It’s Autism Awareness Month, and every year I’m flabbergasted by how many people still don’t know what autism is. There are so many self-advocates, parent advocates, social media posts, and YouTube videos dedicated to explaining autism, or autism spectrum disorder (ASM). There are shows with autistic characters, and yet when we go out into the…
Recently on Twitter, a mother we’ll call Harriet posted; “Why do we have a vaccine for Covid but NOTHING for autism?!? My 15 year old daughter can’t even dress herself or put on deodorant alone. Get your a**es into gear & find a cure NOW! This is not a personality type. It’s a disability. #AutismAcceptanceMonth”…
“I believe your son has autism.” I was so busy wrestling kids in the pediatrician’s office that day that the words didn’t sink in. I didn’t even know what autism was. I do remember, however, the first thought that popped into my head was, “Will my son lead a normal life?” Fast forward years later,…
At first, they responded to our son’s diagnosis with what seemed to be almost pity. Then that pity turned into “We will do our research.” Eventually, though, the newness of the diagnosis wore off, and suddenly, he was labeled as “spoiled.” The deliberate denial by those we loved that our son had any condition at…
Recently, I saw a tweet from a woman with no kids of her own, much less a special-needs child, who said; “There is no excuse for bad parenting. You say, ‘There isn’t a book for that’, but there are like literally thousands. Just read and do what the book says.” Her tweet had thousands of…
“If God gave me to you and dad, then I hate God! I hate you! I wish I was an orphan! You are the worst parents in the world.” Welcome to our world. Our 11 year old son Luke has high functioning autism. Have you ever just tried to go about your day but are…
In December 2020, at the age of 43, I learned I was autistic. Really, I learned nothing new. I was simply given a new lens to understand the things I had always known to be true about myself. But without that lens, I had struggled to understand those truths, and even fought against and loathed…
On a rainy day in December, three months pregnant with my fourth baby, I sat in our minivan and began to sob. Our oldest child, Annie had just been diagnosed with regressive autism. A very rare and gut wrenching type of spectrum disorder. On the car ride home I remember texting one of my closest…
Saturday evening after the kids are in bed I am wide awake thinking of all the ways to make church go smoothly. Marc, my husband, bathes Anne spending almost the entire time trying to get her hair ready for me and I comb through her massive thick and blonde curls while she pulls away from…
