i just want to rant a little to people who know:)

my husband came home from work yesterday and told me that one of the guys at work was curious about our son and about autism in general. mark will always talk to people about autism. he likes to try and educate the "normies" but after their conversation and lots of exasperation on my husbands part the guy says "then he is resigned to life?" in reference to our son and his autism! i was totally aghast when my husband told me that his co worker said that! i actually started crying! i am just so frustrated by people who think there is only just one way to be and that everyone who doesnt fit that cookie cutter mold should be ashamed of themselves. our whole lives revolve around this boy and making sure that he is happy and healthy and half the time i feel like i am not there enough for our six month old in order to keep everything just so for isaac and then someone comes along and says that isaac is resigned to being himself!?!?! resigned to what!? being happy? being blissfully unware of what a**holes walk around sharing his air? i am so fed up with the idea that our son should be "normal" to make other people comfortable! AAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!:blob_f ire

i would have told him that isaac is as resigned to be autistic as that jerk is as resigned to being stupid!

(((Liz)))

That sounds like an awfully cruel thing to say on the part of your husband's co-worker. I don't think we are "resigned" to our fates.

I vastly prefer our kids, who tend towards social naivete, to your average NT JERK.

But --- sigh --- I am resigned to the fact that life outside the cozy walls of my home is populated with quite a few of those NTJs.

I try to balance my explanations of autism by including a little about how we all benefit from the many gifts this gene line has brought to the world. How some of my son's genes came from ME, & some from his very successful DAD -- he's NOT a freak of nature. He's OUR KID. As a Mom, I feel it's important for my kids to overhear a balance of concern about the struggle, & pride in the specialness, when I talk to other adults.

Hiya Liz,

I look at my little boy and I see a a child who doesn't have a malicious bone in his body. I see a kid who has never said anything nasty to another child, who's never deliberately tried to get another child in trouble, who's never told a lie, and who will happily share anything he has. I see a little boy who has so much to deal with, day in and day out, and who does it with a smile and hardly ever gets fed up. I see a little boy who is soooooo strong, and who, in four and a half years has coped with more than a***holes like your hubbie's co-worker have probably coped with in forty years. And I, like all the other mums, am so proud that he chose me to raise him and feel so honoured to be around someone with such a beautiful personality. I recommend you stick that idiot's head down the nearest toilet and tell him to resign himself to that!!

You said it baby. Although I myself would pay a special visit and make that sh**head feel as small as his comment.!!!!!!! I'm so pissed off for you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

I agree with all of you! As hard as it is to grow up with certain differences, I think it is much more important to grow up as a good and decent person. You are all doing a great job as parents. Keep up the good work.

so frustrating!!!!!

i am around my family, here, and my offline support group most. my friends who dont quite understand isaac but who are at least willing to try to just accept what they can not understand as normal for isaac i hardly ever see anymore as well so its just such a shock to be reminded that there are people out there still who dont know how to keep their feet out of their mouths. we have been spending all summer in and out of meetings, transitioning isaac from early intervention into public school and i swear its a much harder change for me than it is for him!:) but the comment came at the wrong time and it was the last straw that day but today i am good:) ready and willing to reeducate the general masses even if it means putting my size 12 foot where the sun isnt willing to shine!:D

i will continue to wish nasty thoughts upon him, like that a radiator hose breaks in his car on the way to work so that he is late and then gets a tardy! HA! that'll show him!!!

(ok, i have to work on being more nasty:) but what can i say, i think at this point in the game i am so politically corrected that i have lost all of the meaness in me! or atleast i will have to dig a little deeper)

thanks everybody! its always good to rant to people with the same point of view;)