According to my child’s psychologist and his physician my youngest son is suffering from moderate depression. There have been suggestions that the relationship with his brother with Aspergers may be playing a significant part in gestating the depression.
This is a difficult time for me. Trust me when I say I too understand that living with ASD as part of the household, almost a family member in and of itself, can be hard on the psyche. Many a night I have lain down to try and take my rest only to find my mind racing with what ifs of now and of the future. Only when I take a stance of mindfulness, that is letting my mind empty and simply watching the wild thoughts fly by, do I ever find rest.
Since the diagnosis of depression has come to light I have been trying to address some things that are challenging to my youngest son’s life. While I thought I had been making time for him in the past I am clearly setting aside time for him and him alone. Being with him alone and talking to him seems to have had some benefit. Some days now when in response to my questions about how did school go, the words “suck” or “sucked” don’t come out in the first sentence.
Secundus is a fledgling pianist. For whatever reason he has ditched learning classic tunes. In the past year he has moved into the study of what we call the standards. These songs are the compositions that Nelson Riddle arranged around the voice of Frank Sinatra that made women just want to jump his bones backstage at clubs in New York. These songs are the pieces that Nat King Cole and Miles Davis each took to completely different but very beautiful places none the less.
How we got here was a one of those flukes. A couple of years ago when Halloween rolled around Secundus could not come up with a costume. He searched magazines, he looked on the internet, he confabbed with Mom. It was only when he was surfing You Tube that he saw a clip of Sinatra singing “Fly Me to the Moon”. He knew he could pull off that style. He grabbed an old rat pack hat and an old jacket and memorized the song. As he went from house to house he would sing the fist four or five lines while adopting a hipster’s pose. He pulled in more candy than anyone. At that point he knew there was something to this.
Last night was his spring recital. He had opted to play “It was a Very Good Year”. His piano teacher encouraged him but had her doubts. In practice his use of the pedals was on the mark but transitions between parts of the song were not fluid. He would almost get it right, but in reality the piece was never quite right. Even up to the moments before we left the house for the recital he was seemingly struggling.
One of the last acts before we headed out was to get him dressed. He put on some chinos and pulled out a white French cuffed shirt. I don’t remember where we got the shirt but he had never worn it before we had never gotten him cuff links. With the performance imminent I had to drop back and begin the search for links. Through drawers and boxes of knick knacks stuffed in my highboy I rampaged. I knew I had some cuffs from when I was his age. In the 1973 French cuffs were all the rage. I believed I had at least one set because they had been my father’s and had set on his dresser in ashtray with pins pulled from new shirts for the majority of my life. When he passed they become mine. They were nowhere to be found although I did find an old hash pipe, a beer stein from my German trip in 1972 and my ticket to the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City.
Never did I find a matched set. What I came up with was one blue and one ruby red cuff of completely different styles. Secundus loved ‘em. Putting the cuffs on him you could see he was ready to perform.
It wasn’t the cuffs that made the difference and I know that. Secundus is a performance junkie. Whether it is debate or singing or recitals the rush of being in the public eye charges him and changes him. I know in my heart of hearts he loves the spotlight and that he cranks it to level 11 each time he walks out onstage. The cuffs were nothing more that a thread connecting him to the men of his family through the years none of whom shied away from the spotlight. Not Dad, not Granddad, not uncles; this larger than life onstage persona is probably genetic.
My thought is that so is depression. While Secundus’ challenges are impacted by his environment all the men in my family have had dark moments, dark periods. Nobody stepped up early to help us manage it. Nobody had a name for it, or a course of treatment for it. Me I went for positive thinking ala Dr. Norman Vincent Peale and years of reefer therapy. Eventually I came to sober quiet reflection/meditation/writing and I am okay with that. My hope is that by using a psychologist I am doing the right thing. My hope is that with some external insight emphasizing positive approaches to life Secundus can come to a point where he knows how to get back to balance when things start to grow dark.
I don’t want him to lose the joy of performance. Neither do I want him to have to travel the dark roads I have seen in the past. Being a parent is a balancing act and while others can offer suggestions a parent is ultimately the person who has to make the tough calls.
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