The Old Normal Needs to Change

My sweet Kaden....I love that little cutie so much.  The struggle lies in his meltdowns.  I can live with the developmental delays, the quirkiness of his personality and I can even handle the lack of personal hygiene.  The thrashing his body around, hitting himself and throwing himself down the stairs....not so much.  He is almost 9 yrs old and not one broken bone yet....knock on wood.  But, I fear the day is coming that we can't protect him from himself.  What will we do in 8 years and another 75lbs?  
I talked with his ABA person yesterday and she knew this talk was coming....she's predicted it for 4 years now.  I refuse to put him anywhere, even for a few hours.  We are planning for the future when Dad and I wont be here, so he has money.  I know his Sister will be the one to take care of him.  She has loudly voiced that she gets him at her house and not Skylar's.  Kaden is closer with Mahala, so I can easily understand that.
I'm not saying he needs full time babysitting for the rest of his life.  But, in the past almost 5 years of testing, therapy and education Kaden is still consistently the same.  He's super smart, but socially and emotionally he has deficits.  They other day he misspelled alligator, by forgetting the second L.  He was so upset, started pacing the floors and slapping himself.  I tried to move on and expressed how it was a common thing to forget the other L.  No biggie, let's do something fun now?!?!?!?!  PLEASE!!!! :) :)
Nope, he went up the stairs kicking his feet along the wall.  Once upstairs he started throwing himself down, not even trying to catch himself.  The whole time he was crying and asking God over and over why he was so stupid.  That he should have never been born.  After letting him fall 3 times we stepped in.  We waited 3 times, because we try not to over react to this kind of behavior.  But, honestly this is not a typical tantrum.....he is mentally tortured with these emotions.  A typical tantrum a child is either wanting something or is trying to get out of something.  Kaden's meltdowns revolve around something new in his environment, a last minute change that's out of my control or when he feels like a failure.  And that can be as simple as his sheet coming off by accident in the middle of the night.  Yes, this has happened in the middle of the night and we were up dealing with his meltdown half asleep and scared to death.
So, back to the other day....after the 3rd time Skylar and Hubby had to restrain him.  Over an hour of Kaden fighting, pulling and pushing he decided to melt.  He literally rested for 3 minutes and then started talking about a character in one of the books we are reading.  The guys just look at each other dripping in sweat and wonder what the heck, but thank you Lord that Kaden is back with us.  Because when he is in meltdown mode you hardly recognize him.  It's so scary.....this is the part I hate about Autism. 
As he comes down the stairs with a stretched out shirt and sweaty hair I recognize his sweet little smile....my Baby is back.  He asks for some water and if we can play legos.  All of this like nothing has ever happened.  It takes us a little while, but we go back to normal.  But, it's traumatic....it's a crazy life.  But, I am so thankful God gave me him....I would never for a minute want him to be someone elses Baby Boy.  I just want to keep him safe....we Love our sweet Kaden.  We are going to go back to a strict gluten free diet again.  He did better when we were consistent with this.  During the Summer we have been lazy with that, eating gluten foods here and there.  I'm also looking into a few other types of therapy.  Pray with us as we tighten down around here.  Change is hard, pray for Kaden as we try new things over the next few months.