So the day came when it was time to hear the diagnosis. We were asked to attend a meeting at the special school where the pediatrician, special needs teacher, speech and language teacher, and child psychologist, were all in attendance. Once the pediatrician had explained to us their process of diagnosis, which basically consisted of various tests and a lot of observation, she told us our son was autistic. After a pause of what seemed a couple of minutes she added, "High functioning of course." I don't know if she said that to make us feel better, but it was the first time I had heard the phrase and I was still trying to digest the first statement because at that time I was not very knowledgeable about autism. After a little explanation I took it to understand that a child with 'high functioning autism' has a good chance of learning how to cope with day to day living pretty much independently.

There then followed the standard  explanation of 'autism', which while it does go some way to explain the behavior of autistic children, does nothing to help a parent understand what they are up against and what kind of behavior they will have to try to navigate through in the coming days weeks, months and years. The explanation of autism and how an autistic child might behave can be easily found on the internet, but no matter how many different versions I read it does nothing to help me. It only told me what I already knew, but it did not tell me what I could do with this information. To me this is the enigma that is autism. You will be greeted with knowing looks and nods from parents of autistic children like we are all members of a special club, but on further investigation you will find that no two autistic children are alike in every way. Most are in fact very sociable, they just expect you to know what they are thinking and where they are coming from automatically. More than other children they love and trust their parents unconditionally, as if they believe the parents will somehow guide them through the fog and panic and insecurity of autism ....