Delusions of LEGOs

Yesterday I was woken up by an irate child at 4:13 a.m. The issue: where was the new LEGO toy we'd gotten at the LEGO store the night before?

Cooper didn't like the answer: the toy he was thinking of hadn't been purchased after all, and what we did buy was already on the living room floor, ready for him to assemble.

He seemed to have a different memory of what happened during our trip to the LEGO store, and no amount of clarification on my part could mute his hysteria.

He insisted that he was right, and I was wrong. "You don't have a good brain, Mommy!"

I wasn't surprised that Cooper was having a meltdown because he'd been impressively flexible the day before at the LEGO store, so now it was time for payback.

He wanted to buy two Star Wars LEGO sets that had been released on January 1. He'd been saving LEGO gift cards he'd gotten from his birthday last summer and was combining the amount with a gift card he'd gotten for Hanukkah. The sets, however, were already sold out in the store, so a nice employee helped us place the order online.

But this meant that Cooper would have to wait for another week before his new LEGO sets arrived, and his hope in going to a LEGO store was to have immediate gratification.

While waiting for the order to be placed online, I found a Ninjago keychain and asked him if he'd like it to replace the LEGO zipper pull that broke.

Then we learned that my LEGO VIP account had a $10 credit that could be redeemed anytime, and Cooper still had about $5 left on one of his gift cards after buying the Star Wars sets.

So he found a few sets in the $9 to $11 range, and then decided to peruse the new Legends of Chima sets he'd been reading about on Brickset (a website for LEGO fanatics). These sets were also released on January 1, and a lot of thought went into his ultimate decision to choose two Star Wars sets with his gift card money.

After we discussed the merits of various sets, he zeroed in on Legends of Chima:Target Practice, which, at $14.99, was within his budget.

Then I saw that another set, Legends of Chima: CHI Battles, had two mini-figures as well as two Speedorz (mini-racers that appear similar to the Beyblade); whereas the Target Practice set only had one mini-figure and one Speedorz. The CHI Battles set was $19.99, so I offered to give him the $5 to use toward that set if he chose not to get the Ninjago keychain.

We talked about how the CHI Battles set would be more fun to have when a friend is over.

I thought Cooper agreed to get the CHI Battles set, and he was excited when the employee we'd been working with gave him a free LEGO Legends of Chima: Ewar'sAcro-Fighter set (an exclusive polybag item being offered when your total purchase is more than $75).

For Cooper , these decisions carried as much importance as the process an adult might undergo to, say, buy a car. He had been thinking about his choices for at least a month, and factored in the sales tax when determining if an item was within his budget. He also knew he'd be responsible for shipping and handling charges if he ordered the sets online, so his preference was to go to the store in person (whereby his parents incurred transportation costs such as gas and tolls!).

Cooper was excited when we left the store, and agreeable when we stopped at a few other stores before we got in the car around 7:30 p.m. to head home. 

Despite it being a half hour past his usual bedtime, he was wide awake in the car on the drive home, talking about his new toys. I told him I'd get everything ready on trays for him to put together in the morning when he woke up.

The next morning, however, he had no memory of these negotiations and instead was convinced that he had been wronged.

His shrieking went on for a few minutes, and none of my usual tactics could calm him.

Soon Marc was up as well, wondering why there was so much noise at that hour.

Then Marc started to say something well-intentioned about how there are many children in the world. I knew where he was going with that (there are children who don't have any toys, so Cooper is lucky, etc.) and could tell that Cooper wasn't going to be able to see the forest past the trees at that moment.

Cooper was stuck on the notion that there was a missing toy, and when he gets stuck, watch out. It can take an hour to get him to let go of the thought that is vexing him. A long, painful, exhausting experience that sometimes compels me to eat frozen brownies or cookies afterward just to have something sweet and pleasant (emotional eating, I know, but let's not get into that now!).

I didn't know what to do to stop the meltdown, so I picked up a Speedorz and tried to play with it, and commented that Daddy didn't know how it worked. At that point, Cooper was able to shift his focus and snatched the toy out of my hand to demonstrate how it actually worked (since I obviously didn't know what to do), and then, as if a switch had been flipped, our happy child was back.

We left him in the living room and returned to bed as soon as we could, wondering,

"What the heck was that all about?"

I honestly don't know. I think it's part of Cooper being on the autism spectrum, since he was having trouble controlling his emotions. He was really flexible and accepted that the Star Wars toys would be coming in the mail in a week, and something snapped when he was sleeping -- maybe he had a dream that he'd gotten the other Legends of Chima toy? -- and he woke up snarling.

As parents, the episode was a reminder that, with autism, wherever you go, there you are.

And some mornings are just better than others!

-- by Amy Debra Feldman