Is it wrong to envy other families children and the normalcy that they posses?

This being my first child I had certain expectations of what parenthood was going to be like, and in some ways these expectations were met. However there are things that we as parents of autistic children are experiencing that are unlike that of other parents. Everyday i am learning new ways to revel in those differences, and appreciate the fact that I have a daughter that is unlike her peers. In some ways their lives seem mundane, or average. And at times I find myself overtly happy that our life is somewhat different, but their are times that I am envious of other families. And i find myself at a crossroads wondering if it is altogether wrong to be envious of what they have.

I used to be an extremely sociable person, and this was by far the time of year I loved the most. You get together with family and friends and sit around and talk about life; yours, mine and things in general. Its a little different now. Well let me start over; I had a bad day, well actually I had a bad couple of days. I have a four year old autistic child, love her to death, she is my joy, for the most part. But just like most of you here, we have good days; were I am so optimistic about life, and I find myself thinking that things are going to work out fine, she'll get older have friends, walk, talk and be "normal". And then there are the days that I have been having lately, those days that I just want to curl up under the covers and cry myself into a new reality. Those days where not only will she not eat but she knocks all the food on the floor, or those days where she cry's countinuously non-stop for hours to the point where, Myself and her father have to step outside to argue and place the blame(because when things go bad as they often do, the faultline has to lie somewhere....if only for a moment). And on the bad days things seem like they cant get any worse...until they do. Right around Thanksgiving, my daughter had a breakthru, see she doesnt walk , or use normal speech (she does some signing, but mostly we use pictures, and do a llot of guessing). But her teachers had been calling and telling us how well she was doing at school; standing all day, and walking long distances in her gait trainer, even doing some spoon feeding on her own at home, just making a lot of progress in general. Then saturday and we couldnt get her to eat, she's fighting, and exibiting a lot of SIB's. Then the nonstop crying. now usually at this point we put her in the tub because bathtime calms her down tremendously, but not today.  read more »