Autism debate

[Midnight_Fairy]

I would never actually hope for a child with autism though but he is who he is! x

 

[JASMAK]

I agree Midnight, but I also know, if I could take Makena's autism away, I would. I think if you asked me a year ago, I would have said no, but the past few days have made me change my mind. I know that would 'change' her, but at the same time, I hate to see her struggle so much.

 

[Midnight_Fairy]

we are having a "bad autism" week this week xxx

 

[JASMAK]

Sometimess I dislike autism but its who he is, struggles and all x

I know what you mean...it's part of them, for sure. But, I hate it too. I hate to see her struggle. I am having a bad time with it right now too, just because M wasn't invited to two birthday parties this weekend, and they were for girls who M plays with DAILY, and both came to hers. I thought they were friends, but time and time again, she doesn't get invited, and it pisses me off. She is a wonderful person who LOVES her friends, and she acts 'funny' and well, you know how it is with the behaviour, and that is when I hate hate hate it. It's not fair!

I hear you hun, I know what you mean. I was meaning to the other poster who was just posting quotes saying it was wrong to describe my child as a child with autism :S x

Uh, I posted plenty in my own words as well. I posted two well respected pieces from a well respected autistic author. Everything above "by Jim Sinclair" was my own.

If you do not see autism as inherently bad, you would not be comparing it to cancer. You would compare it to being female perhaps. Or being <race>. For example, being African American in the US has caused a lot of hate, discontent, racism, etc for over a century. Being African American can result in fewer chances for jobs, rude commentary, being excluded from events, as a result of racists that refuse to tolerate and embrace diversity.

But you would never say "person with africanism" or "person with decent from Africa". You say African American person, because there is nothing bad or nothing to be ashamed of, and if someone else has a problem with their race, it is recognized as the racists problem, not the african american's problem.

That's where the autism community is trying to get with autism. There is nothing inherently bad about being autistic. It is a part of who we are down to the core. The vast majority of problems are caused by a lack of understanding in society. It's just sadly still acceptable to be ableist.

Ummm....a person who is african american, hispanic, or native Indian (examples) is actually what they are! There is no 'challenge' in it? Saying a person is an 'albino kid' or 'deaf kid' or 'autistic' is in no way shape or form the same as saying my kids are native (which they are). Saying some is a 'pianist' I can understand, because it is a strength. Saying my kids are native (or natives) although, I wouldn't say it that way, it's not a CHALLENGE, as autism is, or at least, the autism my daughter has. I am only going on MY experiences. I have four friends (close ones) whose children are SEVERELY affected by autism, and they DO NOT call their children 'autistic'. My sister works with a man (he is a doctor) whose son suffers with albinoism, and she accidently said 'your albino kid' and he got very offended and told her so. It is the same here. Honestly, this isn't the first conversation on this site where I am trying to relay this message. It's picking out a trait that you may not want people to know, that is a challenge, and sticking it front of their name and title to describe someone. Not cool. OK, going to leave this now. I just had a chat with my sister about it, and she told me about the albino comment, and I said "EXACTLY". My sister felt HORRIBLE and gets it.

 

[Wantingbbbump]

My daughter has Autism and I love her more than anything. It is hard to understand her though. She acts like dogs and horses and will get into it to the point that when she is "Doggy Megan" she will pretend to pee on people. She walks around on all 4's. She has NO friends and gets picked on all of the time. She is 10y/o and is like a 5y/o mentally. She is in the 4th grade but can only do 1st 2nd grade work. She picks at her scalp until it bleeds and scabs up and she now has bald spots from this, she hit's kick's bite's and will shut down and we will have to wait for her to open back up. She also cries a lot if she feels like people are yelling or fighting. It's really bad if she gets into trouble for something. I hate watching how other people treat her. I have had other kids beat the hell out of her after they asked if she could play and have even had to call the cops after a child threw a rock at her that broke her tooth and she went into shock from it. Just thinking about these days make me cry because she is such a sweet little girl. She has the biggest heart and I love her so damn much. It's hard for me because I have to try and tell her why these kids treat her like this after she was so happy that someone asked her to play. She also has ADHD and OCD. But she is beautiful and loves to sing and she is really good at it too, like she can sing Katy Perry and you will think she is listening to the radio. She is also very very funny. Adults can't help but fall in love with her. She is also starting to realize that she is different from other kids and try's to be "normal" but gives up.

I also have a nephew with Autism and he has it worse than my daughter does and it's the saddest thing to watch. He is 7 and weighs 101lbs from all of the meds he has to take and the fact that he has to eat the same foods everyday. He throws huge violent fits so my parents just give him what he wants. He can be a big love bug but 98% of the time he is hitting you or hurting you in someway. His mother also has it and I have a cousin that does as well. To me there is no debate..it's a disability and is in a way a disease because it effects the brain. IDK all I know is the hurt that this causes the people that I know that I love very much!!!!

 

[suzib76]

for me i dont see the debate

i think that as you have no first hand experience of autism you unfortunately fall into the 'cant see a physical disability so its not real' camp

my son is currently being diagnosed with having Aspergers and i can assure you his disability is very very real

 

[JASMAK]

My daughter has Autism and I love her more than anything. It is hard to understand her though. She acts like dogs and horses and will get into it to the point that when she is "Doggy Megan" she will pretend to pee on people. She walks around on all 4's. She has NO friends and gets picked on all of the time. She is 10y/o and is like a 5y/o mentally. She is in the 4th grade but can only do 1st 2nd grade work. She picks at her scalp until it bleeds and scabs up and she now has bald spots from this, she hit's kick's bite's and will shut down and we will have to wait for her to open back up. She also cries a lot if she feels like people are yelling or fighting. It's really bad if she gets into trouble for something. I hate watching how other people treat her. I have had other kids beat the hell out of her after they asked if she could play and have even had to call the cops after a child threw a rock at her that broke her tooth and she went into shock from it. Just thinking about these days make me cry because she is such a sweet little girl. She has the biggest heart and I love her so damn much. It's hard for me because I have to try and tell her why these kids treat her like this after she was so happy that someone asked her to play. She also has ADHD and OCD. But she is beautiful and loves to sing and she is really good at it too, like she can sing Katy Perry and you will think she is listening to the radio. She is also very very funny. Adults can't help but fall in love with her. She is also starting to realize that she is different from other kids and try's to be "normal" but gives up.

I also have a nephew with Autism and he has it worse than my daughter does and it's the saddest thing to watch. He is 7 and weighs 101lbs from all of the meds he has to take and the fact that he has to eat the same foods everyday. He throws huge violent fits so my parents just give him what he wants. He can be a big love bug but 98% of the time he is hitting you or hurting you in someway. His mother also has it and I have a cousin that does as well. To me there is no debate..it's a disability and is in a way a disease because it effects the brain. IDK all I know is the hurt that this causes the people that I know that I love very much!!!!

Just wanted to send you lots of hugs x x x x

 

[Justagirlxx]

I'm going to try to say this in the nicest way possible. I don't understand how autism could be considered anything but "bad". Not that the children with it are bad of course. But...isn't having any type of disability bad? For example any sort of mental ******ation, mental illness, etc. If it's not something you would WANT your children to be born with, I wouldn't consider it to be a positive trait. The struggles they face in their day to day life and the fact that many of these children who are not high functioning will never grow up able to care for themselves is to me the reason why of course we view autism as something that is an undesirable trait. I may be missing something and I'm truly sorry if I've offended any of you who are parents of autistic children. x

 

[Menelly]

You hope you don't offend the parents of autistics, but don't particularly care if you offend autistics?

Those of us on the spectrum, from high functioning to low functioning don't consider it "bad" because then it's one small step to US being bad. Because we feel that it is as much a part of who we are, our identity, as gender or race is, saying autism is "bad" means that we ourselves are "bad" and that's not something we're ever going to agree on.

There really is an autism culture out there. We're growing. And we're happy not being "normal". Do we want better services for people who need them? Absolutely. Do we want better housing options, better schooling, help after reaching 21 (when you get shoved out of the public school system in the US)? Absolutely. But we don't want to be "fixed" and we are not "bad."

 

[Tiff]

With going through the motions of having our daughter diagnosed, we've been watching/reading more about Temple Grandin. For those who don't know her, she's high functioning autistic and is one of the best known Autism advocates.

She's a massive supporter of neurodiversity, and doesn't want a full cure of the entire Autism spectrum. My husband and I watched an hour and 20 minute lecture of hers on Youtube (search "My experience with Autism - Temple Grandin) and she talks about it on there as well... she feels that without people on the spectrum you wouldn't have cellphones, TV's, etc as you need those people who are preoccupied with certain things to get there.

So I do get where Menelly is coming from.

That being said, I can totally understand where Midnight Fairy and Jasmak are coming from too. I don't think there's anything wrong with a mother wanting there to be as little hardships as possible for their children. Maybe that's not the greatest way to put it, but I know it breaks my heart when I can't even bring Claire into a room with a large group of people as she emotionally shuts down, screeching and crying, burrowing her head into my shoulders and clasping her hands over her ears.

Or when we go on playdates and she goes off and amuses herself in the corner rather than playing with the other kiddos.

 

[vintage67]

My 7 year old son has Asperger's Syndrome. I don't talk about it on Baby and Bump much. Our struggles started when he was 3. He started preschool and it became so blindingly obvious how different he was than the other 3 year olds. He spent "free drawing" time writing out multiplication tables and he could read every sign in preschool, even found the warning labels on the window blinds and read them to the teacher. But he couldn't tell me how his day went and he didn't play with the other children.

Four years later things are better, but social issues are a constant struggle.

We have a friend who is 30 years old and had Asperger's syndrome. He found his niche in life and has a Phd in Mathematics. He has a circle of kind of odd, quirky friends like himself and he can escape into his passion of math and also make a living from it. He had excellent parents who were well off and could give him all the help that he needed.

We aren't well off, but we are fully committed to giving our son all that we can. He also has our complete understanding. My husband and I are 44 and 37. They didn't diagnose these things back then, and we now see ourselves in our son's behavior. There is no doubt that some of those tendencies he inherited.

Our son mystified a lot of specialists. Asperger's Syndrome is a "close" diagnosis. We have a Center of Autism Studies here in our city and after hours with our son I really loved their "unofficial diagnosis"--they said he was
"oddly related." I love that term.

 

[JASMAK]

My daughter is 7 and she BEGS and CRYS for me to make her autism go away. I think it's great if people who have autism are happy, that is all I wish for my daughter, but to assume that everyone has autism *is* happy is short-sighted. Again, I will say that there is varying degrees of autism, and some with higher-functioning, who can live a normal, or mostly normal, lifestyle will be happier, probably, than someone who is profoundly affected who can never live alone, work, get married, etc. It's apples and oranges.

 

[YoshiPikachu]

You hope you don't offend the parents of autistics, but don't particularly care if you offend autistics?

Thanks what I was thinking.

 

[JASMAK]

You hope you don't offend the parents of autistics, but don't particularly care if you offend autistics?
Those of us on the spectrum, from high functioning to low functioning don't consider it "bad" because then it's one small step to US being bad. Because we feel that it is as much a part of who we are, our identity, as gender or race is, saying autism is "bad" means that we ourselves are "bad" and that's not something we're ever going to agree on.

There really is an autism culture out there. We're growing. And we're happy not being "normal". Do we want better services for people who need them? Absolutely. Do we want better housing options, better schooling, help after reaching 21 (when you get shoved out of the public school system in the US)? Absolutely. But we don't want to be "fixed" and we are not "bad."

Well, you do?! You just don't think so! So...I don't get your beef, honestly. Anyhoo...before you pick apart someone else's post when they are actually TRYING to not be offensive, why not look at your own posts where you know some don't like the words "autistics" (to me, just as bad as ret*rds) and think about how that would offend someone, like me. Just sayin.

 

[vintage67]

At this stage I am generally more sad than my son that he has no friends. He is often too socially unaware to realize how bad he is being slighted or left out of things. It makes me very sad.

 

[Justagirlxx]

You hope you don't offend the parents of autistics, but don't particularly care if you offend autistics?

Those of us on the spectrum, from high functioning to low functioning don't consider it "bad" because then it's one small step to US being bad. Because we feel that it is as much a part of who we are, our identity, as gender or race is, saying autism is "bad" means that we ourselves are "bad" and that's not something we're ever going to agree on.

There really is an autism culture out there. We're growing. And we're happy not being "normal". Do we want better services for people who need them? Absolutely. Do we want better housing options, better schooling, help after reaching 21 (when you get shoved out of the public school system in the US)? Absolutely. But we don't want to be "fixed" and we are not "bad."

I'm sorry I worded that wrong, I don't want to offend anyone. , children or adults on the autism spectrum... anyways, I think Jasmak said it right up there, there's a world of difference between high functioning individuals such as yourself and the lower functioning who struggle so much and dont have the hope of being independent and taking care of themselves someday, graduating, getting married, having a family. I'm glad you are proud of who you are and I'd never try to fix someone that is happy and thriving, but someone who is struggling with more severe autism, of course I would give anything to take away their pain and make things easier for them so they can live a normal life.

 

[Karlie06]

My son is almost 8 and he is non verbal, struggles everyday with simple things and will need help for the rest of his life. He has severe autism and if I could, I would take away his autism in a heartbeat. I just want to make life a little easier for him xx

 

[leelee]

I think people who have autism are born with it. I do believe early intervention can make a huge difference with coping skills, social skills etc. I have worked with children and adults with autism/aspergers for 15 years.

One of my closest friends has a child with autism too. We speak about how she is feeling regularly and although she adores him, she would take away his autism in a heartbeat too. She said it breaks her heart when people stare at him in the shopping centre.

 

[hastbury]

Fascinating stuff here, and interesting debates, funnily enough not necessarily the original one!

I just wanted to contribute this. My husband is Asperger's. He is an adult. He functions in society (albeit with extra challenges compared to others).

Yes, sometimes he does feel like an 'alien in an alien world'...but the last thing he wants to do is find others who are the same, online or otherwise! He would much prefer to feel that he is able to function in whatever situation life throws at him, just like the rest of us, whether those around him respect/understand him, or not.

This really doesn't seem to be in line with what menelly is saying, yet my husband is an aspie. So does that make him different to you, by any chance? Does that mean (shock horror) he might have different views on how he wants to conduct himself? Could that even mean that he has traits that belong to him as a person, and not only as an aspie?

Food for thought for all.

 

[Aidan's Mummy]

Those of us on the spectrum, from high functioning to low functioning don't consider it "bad" because then it's one small step to US being bad.

I don't think anyone can say that all children/adults that have Autism don't see it as 'bad' or a struggle. In fact it is unfair to say how every person with Autism feels or how it affects them because they are an individual. Menelly just because you or others you know/have spoken to say it isn't a 'bad' thing to them doesn't mean that all people with autism think that. I have a close friend with two children both have Autism but at completely opposite ends of the scale. The oldest child is now 16 and lives a next to normal life and she hasn't really suffered in a sense apart from being bullied by ignorant people. However her younger brother HAS suffered, he is still doubly incontinent at the age of 14, he has no speech just grunts, he is petrified of any noise he does not recognise, he has fits and he has violent outburst where he will harm himself badly if not restrained. What is good about any of those things? How could he think none of those things are bad? As they cause HIM pain, upset, confusion and frustration. I hate it when people generalise and use their experiences to say everyone with a certain condition thinks/feels the same way. Jasmak and midnight were not saying that having autism is 'bad' or that everyone that has autism thinks it's bad. They are saying the symptoms often associated with Autism ARE bad they DO cause suffering and not all people with Autism do see it as something that isn't life limiting etc. Just to add the older girl I described prefers to say I have Autism and she hates being called Autistic as she believes it takes away her identity as an individual person. Again another example of how people with autism perceive it in varying ways
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