Broken Glass and Patience

“Have patience with all things, But, first of all with yourself” -Saint Francis De Sales. Patience is a trait that most people wish to have. Oftentimes, life can be frustrating and it may seem to never get any better. This is where the desire for patience comes in. Due to the fact that I have two sisters with severe autism, I often find myself exercising my patience a lot. Because of that and many other frustrations I’ve come across, I’ve learned to become more patient which led to me being more tolerant of the things around me.

Both of my sisters have very severe autism with one of them being so severe to the point where she isn’t potty trained and she needs 24/7 care. Patience is important when handling children on the spectrum because you can’t discipline them the same way you would with regular children.

When my sisters are misbehaving, they’re not doing it on purpose. Whenever they lash out or yell and shout, it’s because they’re being put in an uncomfortable situation that is new to them. Too much stress on their minds and they’ll have a meltdown. However, it isn’t the same as a regular meltdown. Unlike the kid who’s screaming and shouting in the store because their dad said no to the Cocoa Puffs, people with autism have no control over their own actions once they go into a meltdown and they’re going to do everything they can in order to lower their stress levels. In my case, my sister (The one with 24/7 care needed) will resort to anger and violence. We’ve learned that she won’t calm down until she’s released all her stress and there’s no other alternative. She’ll either get tired from all the yelling and crying and fall asleep an hour later or she’ll release her stress through more violent ways. During her meltdown, she’ll try to do as much damage as possible, whether it be breaking plates, knocking TVs over, or even hurting us or herself. In order to keep her safe, we have to hold her down in her bed until she tires herself out and calms down. It may be a poor way to go about it, but we have no other choice or else things could take a quick turn to the hospital.

Often times dealing with my sisters takes a lot of patience in general because they don’t pick things up as easily and you have to be really gentle with them. I’m often restricted in the way that I can’t keep valuables in my room without locking them up because they’ll get ruined. We have to put locks on the fridge and every cabinet or else they’ll eat everything. I can’t get a full night’s sleep because they wake up in the middle of the night and try and get into stuff. It’s pretty stressful trying to care for them and I feel like I can’t really look away and relax until I know they’re either sleeping or someone else is watching them, but even then, it’s only a matter of time until they wake up.

On top of having to be patient with my sisters, I also have to be patient with my parents. My parents are divorced and both have bipolar disorder which can be a stressful situation to be in between. I often get very frustrated with the decisions they make but I have issues talking to people so I never voice my frustrations. Although having issues with confrontation is definitely not a positive trait to have, I do think that I learned more patience because of this defect.

Patience is one of the most valuable and essential skills to have in life. Most people wish to have it but may not know how to where it comes from. Patience is something that takes time to develop. What I’ve learned from my experiences is that patience comes from times of struggle. Such as having autistic sisters or bipolar parents. It comes from the struggling times where you feel frustrated or confused, where you’re unsure what to do and have an impulse to make a decision without thinking. Moments like those are where you build patience. When you decide to take a step back and breathe instead of acting on the first gut feeling you get. However, I’ve also learned that there are negatives to having too much patience. Being able to stand up for yourself is just as important as being patient. Patience will throw you to the ground and walk all over you if you don’t have moderation. While I’ve grown to have a higher tolerance than others, I would really like to be able to have my own opinions without fear.

“Broken Plate” by joh.ehr is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

“autism cartoon” by hepingting is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

“Emotion – tantrum” by Ambernectar 13 is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

“jumbled thoughts” by djfrantic is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0