Check out the latest issue of Readers' Digest (August 2006) for an article called Boy Wonder by Cammie McGovern. It is a heart-wrenching/heart-warming account of coming to grips with her son's PDD-NOS diagnosis (pervasive developmental delay - not otherwise specified, a variant of autism).

The article is brief, but does cover a variety of ground, mentioning the Thimerosal/CDC vaccine controversy, Gluten/Casein-free diets, and ABA therapy.

What I liked most about this article was the mom's frank admission of the truth "We've fought this battle for nearly seven years, and we haven't -- in all honesty -- won."

She then goes on to explain how acceptance of the child's autism as a part of who he is and that there comes a time as each family wages the war against their child's disability that it comes to a point where you lay down your arms and realize that you are waging a war, in many ways, against who your child really is.

It was incredibly touching to me as she described one of her son's idiosyncracies: "When he laughs at the same intersection whenever you go through it and says 'I don't know, I just love that traffic light,' you think, Well there are worse things to love." This touched a nerve at this house, because LuLu does the same thing whenever she sees a digital clock time with the number 4 in it. "Mom, I just love the 4," she squeals. Maddening to me as her parent, but harmless really, now isn't it?

Check out this article. It is so nice to see more and more awareness in the mainstream of children with autism spectrum disorders!

Thanks Cammie and Ethan for going public on your lives!