Thomas West

Alone in Autism Thomas West

The doctors said he was wrong to hope. The teachers said the same thing. The autism experts told him not to have "high expectations" for his "low functioning" child. Single father Tom West refused to listen or give up on his young son, Dante. He did his own research, traveling around the country and visiting one special needs school after another, deciding that none was right for his situation. He had to find another way, a better way -- his own way of taking Dante into the mainstream. "No one," he said again and again, "is going to tell me what he can and can't do in life." Half a dozen years later, his instincts as a father have paid off. A child who couldn't talk at three -- let alone learn to read -- is now doing both things at a level near others his age. Dante goes to a regular school, studies the piano, and plays sports with his friends in a small town in Colorado. How did Tom and Dante do what the experts said they couldn't do? How did they overcome the odds and beat the system? What can other parents learn from their experience? The answers are in Alone in Autism, a journey through the world of special needs children that changed and strengthened both father and son.