Speculation

It was the one hundred and seventy third day of the twenty-fifth year of this life and...

My wife and I admitted something last night Wwe had been trying to overlook, or atleast hoping this wasn't the honest conclussion. Our DS [23m] (Darling Son, 23 months old) shows signs of autisim. His speach is delayed, only using a handful of rough words. And by rough I mean not fully pronounced. He loves cars but shows signs of OCD, lining them up on the stairs. He is easily frustrated too, getting upset if he can't line them up for whatever reason or if his routine is changed drastically.

He's been cloistered most of his life, but now that we do get him around other kids he flip-flops between being interested in playing with them and wanting to play on his own. I've come to think this is to be expected since I was much the same younger (only child). He's been showing the most improvement now that our DD [8m] (do I really need to explain?) can move around and tries to play with him, though he does get a little rough with her occassionally but what kid doesn't.

In the back of My mind though I wonder if it's atleast partly My fault he's turned out this way. Immediately a few of My past sins come to mind, mostly the drug use in My teens. There's no definitive study about the effects of a parents use to a child's development but I know enough about modern medicine not to rule it out. Then another thought slowly starts to creep up on Me too. Maybe its My raising, since I am the SAHD. Maybe I haven't tried hard enough to help his development. Maybe I've been too slack on reading and trying to teach him, both of them.

Okay, I'm cutting this off before I go too much further down that dark and narrow path.