You didn’t wake up this morning knowing that your world view would change, but it has. You heard the words so many of us have heard, and your heart split open.

Autism.

Or attention deficit disorder. Or anxiety disorder. Or obsessive compulsive disorder. Or mood disorder. Or some other string of seemingly random words that previously held no power but now feel like a boot crushing your chest. Heavy, suffocating, hopeless.

Yes, your and your child’s lives will have more than their fair share of challenges. The valleys will be full of frustration and bitter disappointment. But know this: The highs — oh, those peaks and zeniths and mountaintops — will hold more joy than you think your heart can hold.

Make no mistake, you’ll work hard for those heights. You’ll scrimp and save for the best doctors and therapists. You’ll fight insurance companies and relatives and friends who tell you your child doesn’t need the doctors and therapists. You’ll try therapies and medications that don’t work. You’ll battle for resources and time in classrooms led by teachers who are overtired and underpaid.

And you’ll wage war inside yourself. Every time you make a decision, you’ll worry immediately that it was the wrong one. Every time you push your child in a new direction, you’ll wonder how anyone could trust you with this precious gift. And every time you make a mistake — and you will make mistakes — you’ll be haunted by the fear that your child will suffer irreparable damage.

But you have one job and one job alone. Your job is to be the fiercest advocate for your child. You will meet the worry and the fear with education and confidence. You are strong. You are smart. You know your child in a way no therapist or doctor or teacher or armchair psychologist ever will. You are the secret weapon in that child’s arsenal. You’ll worry and then you’ll get on with the business of parenting.

You have a long journey ahead of you, but you’ll walk it hand-in-hand with all the other mothers and fathers traveling the same path. You aren’t alone and neither is your child. Labels don’t apply here. Your child isn’t Autism the same as my child isn’t ADHD and her child isn’t OCD. Our children are young, complicated, amazing little people who happen to have these disorders — but the disorders don’t define them. And they don’t define you.

Today your heart is raw and bleeding. But it’s already healing and learning and singing with the desire to protect and nurture your child — your child who hasn’t changed but who you now understand more completely. You may not feel it, but your heart is already preparing to encounter those dark lows and the criticism and disbelief they bring.

But it’s also preparing to feel my hand in yours. And bracing itself to share in the ferocious strength of your new community of moms and dads ready to fight for you. Yesterday you were just a mom like every other mom. Today you are a warrior.

Welcome to the team.

Kelly is a mom to two children and three chickens. She blogs about parenting, ADHD, living green, working from home, and life in general at The Miller Mix.