Open letter to my son with autism

I had always dreamed of being a mother. I imagined the face of my future son in every detail: the color of his father’s eyes, my smile, his grandmother’s hair, his grandfather’s height… Motherhood for me has always been something as natural as breathing. But when my dream finally came true, it didn’t happen as I expected. The possibility of having a child with autism had never crossed my mind.

I felt like screaming, kicking and cursing the world. Why me? What is going to happen to him? Am I going to see him suffer? A cascade of emotions and questions crowded inside me. So I decided to write him this letter, to tell him everything I feel, because with autism or without it, my love for him grows bigger every day.

Welcome to a world that is not made for you

Dear son:

I don’t know what’s going to happen now. I know, I know, I’m your mother and I’m supposed to have everything more or less planned out. It is assumed that I would have already made lists of the closest schools that you could go to and look for a good one. It doesn’t have to be the best, I’m not one of THOSE mothers, but I would look for a good education for you. I would have the video camera ready for every performance you did at school and I would spend the afternoons helping you with your science projects, because that’s what loving mothers do.

What does that mean? Yes, I know you’re only two years old, but it seems like we’ve lost our way. I want to do a good job as a mother. I want to give you every opportunity possible. I want you to be prepared to fight among the best in the very competitive world we live in, because even though I am not one of THOSE mothers, I want you to follow in my footsteps and be successful in your studies.

Like I said before, I’m supposed to know what to do, know every step of the way. Thinking about the extracurricular activities, the tutors, the soccer team, the piano lessons… I had literally written down the details of your upbringing and education before heading towards the cesarean section. So, you see, I knew what to do every step of the way.

So, yesterday you were diagnosed: you have autism. Now I feel like the two of us together are stranded at sea. As if a current of waves hit us hard in the middle of a storm and we could only let ourselves go. I’m not trying to scare you. But I have no idea what to do next: there are not many manuals on raising children with autism… and there are many questions.

Last night, I found myself trying not to cry. I was grieving as I said goodbye to the doctor you would never be, to the basketball star you would never become. I was crying about girlfriends, jobs or achievements that you will never experience. She was torn about the future because none of the pieces fit together.

But, you know what? Do you know what I’m thinking right now as I write this letter? Let’s face all those expectations: you would have broken them anyway, although perhaps later. And I had had to learn in the same way to be a good mother to you, to your own needs and desires.

That is to say, Have you seen those children who prepare from childhood to be doctors? Don’t they make you want to run away before imagining someone who doesn’t know how to expel their own gas pricking you with a needle? On the other hand, do you know the topics that some of them use in their PhDs? Do you think we need more experts in the world on “the mating habits of Pitbulls with some resistance to antibiotics”? I imagine these questions will baffle you, after all you are only two years old.

I have realized that that plan I had for you, even if you had accepted it (even if you had made that mistake), would not be a guarantee of anything. . Do you know what I realized too? That you are not boring at all. You are sweet, kind and brilliant.
You will run across the room to kiss me and solve problems your way. You will even grab the cat to hug it violently when it is running away from you, which is actually something we have to work on, but it makes your mother very proud. And, yes, you are my son with autism, but you are also unique and genuine. So why am I crying over broken plans when they never really existed?

At the end of the day, of course, your future is still unknown. But based on the little one I already know, I’m starting to think that you will be a happy, independent and fulfilled adult. Because, the diagnosis has not stopped me from seeing that intelligence and exceptionality in you that fascinates me.

So from now on, starting this morning, I have hope that you will be treated like any other volatile, unreasonable, emotional, reactive, explosive, weird, temperamental child. For years to come, I’ll be crossing my fingers instead of complaining, right alongside the mothers of neurotic kids, when you change your mind about your preschool snack. I’ll want to see you discover slugs and bury them like treasure, inexplicably still alive, just like children without autism do.

I mean, my love, having autism is not an insurmountable obstacle to greatness, success, or normality. And I anticipate that, as you grow, it will continue to be that way. You are sweet and ingenious; You are stubborn, resilient and determined. You are able. Bright things await you in the future. And, despite what we learned yesterday, I consider myself a lucky person, because of all the newborns I could have as children, I have you.

We have you, my love. And together we will figure out how to move forward.

Having a child with autism is discovering the world anew

Despite how dramatic it may be to hear for the first time that you have a child with autism, the reality of the diagnosis is not as terrible as we imagine. Having a child with autism simply teaches us to discover the world anew through their eyes and their genuine way of relating to it.
An autistic child is like any other child with a different way of relating to the environment. If you are also a mother of an autistic child, you will soon realize that with early intervention they can lead a good life. With your support, your son with autism and you, whatever it may be, he will follow his own path, in which he will surely find happiness.

Author’s note: article based on “An Open Letter to My Newly Diagnosed Autistic Son” by Shannon Frost Greenstein.

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