So many thoughts

Today was the last enrollment day at ASPECT terrigal school for the year.
I went to get the enrollment details for Mikey and put him on the waiting list for next years school intake.
The school is great and they work well with the students and my main question pertaining to intergration into mainstream whent hey're ready has been answered and that is that YES they do look out for signs of the child being ready to enter mainstream school. so i dont have any hesitation enrolling him.


However, i was not expecting the head on with a semi that happened in my mind when i got there.

It was unlike anything i've been involved with so far... and for the first time i think i was made to realise that Mikey will always have these big problems. There were two teachers from the high school component of the ASPECT school who were talking about how they cope with the older children on the spectrum and it really freaked me out.
One of them was saying that sometimes they will do a class focussed solely around 'intergrating into society' (just those words are enough to make me shudder in remembering that my son is definetely different) where they take them out into public and teach them how to buy a train ticket and go somewhere on the train, how to order a meal at a fast food place like mcdonalds.... all this... at 16 years old.
man when i was 16 years old id been to Japan, I used to do work experience and went out with my friends on weekends... i'd go to the beach with my best friend and we'd get potato chip burgers with the money we'd earned at our jobs.... and to think that at the same Age mikey will be learning the very basics because he simply WONT know otherwise is just insane.

Something they said which almost made me cry was that these kids who are on the spectrum and need to be at the Autism school... they never change. they get bigger, they face new struggles at each age level... but their sensory stuff... it doesn't go away. it just stays there and they just have to keep finding new ways to cope.
it virtually just broke my heart again as i thought about all the struggles my beautiful boy has with social interaction, noises, busy environments, and all his other little problems...
I can't imagine how this is going to work when he's a teenage boy... i just can't imagine what i'll do or what life will be like.

in all honesty i really couldn't get out of there fast enough. I can't deal with this reality right now... it's just too much.

It feels the same now as it did when Mikey was first diagnosed.