Why I Taught My Nonverbal Son to Put On Deodorant Before He Needed It

Lucas was about seven or eight years old when his teacher first told me that they were teaching him how to put on deodorant.

“I know it’s not really needed now, but it’s good to learn before he actually needs to do it.”

The whole thing struck me as funny for two reasons. As a nonverbal boy with profound autism, my son is often compared to an age younger than he is. After all, he watches the same shows, reads the same stories, and enjoys many of the same things today that he did as a baby. From Leap Frog tablets to The Wiggles, Lucas’s growing stature can sometimes be overlooked.

In this case, he was being treated as a boy much older for a change. It made me smile.

It also made me smile to see this little Christmas Ham with legs raising his arm in the air like the Statue of Liberty and run a deodorant stick across his pits. He had a look of focus that showed he was locked in.

That was a hundred years ago.

Today, he definitely needs deodorant.

And, just as his teacher told me long ago, it’s good that he learned before he needed to do it.

Sure, I still give him hand-over-hand assistance to make sure he truly gets in there, but I know he can do it all on his own, if need be. Honestly, though, I never saw it coming.

I remember that first time he hugged me and nearly knocked me over. That was the first stop on the Great Puberty Coaster.

Suddenly there was acne, body hair, and whispy beards. None of it made sense as, in my head, he was my forever-baby.

Even the things right in front of my face were impossible to comprehend. At one point, I kissed his cheek and it felt like sandpaper. My first thought was that he needed lotion.

And then I looked — really looked — and saw that he had Fred Flintstone stubble.

My baby had Fred Flintstone stubble.

As I mentioned earlier, at seven or eight, he still liked the same shows, stories, and music that he did as a toddler. Well, at 14 years old, that still holds true.

Just like that first hug, it knocks you for a loop. I forget he’s a little man now. Yet here we are.

This is the age that they warned us about. The age where he goes from little man to actual man. So much preparation went into these moments.

It stretches beyond deodorant. It’s about what’s acceptable for a man to do in public versus a child. I always knew it, but now I see the actual young man in front of me.

Stories about stealing the coffee from strangers won’t be so funny when the kid is taller than you and pushing two bills. It’s why I never let him “steal” food from anyone, even the counters in our home.

Was it easy? No. Every time a kind person said, “Oh, let him have it,” I had to be the bad guy. The answer was always no. He had to know that behavior like that never reaped a reward.

This stretches across so many things in his younger life. From how to conduct himself in public to not sitting down in the middle of a busy intersection to keeping his hands to himself — all of it was done with this in mind.

Has he learned all those things? Yes. I’d say so.

Is it guaranteed that he’ll never do them? No. I’d say not.

The fact of the matter is that my son might do any of those behaviors and more. I recognize that and have learned, throughout his life, to anticipate it. If I see him getting tired or hungry, I make sure to either meet his needs or, more preferably, make him understand that I will soon. I don’t want him to think the world stops for him. But I never want him to think I don’t understand him.

There are no guarantees, though, and at his size, I know the risk that might come from letting him chase down someone for a slice of pizza. That’s why I try to give him freedom in times that I know he has it under control, but I hover close during moments that could be too overwhelming.

How do I know? I don’t know. I just do. I know my kid.

Sometimes it’s a look on his face or a whiny noise that I call “the baby elephant.” Sometimes it’s the time of day or the amount of sleep he got the night before. Most times, it’s just a gut instinct.

Will there be a day that I don’t have to follow so closely? That’s the goal, but I know it’s far off. Still, we work on those things now.

Just like putting on deodorant. It’s better to work on something now with hopes it will be easy for him tomorrow.

If this story resonated with you, I talk more about parenting a non-verbal child on the latest (and all episodes) of
Hi Pod! I’m Dad.