h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

What a beautiful piece of writing and clearly very personal.

Your daughter sounds like a beautiful girl who has a loving and supportive family.

I think you and your family were very strong not to say something to the person who made such a unnecessary and ignorant comment.

Your piece of writing touched me and I imagine many offers feel the same. For evey ignorant, uneducated person there are others who see your daughter and others like her as the people they are.

Thankyou for a wonderful piece of writing! It touched me in a personal way.

I agree with Calliopes_teacup, I think you were very brave in not confronting the person who made the offensive comment. I'm not sure I would have been able to stay quiet if I was in your place.

Thankyou once again, for writing something which seems very personal.

My daughter suffers from a thing called Semantic Pragmatic Disorder which is a form of Autism. Some people only see the disorder and not the person which is a damn shame

This is marvelous. The amazing person inside your daughter is clearly beloved.

I sit here as I read this enriching entry and I try very hard to to judge the people (who say retard) harshly. I know somebody's daughter who is not neurotypical, I believe the word was. It's striking when you take the time to think about it, instead of just rashly catagorizing people on surface differences, how many of us remain ignorant to how much influence our one remark can be having on a fragile self, especially when one believes it would not be heard.

I wish you the best of luck

The world we live in need awareness. Ignorance/prejudice do not excuse anything.

Brilliant piece of writing. Thanks for giving us an insight into your life. I also am classed as 'disabled' (mild cerebal palsy in the legs) and although my disability is probably the other end of the spectrum, I get comments like that as well. And yes, they are extremely hurtful to me as well.

I know this probably doesn't help, but you gotta let it roll right off your back.
Or turn round and give the offending idiot a mouthful. (Normally what I do, but my mates class me as 'extremely volatile', so when I do that I go all out and swear ten to the dozen)...

I admire your courage at NOT doing that, though and I hope Joy will go on to lead a good life, despite being autistic.

Many thanks for writing the article.

Also remind these people to watch Rain Man and A Beautiful Mind occationally

I love Rain Man. Dustin Hoffman is great.

He was very good in that, my daughter doesn't suffer from Autism as such but the school she goes to teach her as if she was, she does like things to go in a routine, if that routine breaks she gets very agitated

We read this book, The Curious Incident of a Dog in the Night-time, in the spring and I really think that some scenes address the schools as well as life on the outside, without protective parents. Tell your daughter I say hello!

I will