The Safety Sleeper Blog

This is the time of year where I start thinking about futures for students, as graduations pop up like springtime flowers all around my home in Western Pennsylvania. It’s tempting to think about what my son with special needs won’t graduate and go on to do, but I’ve found little value in this kind of pessimism. Instead, I take the words of a good friend to heart, and try to “be the change I want to see in the world.”

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Sometimes even those of us who have autism as part of our lives everyday need to celebrate our own kind of autism awareness! In this blog post, Rose reflects on her appreciation for Abram's growth with Autism as he becomes more conversational.

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Autism Awareness Month is always a time for me to reflect on my family’s journey and how an autism diagnosis redirected the life plans I had laid out so intentionally in my mind. I remember the shock and numbness of diagnosis day and the change I had to make in my mindset to continue my forward march. Over time, I learned to shift from planning life events to focusing on what’s important and taking it one day at a time...

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Ask parents of children with special needs and you will hear very different stories of diagnosis day. They may remember the exact date and time and it might even be marked on the calendar like a birth date or anniversary. Our journey with Abram was gradual. Over time, we noticed he wasn’t developing like our older son or our friends’ children. We started making appointments with doctors and therapists...

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