The Rotten Egg

-- Mother Teresa

Children at a very early age are able to pick out the children who are "different."  My son was about 4 when I went to a "sewing" with a bunch of ladies from our church.  The little children were playing together.  As I watched them interact I noticed that it looked like he was playing with them but he wasn't.  He was in his own little world, doing his own thing within the group.  He wasn't connected. When we were riding home in the car that afternoon he said very seriously, "Mommy, am I a rotten egg?" I said, "No honey, why?"  He said, "the other children said I was the rotten egg!"  That hurt me much more than it hurt him.  I realized they had singled him out as different.  That singling has followed him through his life.   Even today at 40, when he is in a group, he is in his own world doing his own thing. The Aspie isn't the "rotten egg" but a very special, unique individual."  It's up to us as parents to point that out to them, and love them even more for who they are.  God didn't call us to judge, but to love!