Rebecca Pov

  I felt sick to my stomach waiting to be seen, which was weird as I had been here before with all my kids, (Ophelia was the first of the kids to be diagnosed Autistic, but it was a snowball effect after that, hence why I was here just a year later).

  Levi's appointment was a couple of weeks after mine, I think that he asked for it to be that way, as he was the one that requested the appointments, as he does way better on phones than I do, (though I probably would've chickened out if his was first).

  Anyway, I was sitting there feeling sick, (honestly anxiety picks such shit moments to make itself known), it felt like all the things that I did wrong were coming back to haunt me, (even though that's not how things work), and honestly if Levi wasn't there with me I would've missed my name being called, (which would've counted as a no show and I honestly probably wouldn’t have tried again to be honest with you).

  I was called, (obviously), and I don't remember a single thing about this fucking appointment, (though maybe that’s a good thing though), just that I had the 'scared shitless' the entire fucking time, (my brain blocking shit out such a pain in the arse), and the letter came a couple of weeks later, (and conveniently after Levi's appointment too).

  Anyway, I held this letter that had my name on, (which felt weird, as most official looking letters came in both our names), and honestly for a long while I just stared at it like it would've bitten me if I dared opened it, which was so weird looking back on it as I had actually wanted some answers as to why I did what I did, (yeah I really don't make sense sometimes), I only opened it when Levi asked if I alright.

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  "Hey Babe, you feeling ok?"

  "No, which I logically know is weird as it's just a letter, I didn't even feel like this about any of the kid's diagnoses"

  "It's life altering information"

  "And it wasn't with the kids?"

  "Not in the same way, you love them unconditionally, so it made very little difference to you, but you don't give yourself any grace when things happen that involve you and that's why you feel off"

  Levi was right of course, but it didn't help me feel any less weird about the letter, (though I did start to try and give myself some grace, so it helped in the long run), and as much as I didn't want to admit that he was right, I knew that he knew that I knew that he was right.

  "I hate when you're right about stuff like this"

  "I know"

  "Does this change things?"

  "Depends on what you mean by that"

  "Between us, or with Jake and Opal"

  "Well Jake would be a raging hypocrite considering that he has ADHD and we've known that since he was about 7-"

  "That's not the same-"

  Yes I knew that realistically that Jake wouldn't have given a shit, as like Levi pointed out, he also wasn't neurotypical, but I'm not good at making friends, (I mean Levi, Jake and Opal were the friends that I made and I was 11 years old), so I still wasn't sure what the limits of friendship were.

  "Both are the way that the brain works, Opal has also known that Jake has ADHD since she was 7, so she would be a hypocrite and also weirdly sexist-"

  "Given that her father was anti everything not 'normal' I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case"

  "Well she can fuck off if that's the case"

  "(Snorts), Jesus Christ"

  "And the only way that it would ever change us is if you wanted to end things"

  "But I'm not who you married"

  I would say that we can thank Rita for my lack of the ability to think of myself as lovable, but I actually don't think it's entirely her fault, (yes she's the main cause, don’t get me wrong, but some of it does fall onto Jack as well), and honestly to this day I'm still trying to unpack that but I don't think it'll ever really go away, it might just get smaller.

  "Baby you are exactly who I married, sure our knowledge of how you are has changed but you haven't"

  "I guess, it doesn’t make the feeling go away"

  "I know, sometimes I wish that I could give you my eyes-"

  "The ones that have the same eyesight as a 90 year old?"

  "Not physically"

  "Oh, that makes much more sense, go on"

  "For if saw how I see you, you’d know what I love about you and why"