I was an autism mom before I was autistic. 

I mean, obviously that can’t actually be true, because I’ve been autistic my whole life, but I came into the autism community as a parent years before I knew I was autistic. My introduction to autism was as a mom to my young son Jack back when he was turning three. 

It didn’t take me long to suspect that I was autistic as well, but it did take me a long time to claim autism as an identity. 

At first, this was just because I was spending all my time taking care of Jack and his brothers. I was learning how to navigate therapies and decide what was important. I was learning how to advocate for my son to get him the services he needed in the school system. I was also dipping my toes into the online autism world, reading blogs of parents and autistic adults and seeing myself in both places. 

My son Leo has passed the eleven and a half years mark. I feel like I'm finally hitting my stride as an autism parent, in terms of accepting Leo on his own terms, and not giving a damn about the imaginary "easier" alternate reality society thinks I'm supposed to pine after. This means I think a lot about the information and attitudes I'd have wanted to jack, Neuromancer-style, straight into my brain eight years ago so I could instantly be the parent Leo needed me to be.

I always feel the need to add a disclaimer when writing about why I chose to homeschool and why I think it is better for my family. I do believe that public school is better for some children/families, and I want to be very, very clear that I do not think less of a parent who chooses to send a child to a brick-and-mortar school. That said...

With the start of the school year approaching, this is the first year since my children were born that I have known exactly what I was going to do and felt completely confident in that decision.

We are putting together three interest surveys: one each for (1) autistic parents who are parenting autistic daughters, neurotypical parents and caregivers parenting daughters with autism (2) autistic women (3) and the professionals that work with us in order to figure out what the community needs, and where their interests are focused.  

(*) This is the first survey in the series. 

We value your input and appreciate you taking the time to share your opinions and suggestions with us. Please follow the link to take the brief 10 question survey. Thank you! http://bit.ly/IKoO4r

^{Mara Fritts is the mother of four, she is diagnosed AS, and she sits on the AWN Board of Directors.}

I started Homeschooling when our oldest son was 7 years old, after fighting a school system that would not listen to my pleas that there was something different about him. I saw it. Why didn't they? Why did they say that our son was normal when his teacher said there was something different with him? I saw him as being alone and not understanding why he was having issues at school. Why didn't all the children throw gravel at other students when they were frustrated ? 

When our son was 5 years old, he started Kindergarten in a private school. They said that he was too immature, so they put him into the preschool. Our psychologist at the time said our son has Attention Deficit and Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) and that he needed additional observations. We were told the public school would also do testing on him, so we sent him. 

From the beginning, we had issues with getting the school to observe our son. They were supposed to look at him at the beginning of the school year. After several months of not hearing anything and many phone calls, they finally had the Occupational Therapist (OT) and the school psychologist look at him. They said that everything was normal. His homeroom teacher, who was a former resource teacher, disagreed with this. She helped us place him in a behavioral program from the local university. It was the only help she could offer. It was based on rewards, but he wasn't really interested in earning anything. Over that summer, our son went to a private OT to help with the hand weakness and balance issues that his pediatrician diagnosed him with. The balance issues were something else that the school missed.