Living a Lie.

Sometimes I feel like a fraud.

My daughter is very high functioning.

Tigerlily was diagnosed very young. She started therapy very young and did a lot of therapy, for a long time. She is the poster child for early intervention.
Most of the time my child passes as "normal".
Most people don't see her stims, and she's pretty good about keeping it together in public and we are very good at reading the signs of an impending melt down (exit stage left).
She attends a very small private school with only 40 students from JK to Grade 12.
In the right environment Tiger is totally functional.
If we are following the routine, and she's getting enough sleep and its a really good day, my little girl acts more like she's 10 than 6 years old.
One on one with adults she is amazing and again most typicals would never think she was autistic.

On the good days, its easy to lie to the world, we can hide our autism in plain sight, confident that the public won't pick up on it.

On a bad day, Tiger is difficult, things must be done as per the routine and even then she will be noticeably off. She will be clumsy and get hurt. There will be outbursts and overt stimming but even then most people will think she is just spoiled , or over tired etc.

On the roughest days, no one sees us.
Maybe because she is completely manic, stimming non stop, very loud and throwing her body around.Or maybe because she won't get up, because she can't walk and she's pulling herself around on the floor. Either way we are housebound on the rough days, hiding our autism at home.

Most days start off good and end leaning towards the bad. I know what days I can go to the store with her and which days I can't. We are really quite good at living the lie in public. Yet, I know its a lie and I'm keeping one eye open for the signs, at all times. I am very grateful for all the gains Tigerlily has made, and I'm so glad that we can play the part of average family in public.


The High Functioning Life where we put on our normal face to go out.