One of our Facebook/Twitter followers asked: "Are you sick often? My son is." Ask my wife or my mother… or even my college students. Oh, yes. Definitely. I'm sick right now. It seems like I'm sick twice as many days as I am well. There are days when I believe I am never well. My colds turn into something worse most of the time. I have chest congestion, and have for months. It started as a cold, became bronchitis, and then a staph infection. Antibiotics and steroids have not cleared my chest. The coughing hurts, the gunk in my throat disgusts me. But, there hasn't been a good solution. The immune system overreacts to everything. A minor cold? Nope. My body rushes to "help" and ends up making matters worse. I realize this question was about illnesses, but physically I'm fragile, too. When I have an illness, it makes it harder to ignore the leg, back, shoulder, and neck pains. I was in a back brace for scoliosis and there are some permanent...
At birth, doctors suggested I would be mentally disabled, in addition to the physical injuries I suffered. I have never been described as normal. “High-functioning autism” (HFA) is just another way to describe a few aspects of “me.” The autistic me is the creative me, the curious me, the complete me.