Article By: Christina Farrell
Article Date: 08/29/2010
Please don’t cry for us, pity us, tell us how sorry you are to hear the news or generally feel sorry for us, as I have done enough of that myself. It has been 7 years since my son was diagnosed with Autism at the age of 2 ½. When first hearing the news we were shocked, stunned, confused and mad. How dare this doctor tell us that our son was Autistic!!! All we wanted to hear was, “He’s a late talker.†or “don’t worry he will catch up.†But unfortunately that didn’t happen. And we began our journey into the world according to Jasen. (My son with Autism).
I am not going to give you the long drawn out day to day struggles we face as there are many families before and after me that have done that already. Suffice it to say it has been challenging and continues to be everyday.
Our son is verbal and integrated into a mainstream classroom. He is many years behind his classmates and is NOT diagnosed with Aspergers. He may never live away from us and he may never do a lot of things but I am not here to focus on the negative…I have done that for too long.
Jasen is artistic(loves to draw) and has a great sense of humour and loves to watch movies and laugh. He tells the truth to a fault as he doesn’t have the capacity to lie.He does not bully people, call them names, or know how to make a person feel bad about themselves. If he sees someone crying he wants them to “not be sadâ€. He loves his older sister Rachel and looks for her as soon as he get up in the morning. He bugs her and embarrasses her as all siblings do.
I am sure there are days she wishes she was an only child or that her brother wasn’t Autistic but she has learned to accept him as he is and in my opinion we could all learn a great deal from Rachel.