The day we received the official diagnosis and were told our son had Autism, it felt like the lights went off in my life. The only way I can describe the feeling is absolute darkness. The doctors, therapist, and psychologist all told us to prepare for the worse. They told us there was a possibility he would  never talk, never live independently, never progress mentally past where he was. They basically told us not to have any hope for our baby who was only three years old. He was only three years old and the professionals we trusted told us to give up on our baby before he even had a chance to try.  I didn’t know what to think, I didn’t know what to do, I didn’t know anyone with Autism, I didn’t really know anything about Autism,  I just did not know. That lack of knowledge was a paralyzing fear.

For three weeks following the diagnosis everything in life just seemed to move in slow motion. I couldn’t think beyond my poor baby and that Autism had destroyed our lives. I cried whenever I was alone during the day and nonstop at night. I lived in this “why did this happen to my baby, what did I do that caused this, I hate Autism” 24/7 nightmare. I knew I needed to be strong for my son but, I couldn’t find the strength. One day I was crying and my  baby, my little three year old son, came to me, climbed in my lap, hugged me, kissed me, and I knew it was time to  get to work because he was my strength.

The first thing I did was terminate his entire medical staff. None of them believed in my child and I did not want anyone on our team that did not believe we could win.  I decided in that moment that I would be the specialist in my son and that instead of being afraid of Autism I would embrace it. From that moment my son has continued to progress and reach milestones that I use to dream of. Six years later, at the age of nine years old, my son now does ALL of the things that the medical professional stated he would never  do. He is a happy, well-rounded , active nine year old  boy and Autism is one of the many things that makes him amazing – not the one single thing that defines him. We have experienced struggles and hardships on our journey through autism and I predict we will experience many more as this journey is a lifetime. We have also experienced great joys and created wonderful memories on our journey, and I predict we will experience many more of them in the future.