“Kids will not listen to that. They’re going to experiment no matter what, so you have to be honest.”

You totally value and respect your body as you get older.

I didn’t have to work out before 35 but now I have to.

I guess now that I think back, I used to play priest and be a funny priest. I don’t know, I grew up in such a Catholic family that I kind of liked to test the boundaries a little bit and I think I had fun watching my mom laugh.

I’m so scared girls look at my breast implants and think, ‘To get boys, you need big boobs.’ I tell them, ‘Don’t get it done. Those fears go away. You develop other insecurities, but breasts aren’t one of them.’ I want to get them half-size.

I tried a few times, unsuccessfully, to lose weight. It wasn’t until I joined Weight Watchers that I was finally able to do it. I went to meetings and my son came with me. The best thing was that I could eat what I wanted and still lose weight. Slow and steady, I was getting my pre-pregnancy body back.

A talk show is difficult because the formula is always the same: there’s a host and there’s guests. Really what you can change is only so much. So, I don’t have any pre-interviews, which forces real conversation.

Those outside of autism need to understand this is an epidemic and we need more government funding, insurance coverage and education reform.

Craziest thing I’ve done for love is getting married. I think it’s crazy. I think it’s crazy, crazy, crazy. I’m never going to say I wouldn’t do it again but I have to make sure it’s love and not settling for the ‘I have to do this by a certain age,’ which is kind of what I did.

For a seriously autistic kid, the best prognosis might be getting into a mainstream school without being too much of a shadow. For a moderately autistic kid the best prognosis is full recovery.

I look at autism like a bus accident, and you don’t become cured from a bus accident, but you can recover.

Google is one of the most incredible breakthroughs that we have today. Yes, it can scare a lot of patients, thinking we’re all dying because we look up something on Google. But there’s also a lot of anecdotal information from parents, firsthand accounts of what they did for their own child.

All those girls who were mean to me[in high school], I pay them back by going through the drive-through window and asking for my burger. That feels really great.

It’s absolutely imperative for the parents and the typical kids to have time by themselves, to go out to dinner or even go on vacation while someone else cares for the autistic child.

I can’t even begin to tell you how many casting couches I was attacked on. Not just by casting people, but by stars.

I figured out something spiritual. Billboard this: ‘Life is supposed to be fun!’

I have my once-a-month nachos, but it’s soy cheese and turkey chili on it, so it’s somewhat safe. But it’s still a big vice for me, because I have a big bowl of it.

I’m not a hero or a superstar. I’m an everyday guy. I feel happy when children approach me. I feel that something good is happening in life when little kids recognise me.

Every kid I knew had a father with a little stash of men’s magazines which the father thought was secret and which the kid knew all about.

I am who I am: an Irish Catholic kid, working class from Long Island. And I made it big.

I compare songwriting to childbirth. How many kids can you have before your uterus explodes?

I would say my greatest achievement in life right now – my greatest achievement period is – and I’m still trying to achieve it – is to be a wonderful father to my kids.

Your parents were always trying to get you to be careful when you were a kid, and that’s all pervasive in this society.

The party now is having my kids laugh and my wife laugh and my teammates. I want them to see me have fun and put it in a different way.

I like to make things. Its been part of my identity since I was a kid.