Mentally Processing a new Autism Diagnosis

Some discussion within our group arose a couple of months back on how parents take it when their child is newly diagnosed with Autism. I remember when I was diagnosed years ago at the age of 17, it was a breakthrough for me as well as a shock because I was not educated on it yet back then. I was initially diagnosed with Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD). My parents were told that is was part of the Autism spectrum. And then they told me. At first I likened the word "Autism" to retarded or lower functioning, simply because I knew a girl at my school, who I had been hold by my friend had Autism and I knew she was low functioning. Is that me too? I would find out it isn't later after educating myself a a lot more. Along with this, I was lucky my parents took it better than I did for the most part. 

 Most parents view it as a sudden ruining of the visions the parent had for their child's future from a neuro-normal, running, happy child to a child with a life of sheer uncertainty. They must question and  wonder whether their child with ever walk, talk, be social, etc. They must say goodbye to that vision of a typical life and hello to a new unique path, that with proper education they will come to accept down the road.

 But their are some other ideas I've come across also. I posted the question on Reddit and got several really great responses.

As I think we would all agree with, the initial diagnosis of Autism is only the first step in a long process, and the pathway, which one poster put it, is not linear and headed in one direction as the parent thought, but many different directions. Others reported denial at first, grieving, I have heard they have felt like it was a kick in the gut, questioning what the parents did wrong, etc. due to being uneducated as one poster admitted. One poster mentioned that they had to learn to look at their child as a human being and not one with a diagnosis (YES! Exactly.). Another poster says they were stuck between a rock and a hard place. They believe you have to decide whether to give into your child's demands or hold your ground and let the child be frustrated. Understandable. Other parents get into with with the physicians, telling them to shut up or they have difficulty getting straight talk out of the the doctors. One poster was also talking about dealing with people noticing her child's difficulties in public. This is a good thing to bring up because the public isn't always friendly and a lot of people are still very uneducated in Autism. Another poster said it didn't change anything for them.

So, as we can see it really depends on the parents. For most of them things will usually be more smooth as their child ages, especially for those of us who are very high functioning. We feel that Autism is easier to live with as one gets older.