My Friend, Tim.

I once was a very active member on an internet Disney forum, one I got a lot of advice from, and made a lot of friends on, many of those friends being people I have come to know in “real life”.  I was banned from that forum for also posting on another forum (amazing how tyrannical the internet can be), but that is a whole other reason for wine...I have a different story to tell with this blog.

One of the friends I made on that forum is a man named Tim.  Tim is not your usual guy.  He didn’t belong to that forum because his kids love Disney.  He doesn’t have kids.  Or a wife.  Or a significant other.  Or even actually a lot of friends.  He is dependent on his parents.  He loves Disney, anything Disney, with all his heart, and has very definite favorite characters.  He goes to Disney alone, and he goes to the character meals so he can see those characters.  He’s also one of the most knowledgeable people I’ve ever met when it comes to anything Disney.  And one of the sweetest, most genuine, most open people you’d ever see.  I’ve met him at Disney world and hung around the park.  He is a pleasure to be around.

And, sadly, that scares people.  Really scares them.  He’s not their idea of normal. To a lot of people, that somehow translates to that he must be a child molester.  (???) That he is a danger.  That he must be avoided, shunned, and made fun of.  Or, on the other hand, that he’s “making up a persona.”

Some have speculated that maybe he has a disorder, but he denies it, which just fuels the fire.

Personally, I speculate to that he has a disorder too, most likely Asperger’s.  However, he has never been diagnosed with anything (and for people who’ve never had to deal with a “different” child, it doesn’t occur to most of them that could just be because no one went to hell and back to try and get one, getting a diagnosis for a child is not so easy, trust me!), so he is just being honest when he says he does not, and he appears to think in a very concrete manner (which, well, would be a symptom of Asperger’s) and it doesn’t occur to him to speculate that it could be true.

Why am I telling you about this?

I’m telling you this because my own child is similar.  Perhaps not to the same extent, but he also has his obsessions, does not have the same maturity level as others his age, is an open book with his heart on his sleeve, and has a wealth of knowledge about all kinds of trivial things (Just for fun, ask him who the Rays played on any random date!).  He will most likely have a lot more trouble moving out on his own than the average person and need to have some dependency on his parents….he’s just not your average kid, and that is about as well as I can explain it.  And like Tim, he is intelligent and “normal” enough to cast those doubts.

And it scares me to death that people will have such harsh and outrageous judgments about him.  Intelligent people.  Caring people.  But people that just really don’t get it.

And that’s why they have wine.