My life

My name is Abby. I am seven and my favourite lesson in school is history, but my favourite thing in the whole entire school is awards and certificates! I have quite a lot of hobbies and a lot of friends too.

I have a massive family made up from three parts, my dad’s family, my mum’s and my stepdad’s. My dad lives in Australia. He has been living there for six years; he now lives outside Sydney. I see him every summer at my granny and grandad’s when he flies over. I live with my mum, my step-dad and my baby sister, her name is Rosie and she is three and a half.

She has special needs, which is called autism. She has beautiful red hair. Even though she now goes to nursery she still seems like a baby to me. I mainly call her cutie, because she’s so cute and cuddly. Whenever I start thinking of her I want to run to her and give her a hug. She is the cutest living being in the universe.

She can’t yet speak, although she makes some little noises. If she wants something she will usually scream or cry. It is sometimes a little bit annoying. She wrecks my room sometimes and when I play with toys she always tries to get them, and she will cry if she can’t. She never eats her meals but climbs up into the fridge and kitchen cupboards to find jaffa cakes.

I don’t know the proper meaning of autism but I think it means she is in her own world, because she always does her own thing. She can’t play games with other people, it makes me sad that she doesn’t have many friends apart from her family and the other children with Margaret, her childminder. But she does handstands and roll-overs professionally and sways to music, and her laughter is really sweet.

My hope is that she will one day be able to understand rules and be able to speak and do what everyone else can do. I don’t think she’ll ever get over her needs but she might make progress in a couple of years. I really hope she can come to my school when she’s bigger.