📘 Hi World! I’m Dad: How Fathers Can Journey From Autism Awareness To Acceptance To Appreciation
James Guttman’s new book is here!
It is now available for pre-order! Also Available in Audiobook!
👉 Click here to get it on Amazon

We’re just about a week away from the release of Hi World I’m Dad – How Fathers Can Journey From Autism Awareness To Acceptance To Appreciation. More than eight years in the making, this book captures so much of what it has been like for me, as a father, to raise a non-verbal child.

Since it’s also coming out as an audiobook, I had the chance to reread it again… out loud. The experience was surreal and gave me a chance to revisit and relive so many of the memories it contains.

People who regularly read my writing know how strongly I feel about Autism Appreciation. My son has the purest soul of anyone I’ve ever met, and the way he interacts with the world is unlike anything I’ve ever known. There are so many aspects of his autism that contribute to the beauty of his personality.

This outlook, though, didn’t happen overnight. It took time and – in some ways, effort – to find this peace. Today, I can’t imagine not seeing it. Ten years ago? Not so much.

It wasn’t something I stood against, per se. Rather, Lucas’s autism was something I questioned at every turn. In those early years, before I could even say “autism” out loud, anything felt possible.

After all, that’s what people told me. They’d assure me, “Everything will be fine,” and then spin an imagined scenario where he would suddenly start talking.

You’re going to walk into his room one day and he’ll say, “Hi Dad!” You’ll see. Mark my words!

Well, I listened. I marked. And I prepared myself for my son’s inevitable evolution into a chatterbox. I counted the moments until everything was “fine.”

But “fine,” by their definition, never came. To this day, my son hasn’t said a single word verbally.

Back then, that sentence would have crushed me. After all, autism was the boogeyman, and even those trying to lift me up tied our happiness to Lucas’s speech.

Things are beyond fine now. They’re perfect. I could talk about that all day long. But it was that period of uncertainty that set the stage for everything we’ve come to accept and embrace.

It was the time when autism was still a “maybe.” When verbal language still hinged on something I could do to unlock it. This wasn’t our life yet. It was just a speed bump on our family’s road forward. None of it felt real.

I didn’t want to say it out loud, and for a long time, I didn’t. When a family member or friend had their “hello” ignored by Lucas, I’d accept the excuse they handed me every time.

He must be tired.

Sure. Tired. That’s the ticket. I’d nod and agree, despite knowing he was wide awake. The person saying it knew it too. He was usually clapping and bopping around. Yup. That’s my exhausted jumping bean, Aunt Nancy. Thanks for the out.

We’d go to the supermarket and, with Lucas firmly seated in the cart, the cashier would offer a smile and make small talk.

“Hi there, little man. Are those cookies for you? Do you like cookies?”

Then she’d stare at him and wait for a response. In most cases, he wouldn’t even make eye contact.

Here’s the craziest part – I would stare at him too. So now both the checkout person and I are locked in on this kid, waiting for something…anything.

I didn’t want to answer for him, because a voice in my head told me that doing so would stop him from ever speaking. As silly as it sounds, a part of me believed this could be it. Perhaps he had been awaiting this opening the whole time. This could be the moment he’d unleash his verbal skills.

Yeah? These are my cookies. I love them. Good lookin’ out, shawty.

I then pictured him winking at me and fist-bumping her. It was a whole scenario. As all of this swirled through my head, ten seconds would go by. He hadn’t spoken. Now I looked silly.

He must be tired.

Yeah. That’s it. Now give me a paper bag. I might smother myself with the plastic.

Those days were the hardest. I spent them blaming myself for my son’s challenges. Nature or nurture didn’t matter. It was all my fault. One of the two people I love most in the world had an incredibly difficult life ahead of him, and I was the one who brought him into the world.

I beat myself up over my son possibly having severe autism and then I beat myself up for beating myself up. If this was who he was, I had to accept it.

The problem was, I didn’t know when that day would come. This was still the time when he could be “cured” or “snap out of it,” or whatever phrase people used. I was still waiting for that shocking “Hi Dad” moment. I clung to that hope like it was all we had.

But it wasn’t all we had. In fact, it was an anchor around our necks. That hope that my boy would eventually become someone else kept me from appreciating who he already was. I couldn’t see my son because I was too busy searching for alternatives to what was right before my eyes.

And the day I let that go was the day everything changed. It was the day I could breathe again.

It was then that I could tell the cashier,

“He’s non-verbal, but he loves cookies.”

It was then that I could say to Aunt Nancy,

“He’s not tired. He just doesn’t understand high-fives yet.”

It was then that I could grow with him, learn who he is, and truly understand what autism meant. It was then that I could say the thing I always needed to say:

This is my son. There’s nothing to blame myself for other than making one of the sweetest, kindest, most wonderful human beings there is. He is non-verbal. He has severe autism. And he’s perfect.