The Skating Milestone: Go Sebastien! Go!

As a parent of a moderately autistic child with limited speech and learning delays for more than a decade, I have long accepted the fact that I would never feel the kind of pride that parents of neurotypical children feel. The world in which parents celebrate their children’s outstanding grades, sports performances, or musical accomplishments is completely foreign to me.

This is not the kind of pride that I feel for Sebastien, my 13-year-old autistic son.

My pride in Sebastien is an uncommon one, for his accomplishments are not as spectacular, impressive, or even apparent. Instead, his accomplishment is manifested in the not-so-visible forms of dogged resilience, amazing fortitude and infectious optimism of his character. But all that most people see is an awkward youth, oddly clutching the sides of his face, smiling quirkily at his own reflection and occasionally bobbing his head and body to an internal groove.

On the whole, Sebastien is largely indifferent to their sometimes concerned, but more often watchful and mocking stares. One may mistakenly think that Sebastien is unaware of their attention. In reality, with his heightened intuition about people, Sebastien can often ‘sense’ how others feel about him the instant he walks into a room full of strangers.

The truth is that Sebastien is untouched by others’ perceptions because he has come to possess rare strength and confidence, which cannot be easily swayed by others. This has become particularly evident in the last two years as Sebastien strides boldly into adolescence. Simply put, he does not allow anyone to steal the sense of joy that he has fought hard to earn for more than a decade of his life. Therefore, in spite of his significant social, communication and sensory deficits, adolescent Sebastien exhibits an incredible ease in this world, which belies the years of struggle that have gone into the making of his character.

What the people who choose to dismiss Sebastien as just a weird youth do not know is how tough the road Sebastien has traveled to become the young man he is today. For more than a decade, Sebastien has had to cope with the initially unintelligible daily instructions and reprimands, as well as the urban chaos of sights and sounds, which were at first overwhelming to his heightened senses. Gradually, he has also learned to calm the surge of fear of the unknown within him, which used to explode into hysterical outbursts, when there were deviations from routines. Thus, Sebastien’s proud and defiant claim to his place in a world so foreign to his nature has been hard-won.

As his mother who has been the sole witness of Sebastien’s extraordinary transformation over these long years, I had long contented myself with the fact that Sebastien’s accomplishment would largely remain invisible to most people. Certainly, I had never expected to feel the common form of parental pride, though I had always been proud of him. With my books, talks and personal friendships, I have sought to awaken the minds of a growing, but still insignificant, minority of people to the value of Sebastien’s true worth.

Then in May 2008, Coach Sandy Snakenberg, an outstanding skating coach (with a former world record in speedskating), entered our lives. Sebastien was thrust reluctantly out of his comfort zone into a brand new universe of inline skating. During the first class, I had to persuade and prod Sebastien to put on the seemingly never-ending series of skating paraphernalia. When Sebastien was all decked out, with knee pads, elbow pads and a helmet, I smiled triumphantly to myself. Sebastien had certainly come a long way from the boy who had once screamed and fought against wearing a wrist band. By the end of that first day, Sebastien further exceeded my meager expectations by moving tentatively on skates, while clinging onto me for support.

However, my tentative happiness evaporated hours later that. In the midst of a fierce thunderstorm, Sebastien overreacted uncharacteristically, rampaging through the house as though he were on a life-and-death mission to close all the windows. He then spent the next two hours unleashing tearful howls.

At the time, I wondered whether his unusual outburst was due to his traumatic initiation into the world of skating. For Sebastien who has heightened sensory perceptions, the experience of skating, in which one moves forward only in a lateral (or sideways) movement, in lieu of the linear (or forward) motion of walking, could have turned his perceptions of the world upside down. As I watched him vent, I had to make the conscious effort to banish the fear that Sebastien would be unwilling to attend the second class the following week.

In spite of this shaky start, Sebastien continued to attend skating class. His slow, but steady, progress was characterised by his decreasing reliance on my hands-on assistance and his eventual completion of the 90-minute class, instead of leaving after 45 minutes. Once Sebastien had gone through an entire class without needing my physical assistance, I took up Coach Sandy’s challenge to learn in-line skating myself. By then, Sebastien had had a six-week headstart on me, but I was fairly confident that I would catch up…

Well, one year later, I had not caught up. Now, more than 18 months later, I have gladly given up the hope that I would ever do so. Instead, I surrender myself to the sheer pleasure of watching him skate carefreely, doing something out in the public space, without needing my intervention or assistance, for a change. While I huff and puff to grasp the strangeness of lateral motion, Sebastien skates as though he were taking a casual stroll in the park. Skating with his hands placed against the sides of his ears occasionally and humming a happy tune, Sebastien is still a strange boy with odd mannerisms.

But there is no question that Sebastien is surging past some of his typical skating counterparts fearlessly on skates. One day, I caught a glimpse of something in the eyes of these children and their parents, which I had not been accustomed to seeing when most people looked at Sebastien. There was an unmistakable glint of admiration, grudging in some cases, but unquestionably present. Then I felt it, this unfamiliar feeling that I think must be akin to the kind of pride that parents of typical kids feel when their children have excelled in something. To top it off, Coach Sandy gave the green light for Sebastien to graduate from recreational skates to speedskates the following week.

On that day, while handing me the speedskates, he informed me casually, “By the way, Sebastien would be the first autistic kid I trained to try speedskates.” Feeling the pressure mounting, I braced myself for the first challenge of getting Sebastien to wear the speedskates that are meant to hug the feet snugly; in other words, they are meant to uncomfortably tight. Thus it was no mean feat for me to coax Sebastien to squeeze his feet into these boots and tighten the laces.

Alas, Sebastien’s feet were tucked in and the moment of truth had arrived. But, to my dismay, after ten minutes on speedskates, Sebastien whined and gestured to the bag that contained his recreational skates. I persuaded him to try them on for just a little longer…

And my power of persuasion paid off! By the end of the hour, this boy was sailing on these snugly-fitting speedskates, while beaming with his characteristic skating smile. This was a significant triumph considering the fact that speedskating can feel like walking on a tightrope for recreational skaters.

Yet, to me, the best part about Sebastien’s skating is that he is genuinely oblivious to the admiration and envy he engenders in others around him. Unlike the rest of us, Sebastien does not strive to be the fastest nor the best skater. He is also not skating in order to learn cool moves. Most of all, he does not set out to prove anything to anyone with his skating.

He skates well, simply because he enjoys it so thoroughly. For some inexplicable reason, he is perfectly at ease in this lateral universe of inline skating, where I am still struggling to find a foothold. Somehow, Sebastien is completely in his element in a world where one can only achieve a tenuous balance-in-motion by shifting one’s weight from one foot to the other, without ever attaining the static stability of two feet planted firmly on the ground.

As I watch Sebastien speeding by, with his face beaming and his eyes gleaming with pure delight, I feel something warm and fuzzy inside that is even better than parental pride, some kind of gladness that is hard to describe. It is not just that Sebastien has become more than just a weird kid who is excelling in a challenging mainstream activity out in the public domain. Rather, it is the fact that Sebastien is thriving in such an activity while being completely himself. Thus, in skating, he has found a rare sanctuary in the public space. And that, to me, is priceless.

Thank you, Coach Sandy! Go Sebastien! Go!