Loving Autism! Hello World!

Okay, so I finally found the perfect husband. We bought a house. We spent hours painting and decorating and making it ours. This was all to welcome a child someday. You know, the DREAM. That dream most women have of finishing college, finding the bomb of a career, finding the most charismatic, thoughtful husband, and then topping it all off with 2.5 beautiful children.

And when I say beautiful, I mean always smiling, always friendly children. Always dressed in the cutest outfit and certainly never fussing or crying or, God forbid, hitting me.

Well, my day FINALLY came! In February, 2005, this 36-year-old "mature" mom gave birth to beautiful Ross Alexander. Ahhh...my dream had finally really begun. My beautiful family finally begun.

All you moms out there are laughing hysterically right now because you know that pretty much right then that dream was shattered. I'm leary of any mother who says they loved their offspring instantly because...a screaming, jaundiced, collicky baby is NOT at all easy to love. Somehow you do love them, but, damn it's HARD.

And with our little Ross, it just never really became easier. He was always different than my friend's kids. Always. He didn't want to ride the rides at the little amusement parks. He hated meeting new people. He was, let's just say, a handful.

So I went the first three years of his life feeling like I'd won the opposite of the lottery. I won the "handful." So we compensated the best we could. And like idiots, we took him to birthday parties and MORE amusement parks in the hope that he would "get used to them."

I just kept thinking...I can't wait for you to talk to me. I mean really talk to me. That's all I've ever wanted. That's what I thought being a mommy was. Talking. Ross talked all the time, but he just repeated verbatum his books and favorite programs. He didn't talk to me.

So, honestly, my biggest fear was Autism. After we got past the SIDS period of infancy, I was always scared of Autism. At 31/2 I knew we needed to get him assessed so I started the process (which took a good three months - seemed like FOREVER - but actually warp speed in Autism time) but I just kept hoping that it was just that he was just "behind." You know, boys are always behind.

Turned out, that wasn't the case...Ross has Autism. So our journey began...