In My Son's World.

By: Anonymous

The Writer's toddler son has been diagnosed with autism.

My son cried all night last night.

I long to help him, but I cant'n. He is

autistic, they tell me locked inside

himself, inside a world that doctors

tell me I have no access to. I don't

know what he wants. He put his

hands and my my face and cries, "Mama,

mama,"one of the few words he can

say. And I feel my heart break and

shatter because I can't help him. It's

like when water freezes and splits

open a rock; thereis no way to

mend it, there is no way to stop it.

My heart will always be scarred and

broken by his tears.

When I first learned of his

diagnosis, I was determined to pull

him into my world. I sat endlessull

trying to make him speak, make him

look, make him do. And then slowly

I began to relize that his world is

beautiful, too. I stopped trying to

yank him in to my world and instead tried to enter his.

We sit for hours at the fountain in town watching

the water skip over the stones and cascade into the pool

below. We fall asleep watching snowflakes drift lazily

past the window, his cheek against mine, his hand

holding my little finger. We watch a bug make his way

up to the wall.

I learn things about him. He loves the color blue. He

likes Led Zeppelin and country music. He can't stand still

when he hears the opening bars of a song he likes; he

dances and giggles and gurgles until we all giggle, too.

He loves without restraint, without

malice . His heart is so innocent and so pure. It is breath-

taking.

he sees things no one else sees: To me me it is a stone; to

him it is a universe.

I read in a book once that having a child with special

needs is like getting an airplane for a trip. You think

you are going to Venice, but then, the stewardess tell

you that you landede in Holland. Well, you can

spend your time crying for the gondolas, or you can get

out and enjoy the winmills. It's not quiet what you had

espected, but it is beautiful all the same.

So I call himmy little Dutch boy. To rememenber that

windmills are as beautiful as gondolas.

By: Anonymous.