So...this happened...

my son would be crushing the butterfly

Somebody stole the statue from in front of Ben's school.  It was of a boy reaching up with a butterfly alighting on his hand.  It's been a symbol for some years of what autistic kids are capable of, and is called "Beyond the Garden".  I'm not so good at symbolism, but I've personally seen lots of kids touch that statue fondly in the few months that we've been attending this school.  Extrapolate that a bit, and this is an icon that means a lot to quite a few people.  That's quite a few people to whom routine and a stable world are really important.  So...to whoever decided that sawing the boy off at the feet and selling him for scrap was a good idea...good luck!

I'm guessing that you must have a pretty crappy life to begin with to choose to do something like this.  I'm assuming that you're going to melt the statue down and sell it for scrap bronze (on that hawt scrap bronze market).  If you're not going to, you should just give it back.  You should know that parents of autistic kids are kind of a scrappy group.  Our kids train us.

I was a parent of a typical kid for 5 years before my ASD kid came along.  I thought I was tough.  I remember being in the grocery store at 1:00 a.m., picking up diapers and tylenol.  I felt lethal, a little crazed...maybe a little Mel Gibsony (pre-racism).

Now, though...I've had 4 1/2 years of autism bootcamp.  I know that Navy SEALs carry giant logs on their shoulders, but I carry an extra 40 pounds on my left arm for hours on end...every day.  I'm constantly on guard (ever since we removed the stair guards from our house) every moment that my kid's awake.  I've got plenty of adrenalin pumping through here on a regular basis.  Parents of autistic kids are often sleep deprived and may have stress disorders.  I'm not even going to talk about potty training.

So, my point to you, oh statue thief, is this:

Hide that statue.  Melt it, sell it, bury it in the desert, whatever.  Just don't let any of us autism parents spot you.