Living in a city where Newcastle United is the heart beat of the city you’d imagine seeing things as black and white would be a good thing right? In a professional capacity I hate grey areas, it’s a recipe for disaster so at times I suppose we all like things to be as simple as black or white.

Add a 4 year old non verbal autistic lad into this world and the world of black or white and no grey areas becomes incredibly difficult and tbh at times unbearable to the point you could scream. Believe me I have screamed and it’s also reduced this 6ft, 16 stone skin head to tears on occasion.

Parenting a non verbal autistic child is tough and stressful doesn’t come close at the moment, on the flip side imagine being a 4 year old with little way of communicating their needs or even worse fears? Imagine now if you would the distress.

Every time Reilly melts down breaks my heart, why? It’s not the tears or the noise as every kid when they are hurt or upset will cry and scream. What breaks my heart is this little boy in front of me is either so anxious, scared, confused or worse still Ill and he can’t tell us and we can’t explain to him like we can with our other kids. Black or white now doesn’t seem as appealing to me; I’d kill for Reilly to have a few grey areas to ease the complicated world he finds himself in.

So sometimes when I think I have had a shitty day at work this little man of ours puts everything into perspective; you might think to yourself I’m fed up of this or that but at least we have the ability to rationalise, reflect and communicate our thoughts and objections.

This non verbal autistic kid doesn’t have these skills sets to ease the anxieties, stresses and make sense of the world they live in; so Black and White anyone? Not me for one I’d take grey any day of the week.