From Diagnosis to Connection: How Our Autism Journey Brings Us Together

Thriving Moms of Autistics

An Autism Moms Journey is Ever Changing

Hi there, it's Christina. I hope you are having a wonderful week. We're going to do things a little differently this week.

So I thought that we would just spend some really organic time together where I'm just going to be vulnerable and just share some things with you, because I think it's good for everyone to kind of get an idea.

So you know that this person does understand, this person has a child on the spectrum and has experiences that are similar to me, right?

That's really, really important, so I thought, okay, I'm just going to peel back some of the layers and I'm going to share some of that with you today. Now, we all remember what it was like when we had our child, right?

It was one of the best days of my life. My parents actually divorced when I was four, which was unusual in the 70s, so of course, you know, I'm different from everyone just based on that.

But actually, I was really different from other people anyway. You know, it was really new, the whole neurodivergence, and all of those things, so.

My parents decided to get back together and get married again. And then they divorced again when I was five. They tried, okay? You've got to give them that. They tried.

We actually moved from Florida and up to a northern state. And everything was so different. So I had to really assimilate into a different way of living.

I knew I was different, like I said, and I saw all the seasons as I was growing up. I see that now and how that really has helped me develop into the person that I am today. So I had decided that I was going to wait to get married.

I wanted to be a psychologist. I loved working with children and families and adults and just anybody and everybody.

You know, all of the populations that I worked with, I just loved them all. And I was married to my work for the longest time until the right person came around. And I was willing to wait.

So I got married at 40. Along the way, I had some medical issues and the doctor said that I wouldn't have children.

And I thought, you know, God's bigger than that. You know, maybe if another doctor says that, okay, that's something else. And so another doctor came along eventually and said, I don't see you having children.

I don't think it's going to be possible. But then there was a third, eventually, in my thirties, and he said, I don't know why not.

And I thought, okay, I'm going to look at the statistics here, because I'm a data girl. And I thought, okay, you know, two people have already told me this.

Maybe, I should just go ahead and just live my life the way it was meant to live, and it's still going to be a beautiful life. It's going to be okay.

I did grieve, and especially when a lot of people say, Oh, it's such a shame because you should be a mom. It wasn't something that I was going to have.

So I accepted it, and then I met my husband. And we knew right away, oh yeah, that he was the one. And I told him, I said, you need to understand because I don't know if you want children, but I'm not going to be able to have children.

So he's like, no, cause he was actually older than me and by a couple of years. So we're headed for retirement. We're thinking about retirement and planning.

And so I was sitting at my desk one day. I was still practicing at the time and it was almost lunchtime and I thought, oh man, I'm so hungry.

I've never been so hungry in my life. And I had been feeling kind of weird for a couple days. Something was off. So, I just finished up some paperwork, getting ready to go to lunch.

And you know what? It just hit me like a ton of bricks, literally. And I know that whenever I get a nudge in my stomach, and for me, you know, in my faith, I know that that