For various reasons, I had to take Andrew into the office briefly this week. My work colleagues all know about Andrew's disabilities, but they had recently expressed a desire to see how he was growing.
Knowing that I wouldn't be able to keep hold of him all the time, I used his disability buggy. They immediately asked if he could climb out of the buggy to play with them and, given the size of the group, I let him sit on the floor with them. He played quietly and intently for a few minutes, firstly with an ID badge on a lanyard (a favourite) and then with a discarded birthday balloon.
Seemingly before anybody could blink, he got to his feet and ran halfway across the huge open plan office. Chasing after him, my colleagues quickly learnt three things:
1 - he is not physically disabled and can run very fast
2 - he doesn't care where he runs, and
3 - shouting after him to "Stop!" doesn't work because he's deaf.
Their reaction was mixed. Some thought it funny, until I pointed out that he can behave similarly in a supermarket ... Some were sympathetic but you could see they were thinking "Thank goodness my child isn't like that" ...
Now if only he'd had a meltdown when eventually caught, they would have seen how bad life can get ... But maybe, given that the office was busy (200 people on my floor!) it was better that he didn't!!
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