As seems to happen while stringing together these pieces,
a secondary theme came about, one of humor! It makes so
much sense when you think about it – part of accepting
yourself is being able to laugh at your own mistakes, or, as
the Geektastic Jennifer O’Toole tells us in her fabulous cover
story “Congratulations! You Have Autism” interview, “Mistakes
aren’t mistakes if we learn from them. They’re lessons. And
let me tell you, I learned a whole LOT of lessons along the
way.” Folks, I have conducted a lot of interviews throughout
my career, but this was by far one of the most fun. Heck, we
started off as strangers, and two hours later we were making
plans to get together soon for margaritas! Need I say more?
Unfortunately, on the road to acceptance there may be some
very large bumps, which is why we asked one of our favorite
ZOOM contributors, M. Kelter, to write about bullying. His
piece “After Bullying: Your Role as a Parent” is a must read because what we say and do after the incident can be even more
harmful to the victim than the actual act.
There is just so much awesomeness in this issue that I could
go on and on and on, but I won’t because, um, I want you to
read it instead. What I will tell you is that we decided to end
this issue with a very special Q&A. We asked our readers
what autism acceptance means to them, and their answers
were way more than we ever expected. While we have a long
way to go before we live in a world that celebrates diversity,
including neurological differences, I feel a sense of hope
when I read the responses. Just like I told Jay … we don’t
need to have all the answers; we just need to see things in different ways, explore one possible response to a question at a
time, and of course, celebrate that diversity exists!
Until next issue,
Sharon Fuentes, Editorial Director/Founder
[email protected]
Zoom Autism Through Many Lenses
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