In Their Own Words – The Spectrum This “In Their Own Words” is
written by Lou Tecpanecatl. Lou has a four-year-old son named
Diego, who was diagnosed with PDD-NOS in August of 2008. From
the time we received my son’s diagnosis in 2008 I have spent
quite a bit of time reading about and researching autism. One of
the first things I learned was that this is a spectrum disorder
which affects each individual in a different way. This also
means that people on the spectrum have a wide range of abilities
and many excel in their particular area of interest. In our case
I see how remarkable our son’s memory is and how aware he can be
of his surroundings at any given time. He just turned four and
while we are unable to hold a conversation with him, his
spontaneous speech is picking up and he will request certain
items throughout the day. In many ways our boy is just like
other typically developing four year olds, becoming a little
more independent as he gets older. This brings me to the point I
wanted to make on the ide