Latter Day Sinner

We have a semi verbal autistic adult son in the home. He tries very hard to advocate for himself and we encourage that. He will repeat, “Words have power,” and we hope that he has a basic grasp of what it means. He seems to because he is spontaneously articulating his desires. Again we encourage that. Usually it’s “Diaper and clothes and bath” or some combination of those. Lately he’s been saying “Walk to the store,” so I’ve been doing that with him. He did that a few days ago and I had to say “No.” We gave him an extra dose of his medicine and it kept him from a meltdown. But he put his jacket and shoes on and sat in the car to wait for us to comply. While out there he said “pharmacy” which was a much more specific request to go to my old Walgreens. I told him “No” again and that “Words have power.” He cried a little but eventually took off his shoes and jacket and went to sleep on the couch. I took the risk of saying “No” and we all survived.