Personal Perspective: In one excruciating moment, my son understood the relationship of his choice to the disappointment of what followed.
son Nat went as The Joker this Halloween. I was particularly struck by the creepiness of his costume, so unlike his more wholesome costume of previous years. For decades Nat has chosen to be Zorro, a masked avenger from long-ago Spain. He first learned about Zorro from watching Disney Sing-Along videos, and so the character was someone he could readily recognize. But then, for the next 20 years, he chose to be Zorro.
Nat has long depended on having situations explained to him, and I have observed that this has made him more passive, and less able to originate his own decisions. His sense of agency is fragile. This changed abruptly a few months ago when we were dropping Nat off at the end of the weekend at our house. Just as we were walking up to the door, we saw all the housemates coming back from a movie, and Nat realized he had missed the movie. I believe that the sheer clarity of the situation, the sharp regret he felt—what he had done versus what he had missed—opened something up inside of him.
For a while now I have been focused on Nat’s new independence and how that feels to me . But recently I see something far more important: that Nat has made a true developmental leap. He is now thinking about whatI never thought that this would happen. I never thought I would be able to trust that Nat was actually considering the pros and cons of an activity, and actively choosing one. But now it appears that when I ask him something, I will get a well-considered, accurate answer.
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