For The Love Of A Child

My middle child is three and a half years old and is still not talking. He has his own language which only a select few understand. My son is mentally two years old. He uses a sign language only when it suits him and he throws hour long tantrums over little things. He has break downs that last at least an hour every few hours and my husband is usually the only one that calm him down. I get easily frustrated with him when he hits and screams at me. I just wished I could understand his needs, his wants. We have gone to speech therapy and have been told that he is "developmentally delayed" -- in speech, in cognition, and in social aspects. When the specialist told me this, my heart sank. A part of me knew that he was different from other children, but to hear it out of another person's mouth was disheartening, to say the least. To say that my son is different is an understatement; to say that he is amazing is an understatement. My son has the most caring and loving personality I have ever seen. The love he has for others is so overwhelming, and I couldn't imaging my life without him. He loves so fully and so amazingly. His big brother is his best friend. He follows him around and tries to mimic everything he does. Every moment he can, he goes over and kisses his little sister. He loves to come and lay next to her in the morning and she grabs handfuls of his hair and pulls it, and he just sits there and lets her do it. He doesn't complain, or hit her.

We recently moved to a new state, and we're waiting to get him into a specialist to get a full mental evaluation. I'm scared -- what they are going to tell me? What will happen when he has an official diagnosis? I don't want him to be forever associated with that. He is my son, not some disorder. He shows multiple signs of Aspbergers and possibly some other delays, but he doesn't fit into any of those categories completely (even by the DSM-IV diagnostic criteria.) He's just Brigham. He is my son and I will work my damnedest to make him feel accepted and loved in this lifetime.