What Makes You So Normal?

I have five kids. Three of them are on the autism spectrum. Two of them are "normal". I cringe at that term and rarely use it. I don't like it. Define "normal" - who gets to decide what that is? Looking at my kids' stats, autism is our normal. It's the two non-spectrum kids that are the odd ones.

This became important a few months ago. I was having one of many discussions with Cali about Asperger's Syndrome. She wasn't diagnosed until she was 16. She grew up feeling different, not like the other kids, an outsider. Amazingly, she always managed to have friends. Not a big crowd, but a couple of very close BFFs. Thankfully, she was never the target of bullies or teasing. I still don't know how she managed to avoid that, maybe it's because she is such a genuinely sweet girl. You just can't help but love her.

So we were talking and somehow got around to some of her "uniquenesses", like her obsessions with certain things: Yugio, Egypt and dragons. And when I told her that was totally normal for someone with Aspergers, I could actually see the relief in her whole body. She was NORMAL. Words she had longed to hear her entire life. There wasn't anything wrong with her. She has Asperger's Syndrome and she is a perfectly normal Aspie. Until that talk, she wasn't sure how she felt about her diagnosis. But after we talked, she realized that it didn't label her or limit her. In fact, it liberated her. I hope I can do the same for Sean.