I wanted to share with you about the twins, who are not really twins. In our family, it’s our middle child, Picasso, who has the Autism Spectrum diagnosis. Our first son is four years older than Picasso, and our daughter is a little more than two years younger than Picasso. One of the more obvious issues with developmental delays is that the child does not always “act their age”. This is usually because their developmental age is very different than their chronological age. This means that a child who is, say, 8 years old chronologically, may only be 5 or 6 years old, developmentally. It’s unfair to them to expect them to act their age, because they truly cannot.
With an 8-year old (9-year old) who has a developmental delay, and a 5.5-year old (6.5-year old) who is relatively mature and often seems a little older than her age, it sometimes seems as though we have twins. Interestingly, we almost chose a name for our daughter that is very similar to Picasso’s real name. Someone commented that people might think they were twins if we named them similar names. After talking about it, we found that we agreed & ended up choosing a different name for our girl, which I LOVE & about which I have no regrets. On days when I find myself teaching them similar tasks (how to make your bed, change your sheets, etc.) I think about what it might be like if we had named them those similar names.
they’re the one the other looks for first thing in the morning; one climbs out of bed and into the other’s bed if they are scared or if they think the other one needs comforting.
It’s kind of like having twins, without actually having twins.
(Anyone else ever pray for their baby to arrive up to 10 days late?)
