When doctors at CHOP diagnosed Matthew Cramer with “classic” Autism Spectrum Disorder, his mother, Julie, a physician herself, had to excuse herself.

“I was retching,” the Merion Station dermatologist tells SAVVY. “I was absolutely sick to my stomach.”

“It’s not cancer,” her husband, Warren, had reassured her. “It’s not the end of the world.”

“It sort of is,” Julie countered. For a long time, she couldn’t even say the word, autism. “I used the A word instead,” she says.

Ten years later, Julie says the full word without flinching. More than that, she’s eager to share her son’s remarkable journey.