Hot Chocolate with My Wild Child
I’m in the bath again. I’ve snuck here on retreat. A retreat in my bath tub. Far away from the shouts and demands and turbulence raging from my darling daughter’s fraught state of mind. Well as far away as I can get, taking into account our current isolated status.
Maddening how much I take for granted the ability to get up and go for a recharge in more typical times. It appears that for her, cabin fever has become more of a challenge than covid was. The piercing shrieks and harrowing wails that accompany her demand avoidance have reached fever pitch the last couple of days.
Over the course of the last almost 10 years, I admit that it would not have surprised me had some shrewd social service person come rapping on our door. Or perhaps some nosy neighbours, perched over a garden wall. Although, we live in the UK, so people tend to mind their own business.
Except of course when they don’t.
Having worked with parents of children with disabilities for almost 20 years, the stories I’ve heard have been cold and disconcerting.
My god daughter’s mum informs me that, on a regular basis, the stares, whispers and blatant unkindness they experience are enough to shrivel whatever is left of one’s faith in humanity. Not to mention the stories those with unseen disabilities have to share. Of course, there are happier stories.
Stories of kindness, connection and big hearted love. The stories most touching to me are the ones that sneak in under the radar. The shared glimpses of day to day battles, victories, surrender and hope. The shared tears of pride whipped from our faces during a surf lesson at the beach, or the father who gets what it means for my child to go first, gently holding his own back, with a smile and a nod as I almost cry with relief.
Conversations, both spoken and not, with parents whose children don’t fit the ‘mould’ are a tonic to my soul and a bubbling undercurrent to a faulty, clinched and shrunken culture. They remind me that I am not alone and for that I am grateful. It’s easy to forget.
“I hate you mummy. You didn’t ask for it right!”, my daughter shrieked at me.
The offending hot chocolate sat defiant between us. Three marshmallows as expected, melting under a smothering of whipped cream. This was the grave offence.
Third time in this café, third hot chocolate and third variation in both the temperature of the hot beverage and the height of the whipped cream. The pleasure of the experience instantly shattered by a chunk of unmet expectation.
I was hot and bothered, my top lip sweating under my suffocating blue, mandatory mask. Hot from eyes boring into my back. Hot from shame rising up in my cheeks. Hot from judgment threatening to choke me with tears.
Customers enjoying a peaceful Sunday brew in an idyllic beach café, clinking teacups, interrupted by the piercing shrill shout of my little girl. Wild, wet hair plastered against her face. Wild, sandy bare feet kicking out to find my legs. Wild, brimming, brown eyes convinced I’d burnt her mouth on purpose. A crumpled blue plaster lay on the table next to the offensive green cardboard mug full of steaming hot chocolate.
“Ah, for fucks sake”, I breathe out.
