Weird symptoms of head banging 50 times a day, staring into the space, non stop painting for hours, rage, etc. made me suspicious about my 9 month old baby. She would refuse to interact with her 5 years old sister, she had severe intolerance and watching all this was indeed disappointing and devastating. It was the hardest day of my life to discover that my daughter was autistic. After visiting many doctors one after another I finally vested my faith in homeopathy and started her treatment. I read a lot about autism and interacted with many parents to learn more about it. I started preparing her diet myself after consultation with her doctor. After a while, the doctor suggested DTP remedy and I was glad it worked wonders and showed phenomenal results is just 3 months. On her second birthday, after the party, she thoroughly enjoyed opening her presents with her sister and that has justified all my efforts.

Tears welled up in my eyes when I saw my darling boy take his first step even before he was 8 months old. I never thought at that point that he was autistic. It was later, as his first birthday approached, that I noticed he still does not say anything other than “g’day”, but everyone told me some kids take it slow, so, I allowed time to lapse. A few more months and he would still not speak and only gaze at me. I took him to doctors but they would tell me to wait. Finally, it was near his second birthday that my mother-in-law called me and said, “I think Alex is autistic” and then she told me his grandfather was autistic too. It took about a minute for this to sink in and I could not move. My husband had gone off on a deployment and I found it hard to tell him the unfortunate truth about his only son. The only sigh of relief I got was when I recollected my father-in-law’s life and the progress he had made despite his condition and I wish the same for my son. 

Being autistic was destined for me and creating a livable world with my condition was the hardest task. I was twelve years old when I first realized that most of the time I only gazed at people and never spoke a word. My mother would plead me to just say a “yes” or “no” to her questions and in return I would only give her a blank stare. She would beg, she would cry, but I never reacted. People told her she will have to send me to a special home and that used to further aggravate her agony. After years of consulting doctors and practitioners, she finally came across the process of Facilitated Communication that allows autistic children like me to use a keyboard for expressing what we want. At 18, after years of practice I finally I graduated from high school and applied for college. Tears of joy filled my mother’s eyes when I wrote on my keyboard, “A new era is coming.” Today I 48 years old and mother of two wonderful children.