Full Love Ahead

Before we ever heard the words Asperger's Syndrome, we knew we were in for an adventure.   We were seated outside at an ocean front restaurant when our son noticed two gentlemen smoking cigarettes.    These men were sporting lots of leather and chains and appeared to be a little rough around the edges.   Our son ,who was old enough to know better, walked up to these men and loudly declared, "My Dad says smoking is stupid.   You must be stupid!"    There are days when this will be hard.  Get a helmet!

Buying a TV for our son's bedroom was a sensory challenge.    He could hear sounds that we could not and he'd cover his ears and cry.   After my husband carried a 3rd TV back out of the house, we decided to bring  our son with us to the store.  We asked the sales person to please turn off all the TVs on the wall, and then turn them on one at a time.   We tried to explaine why.  The clerk asked rudely, "What is he, a bat?"  then asked if our son was "Batman".   We left and bought a TV at a different store.   We explained to our son not to feel bad, after all,  Batman is a superhero!  Holy  Hyper Hearing! 

The lunch ladies at the middle school would often call out "Would the autistic kids line up over here?"    I called the principal and asked for the school to give these women a lesson in tolerance and diversity.      These women didn't "get it".   But would they have ever uttered the words  "Would all the fat kids line up over here?"   or  maybe "All of the ugly kids line up first."  Autism isn't a tragedy, but ignorance is.