Becoming Superman | Episode 31
Episode 31: From Autism Diagnosis to College Freshman
Becoming Superman.
This episode begins another layer of our developmental archive.
In 2024, as my son was approaching the end of his Young Tree stage and preparing for the transition into college and emerging adulthood, I was writing Raising Superman.
As part of that process, I conducted a series of interviews with him to capture his perspective on his own growth and development before that chapter of childhood closed.
In Episode 31, we discuss the evolution of an identity that began when he was about 3 years old.
As a young child, my son had to work extremely hard to develop certain skills.
I began calling each new skill he acquired a “superpower” and called him my Super Kid.
The message was simple: If it takes you longer to learn something, keep working.
Once you acquire that skill, it becomes yours.
As he grew, something beautiful happened.
He began taking ownership of the identity I had given him.
Super Kid became Super Duper Kid.
Super Duper Kid eventually became Super Duper Young Man (SDYM).
And by the time we recorded this interview, he had decided for himself:
He was Superman.
Through the lens of the Village Engagement Matrix™, I can now see an identity developing across stages.
I gave my Acorn and Sprout language for his strength before he had the developmental capacity to define himself.
As he grew, he began participating in the construction of that identity.
And eventually, he claimed it as his own.
Today, as an Oak Tree, I see the outcome in a young man who is confident in who he is—including his identity as an individual on the autism spectrum.
That is what makes these archival conversations so valuable to me.
We are able to go back and observe development as it was happening, listen to how he understood his experiences at different stages, and then examine how those accumulated experiences show up in the Oak Tree standing before us today.
I called him Super Kid.
He ultimately decided he was Superman.
And I couldn’t be prouder.
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