Autistic people have gifts and personalities just like everyone else does. People I know often have found a diagnosis liberating because they can often then ide

Autistic people have gifts and personalities just like everyone else does. People I know often have found a diagnosis liberating because they can often then identify the ways that being autistic has caused them friction with non-autistic society. If nothing else, they can find tools to help them work better in their environments. But they can also work to shape the world around them to be more accessible to autistic people like themselves. And that allows them to better use their gifts and express their personalities. The parent comment discussed communities of people who have similar struggles. I don't think they meant that the struggle is also the gift (people can make something beautiful out of their pain, but I don't think the pain itself is something to be celebrated). I think they meant that people in a community brought together by a common struggle are better able to see the uniqueness in each other, because within the community the struggle is not what defines them.