To the Subway Employees Who Made the 'Wrong' Sandwich for My Son With Autism

You didn’t know my son is on the autism spectrum when he asked for a sandwich with ham and pepperoni and nothing else on it. He pointed to the meat in the display counter. 

You made a sandwich for a cold cut combo with pre-prepped meat, and we took it home.

Fifteen minutes later I was back and explaining he wouldn’t eat it because the pre-prepped meat wasn’t the same color as the meat in the display counter. I told you he has Asperger’s syndrome and cannot eat the one you made. So you kindly remade it with meat from the display counter, and I am grateful.

What you don’t know is he has sensory issues with many things like clothes, noise and food. He only eats about 12 things period, and venturing into Subway was a big deal for him. He came unglued when the meat didn’t look the same in that sandwich, and it put him into an anxiety attack. Every day is a challenge to prep food for him that he will not find too crunchy, or too sticky or too something. It is beyond his control.

Thank you, for your kindness — for just understanding and making the sandwich again with the same meat, only a different color, to make a little boy less anxious so he could eat. You made our night.

The Mighty is asking the following: Share with us an unexpected act of kindness, big or small, that you’ve experienced or witnessed in an everyday place. If you’d like to participate, please send a blog post to community@themighty.com. Please include a photo for the piece, a photo of yourself and 1-2 sentence bio. Check out our Submit a Story page for more about our submission guidelines.