Let Them Eat Cake!

Because I sure as hell won't! The Reluctant Astronaut

This past Sunday an amazing thing happened.  Well, a couple of amazing things happened.  First, the R.A. sat at a dining room table in a chair while other people were also sitting at the table.  He then allowed the other people to remain at the table.   The R.A. toddled over himself, bringing his Pringles and juice, plopped down on the chair and began eating, looking very much like a "regular" person.  I nearly fell over I was so surprised.  Normally the R.A.'s preferred method of eating is a grazing system.  He strolls around, stops, picks up an item of food, eats a bit (or merely contemplates eating it and tosses it to the ground as he deigns it is unworthy of consumption), then resumes his wanderings.  No wonder the R.A. hardly weighs anything.  He's perpetually burning calories, even while eating.  The calories don't have a chance to set in.

But it got even more amazing.

There was birthday cake at the gathering.  Every once in a while, more for sh#*s and giggles, my husband and I attempt to try the R.A. on a "new" food.  Apparently, on Sunday, we were feeling a bit "devil may care" as my husband and I decided to see if the R.A. would try some cake.

Due to his severe food allergies which manifested themselves when the R.A. was a baby, the R.A. has never had a bite of ye ol' typical cake and frosting - birthday cake.  I remember when the time rolled around for his first birthday I researched "allergy" birthday cakes.  I came upon a series of allergy cookbooks authored by a woman whose son had food allergies.  She had a recipe for a birthday cake and swore it was so scrumptious that it was the only cake she served at her son's birthday party for all the guests, those with allergies and those without..  With an endorsement like that, I made it for the R.A.'s first birthday (also providing a "regular" birthday cake for attendees.)  Let me just say that if my first ever orientation to cake was that cake, I too would never touch another piece of cake in my whole entire life.  That cake wasn't nasty.  It wasn't good enough to be nasty.  The cake was so gross that it was spit out of one's mouth immediately upon entry.  I couldn't believe the cookbook author made her guests eat it.  She was probably one of those overbearing cows that everyone was terrified of so they didn't dare tell her how gross-tacular the cake was.  Heck, they probably didn't dare try to bow out of her spawn's blasted birthday party. That cake was so bad that I brought it into my work where those people eat pretty much anything including expired condiments, two day old donuts left an entire weekend in the open air, and refrigerator items that are so old that they no longer resemble what they were in their past lives.  They passed on that cake.  It didn't help that the cake looked like cow patties wrapped in tar (but not as airy and light as cow patties wrapped in tar).  You couldn't even rise above, "I bet it tastes better than it looks." 

The following year I found a recipe for an edible allergy cake.  Honestly, this cake was pretty good.  It was actually a cake that they used to make during World War Two when there was rationing.  Fortunately it didn't taste like it has been made during World War Two.  Unfortunately, either the R.A.'s autism had really set in and his food texture issues started as he refused the cake or the damage had been done by the previous year's "cake" debacle and he refused the cake.  Luckily my brother really liked the cake and ate the majority of it.  I had been threatened by co-workers not to bring in any cake leftovers.

Back to Sunday.  We laid the cake out in front of the R.A. as he sat at table.  My husband and I were fully prepared for him not only to refuse the cake but to smear it on the table and squish it into the floor  to demonstrate his annoyance (we weren't at our house which explains our cavalier attitude about this anticipated possible and highly probable outcome.)  We even included a fork, something extremely foreign to the R.A. as he is strictly a finger food man.  Everyone sat very still and watched.  Initially the R.A. sat, looking quite puzzled.  He raised his hands over the cake.  My husband and I moved closer, on the ready for when the R.A. grabbed the plate and tossed it to the ground.  All of a sudden the R.A.'s hands froze over the cake.  He cocked his head and then picked up the fork (we took a step back in case he used it like a shiv.)  The R.A. then began to attack the cake, stabbing at it repeatedly until the cake was nothing more than crumbs.  He seemed to quite enjoy himself, ceasing only when he smeared frosting on his hand, thus wigging himself out and ending "The Great Cake Massacre."  Believe it or not, this was a victory of sorts.  With the R.A., as with many people with autism, the first step with anything new is tolerance.  Therefore, the fact that the R.A. interacted with the cake was an extremely good thing.  We're hoping he'll expand this positive interaction to people sans fork stabbing.  Baby steps.  Baby steps.