Different But Not Less

After we learned of Parker's autism, there was a period of time where Tim and I pondered different things. We pondered thoughts of what our future held. The largest one was the realization that our lives would be different than what we had originally thought it would be. We thought about how things would be different but we didn't even know what those things would even be necessarily. It began a total thought transformation about raising our little man. I'm not going to lie and say that we only had positive lines of thinking. Saying that would be lying. We thought about kids bullying him more than other kids, we thought about how others would see his differences as a bad thing, we thought about if he would ever be able to verbally communicate, we thought about getting ugly stares from people in public, etc. Things that probably every parent who has a child with autism has thought of. One thought we never had was about "cures." To us, there is no such thing. Why? Because there's nothing "wrong" that would require a "cure." He's different...but not any less. I have a hard time with the concept of "cures." Yes, I want to help Pman in every way, shape and form to process and adapt better to the crazy world around him but not battle something that no matter how much you can fight is still going to be a part of who he is. I believe it has to do with the thought of a label. With all of us, we are all different from one another but why is it when there is a label to that difference, it becomes a bad thing? Or a scary thing? Something to feel devastated about? You can't get away from TV anchors, articles, and radio discussions about the "epidemic of autism" and "the devestating condition effecting millions of children" blah blah blah. With all of that around you, how can you not think about how this difference should a thing to be afraid of and something to be concerned with as a parent? Truthfully, we had to disconnect from it. We had to just look at our son and only focus on him.

Yes, Parker will always do things differently, process his world differently, react to the world differently, communicate differently, interact differently, play differently....but that doesnt mean that any of these things are bad. Different? Yes. Less? No.