Why I didn't suspect my son had autism.
Up until my son was three and a half years old, I had no suspicion of his autism. Several things made me think he just had a simple speech delay. For instance, he has great eye contact, and he loves to smile at people while looking at them. I often get compliments from acquaintances and strangers alike about my awesome smile. Also, he loves pointing and possesses great joint attention. He does not like playing on his own and often loves Mom and Dad to be involved in his play, which includes imaginative play like cooking soup in his toy kitchen and feeding it to us or to his stuffed animals. Besides these, he does not have obvious gross motor repetitive behaviors. I also strongly doubted he had autism because his pediatrician at the time was not at all concerned. My son had met all his milestones within the regular timeline, and there was nothing amiss. As I mentioned before, the only thing I was concerned about was his speech. When our son turned two years old, we took...