One of my dearest friends has a son who is just a few months older than my youngest daughter. We were together on a daily basis as our sons were also best friends. Together we watched for our younger children to reach their "projected milestones" together. From crawling to walking. From babbling to talking. As these moments came we watched my daughter reach these milestones and waited and waited for her son to reach them as well. When he was not reaching the "age appropriate" milestones, she began to worry that there was something that was not quite right. Her mother's instinct told her it was more than just a delay in development. The way he wouldn't make eye contact. The way he screamed if even the smallest things bothered him-- such as a tag on his t-shirt or music in a store. Finally, she took him to her pediatrician which let to more specialists and more testing. She eventually received the diagnosis that he was on the autism spectrum. Whereas it sounds so rainbow and pretty, it was a frustrating diagnosis for her. Yes, it answered a few questions. But for every question it answered, a hundred more were brought into her life.