Somehow I feel confused though. I have sent out e-mails with information about AS. I have sent my blog for them to read. I have shared poetry about Daniel and have not received any responses. When I have talked to them they have the “how is Daniel” question but that is it. While being with them physically they seem to think that Daniel is perfectly normal or is going to snap out of it or something. To be honest I don’t know. They don’t say anything. I am left with trying to read them and being that I have AS I have no clue!
It is very frustrating and painful.
Maybe it’s my definition of support. I think of support as acknowledging you have read things. You have taken an interest in trying to understand me and Daniel. Time spent reading something about us. Interacting in a way that lets me know that they think about how differently we think and how different we see the world from them. I have spent time doing that for them. I have spent my whole life trying to understand their world. There are people in our life who have shown more vested interest and trying to understand and help than many of our family members.
It leaves me confused and hurt.
Posted in Stages of Change