# Today is Autism Sunday



## Ruthanne (Feb 12, 2017)

Today is Autism Day.  Here is a little about it:

https://www.checkiday.com/ad89ff88e453b334a0dabeaa05927c09/autism-sunday


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## Ponderer (Aug 21, 2017)

First I ever heard about such a day. 
My 14 year old son has what is called Aspergers. A high functioning autism out of the spectrum.
What are people praying for? Peter is different than what we call normal. But normal is a human derived definition. About 1% of all humans on earth have autism of some form. These people have a role in our societies. Aspergers is not a handicap as many would define it.

I saw an article recently that Microsoft was specifically looking for individuals with Aspergers to work in their programming departments. My son has had hazing problems with (normal) students in school, but he is learning to recognize thier own disfunction in realizing value with "different" people. I believe it is part of Peter's call in our society.

My son, Peter, will find his role in society just like all of us have had to do. We encourage him in his growth to adulthood. He is impacting those he associates with in his daily life.


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## Roadwarrior (Aug 21, 2017)

Ponderer said:


> First I ever heard about such a day.
> My 14 year old son has what is called Aspergers. A high functioning autism out of the spectrum.
> What are people praying for? Peter is different than what we call normal. But normal is a human derived definition. About 1% of all humans on earth have autism of some form. These people have a role in our societies. Aspergers is not a handicap as many would define it.
> 
> ...


I was diagnosed with Asperger's a few years ago.  It wasn't recognized until the late 90's or early 2000's.  I often wondered why I thought & did things differently as a person.  After my revelation I had answers, I dealt with it all my life.  I played sports, went in the military, got married, had children & held the same job for almost 50 years.  I was very good in what I did but because of my personality I struggled in the professional arena.  

I never had long term friendships, except with my family.  I did my own thing, would go off by myself & be completely happy.  My older sister has the same tendencies, my oldest daughter has now been diagnosed recently & we've had some great conversations about it.  My grandson whom just graduated as an Engineer in my estimation is also Asperger.  He's reminds me of Sheldon on 'Big Bang Theory'.  Through all this I now know, it's ok.  

When you've met one Asperger, you've met one Asperger.


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## Ponderer (Aug 21, 2017)

Thank you roadwarrior. My wife and I adopted Peter when he was 18 months old. He was obviously different the day we got him. Our daughter (a special education teacher) told us Peter was aspergers when she saw him at age 7 or 8. I read every book in our city library on autism and discovered Peter fit about 90% of the Aspergers behaviors. I also discovered that I fit about 70% of the behaviors too. 

I had retired from a 34 year career as a chemical engineer. Only then did I realize my own issues with people I worked with. How about that. I had obtained 7 US patents and 50 foreign patents for the company on my work. I understand how aspergers is not a handicap from success.


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