I knew my son was on the spectrum before diagnosis, but that didn't mean hearing it from a Dr. didn't hurt. Just when I think I am at the acceptance stage of grieving, something happens(playdates being orgainized in front of me without including my son) and I start the process all over again. I am not sure you ever really stop grieving, but you learn acceptance and take the diagnosis head on. Take time before you dive into all things Autism, you will know when you are ready to start kicking butt!!

@A MyAutismTeam Member I did stop grieving but it took a long time. It came after I started seeing that God could use these circumstances for good.... and when I started valuing my son for who he is, Autism and all. That took a while. Don't misunderstand, I've always loved my son. But at the beginning I was alway trying to separate Autism from him. When I realized my son was not going to recover, I had to start thinking differently. That's when I started looking at him as a whole person.

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A MyAutis...

You move on from it when you are ready. You can't force it, but you can seek help if you need it. Some of us I am sure knew all along, but it is still difficult to hear the word and get confirmation. It broke my heart because I find the word autism a huge label to carry and I don't want my daughter to be labeled or bullied.

I think we all get depressed when we hear bad things about our children, I think that is normal. We have such high hopes for our kids, but when we think about it and realize that they are just not going to be what other kids, or adults are we get sad abou it. You just have to be happy when they reach milestones no matter how small, to try to make up for it.

My son had some testing done recently and he was at average or a little below in most instances, bu there were a few things he was consideraby low on, which mad us sad, but then we kept reading and he was far above average in a few things, so we just tried to think about that, and the fact that he is a very happy child no matter what tets tell us. We know his limitations, and we know what he is going to be good at, and we work with it, and put no pressure on him.

We have known for a long time now what our kids were going to be able to do, or not do, so we are past the expectations of most parents, and we live our lives as best we can, and try to make the kids happy.

When you notice major developmental improvements & a sort of catching up to various developmental milestones (such as beginning to speak if non-verbal thus far)