Sixteen years after her son’s diagnosis, Lisa still has the original letter from the doctor’s office, scribbled with frantic notes—and a vivid memory of how numb she felt going through the motions of those early days. In part one of this two-part reflection, she explores the ways parenting a child with autism has changed her, from advocacy to ego to learning to stay in her own lane.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- How the numbness and overwhelm of an early diagnosis can keep you from being present, and why that is a normal response.
- How autism parenting pushed Lisa to challenge her upbringing, take her ego out of her child’s behavior, and learn to ask for more at the IEP table.
- Why staying in your own lane—rather than measuring yourself against other families—reclaims enormous time and energy.
Resources mentioned:
Related episode:
Self-Care for Autism Moms: Why It’s Your Responsibility (Ep #49)
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TRANSCRIPT
Welcome to The Autism Mom Coach Podcast. I am your host, Lisa Candera. I am a lawyer, a life coach, and most importantly, I am the full-time single mother of a teenager with autism. In this podcast, I am going to share with you the tools and strategies you need so you can fight like hell for your child without burning out.
Let’s get to it. You are listening to The Autism Mom Coach: Autism Changes You.
Hello everyone, and welcome to the podcast. I am so glad you are here, and I hope you are doing well. I am recording this podcast in early January 2026, and this time of year always brings me back to when Ben was first diagnosed with autism, now 16 years ago.
I still have that original letter from the doctor’s office. Of course, we’ve made many copies, but I have the original. I have all of these notes frantically scribbled on it about next steps to take and things to learn about. What I really remember about that time period is how numb I felt.
I was going through the motions of doing all the things that you do when you first get that diagnosis, but I was just going through the motions. I wasn’t really present for it. I was just feeling really numb.
One of the things I do remember doing was getting the 100 Day Toolkit from Autism Speaks. Again, this was 16 years ago, and there weren’t really many resources on the internet about autism. Autism Speaks was one of the places you could go, and they had this toolkit you could download. I did.
I remember that within the first few pages of that toolkit, there was something to the effect of, “The autism diagnosis does not change who your child is.”
I remember hoping that was true. I really didn’t know what we were in store for. But now, looking back 16 years, I know the diagnosis didn’t change him. I think autism is just part of who he is.
What I do know for sure is that my son’s autism diagnosis changed me—for the good, for the better. I am a huge Wicked fan; I had to throw that in. But it’s really true. It changed me forever. And I believe it changed me for the better.
In many ways, it has amplified my strengths as a person and as a mom. It has stretched me. It has challenged me. It has also brought out things in me that I don’t love and that I have had the opportunity to work on.
I think challenges like this—these lifelong shifts in reality—change all of us. Parenting is challenging under every circumstance. But parenting a child with complex needs goes beyond parenting.
We’re not just nurturers, guides, and teachers. We are caregivers, narrators, interpreters, advocates, therapists, nutritionists, co-regulators—the list goes on. Day in and day out, it changes us. It rewires our brains and our nervous systems. It deepens our empathy. It challenges our beliefs and stretches us beyond our comfort zones. And it deepens our capacity to love.
Overall, I really do believe that these kinds of challenges in life give you the opportunity to become more of who you are. It’s like you get this constant push to level up in ways that, frankly, I don’t know that I would have in what I’ll call “regular parenting.”
So I want to give you some examples from my life, and I want you to think about how this applies to you.
For me, I’ve always been an advocate. I became an attorney because I saw the struggles my parents had back in the 1980s getting proper resources for my sister when she was struggling in school. I remember wanting to be an attorney because, in my mind at that time, if I were an attorney, I would know how to figure these things out.
Although I never went into special education law, I really do applaud the special needs parents who also become advocates or lawyers. It wasn’t for me. I didn’t see myself being able to separate the personal from the professional. Looking back, that was probably an early act of self-care—knowing my own limits and preferences.
Still, I was an advocate. I became an attorney. I was always the kid volunteering for a nonprofit or raising money for a charity. That was just part of who I was.
So when my son got the autism diagnosis, I felt comfortable doing the research, connecting with people, and finding resources. Having to do that in a situation where not many people were talking about it really leveled up my ability to be a strong advocate. I use those skills in my everyday life as an autism parent, though it’s not always easy.
Parenting a child with autism has also pushed me to challenge my own beliefs and work through my upbringing. I went to Catholic school my entire life. “Because I said so” was the golden rule. I was a rule follower.
Having a child who struggled with behavior challenged me. I viewed certain behaviors as “bad,” and I knew other people did too. When my child displayed them, I believed it reflected on me. I had to take my ego out of it. It wasn’t about me—it was about him, and he was struggling.
Coming to a deeper understanding of his behaviors—even when they looked like he was just being a brat or throwing a tantrum—was work for me. It did not come naturally. From the outside, it may not have looked like I was struggling, but internally, I was.
Another way my son’s diagnosis challenged me was learning to ask for more.
Coming to an IEP table from a Catholic school background—where there were no IEPs or accommodations—felt foreign. I viewed the IEP as getting more, getting accommodations, getting different rules. That was different for me.
When the team offered what they offered, my instinct was to say, “Thank you very much,” and walk away. The idea that I would say, “Actually, I would like more speech, more OT, or a one-on-one aide,” challenged me.
Externally, I could handle the discomfort. Internally, I was wrestling with it. This diagnosis challenged me to take my ego out of it and also to have compassion for myself. Those Catholic school rules and rigidity benefited me in many ways, but they didn’t apply here.
Parenting a child with autism has also taught me to live in my own lane. This did not happen overnight. It took years.
I had to stop focusing on what other parents were doing—whether they had kids with autism or neurotypical kids. Other therapies. Other vacations. Other sports. Other camps.
I realized how much time and energy I was wasting focusing on other people instead of staying in my own lane.
These are just a few personal examples of how parenting a child with autism has helped me become a better version of myself. I challenge you to reflect on how it has changed you.
Maybe you joined the PTA to advocate for special needs kids. Maybe you became a room parent because you know your child needs extra support during holiday parties. Maybe you educate staff and teachers about how to support your child.
Maybe you created events or organizations for the special needs community. Maybe you became a special education lawyer or advocate. Maybe you wrote a book.
You don’t have to make autism your job or side hustle to see how it has changed you.
Maybe you’ve become more flexible, turning your living room into a pre-K classroom or your office into a sensory gym. Maybe you’ve become more resourceful. You learned sign language, how to use an AAC device or PECS, or how to interpret grunts, looks, and squeaks.
Maybe you’ve leveraged your child’s special interests to teach requests, complete tasks, or build routines.
Maybe you have more patience with elders who have dementia because repeated questions are part of your daily life. Maybe you have more compassion when you see a mom navigating a public meltdown. Instead of judging, you think, “I want to help her.”
Maybe you’re the go-to person at work, in your neighborhood, or in your family when someone’s child is diagnosed with autism. You say, “Tell them to call me.”
These are just a few examples. You have acquired and strengthened so many skills because of your experience as an autism mom.
Alright, that is it for this week’s episode. Thank you so much for listening, and I will talk to you next week.
Thanks for listening to The Autism Mom Coach. If you are ready to apply the principles you are learning in these episodes to your life, it is time to schedule a consultation call with me.
Podcasts are great, but insights are fleeting. Real change comes from application and implementation, and that is exactly what we do in my one-on-one coaching program.
To schedule your consultation, go to my website, theautismmomcoach.com, click “Work With Me,” and take the first step toward taking better care of yourself so you can show up as the parent you want to be for your child with autism.
