Posted on 02/07/2010 5:05:15 AM PST by Patriot1259
As a five year old autistic, he HAS agendas. And his mom, dad, brother, sister, teachers, and pets are repeatedly throwing wrenches in them. Agendas include (but are not limited to) measuring crayons throughout the house, lining up Hot Wheels down the staircase, placing stickers in strategic locals (on mom’s rearview mirror, for example). Though the ‘novice’ might interpret David’s plans as misguided, the scheming is very calculated, methodical, and purposeful. And, (dare I say it) …weird.
(Excerpt) Read more at thecypresstimes.com ...
very moving, especially for anyone who lives with anyone on this spectrum
Beautiful and thought provoking. Thanks for posting.
I am the father of an almost-14-years-old autistic boy. This piece really made me cry, and I do not cry often...Autism is an epidemic, and just recently (last 15 years or so) has aggressive diagnosis programs and proper treatments been reaching the public. Our boy is basically a 3 year old in the body of a teenager. And that scares me to death, especially given the high rate of abuse (physical, psychological, and sexual) that handicapped children suffer.
Decades ago, many of these children would end up in a mental home AT CHILDHOOD, dumped by their parents, out of frustration or inconvenience. It was a common diagnosis by “experts” in Neuro-psychology up until the 80’s, that Autism was caused by “frigid mothers”, i.e., mothers whom did not express enough love or gave enough attention to these children. Imagine the damage to the family, the child and the mothers!
Somewhere in the neighborhood of 84% of parents with Autistic children end up divorcing before the child hits the teen years. I can tell you for personal experience, it is the HARDEST job you will ever have, caring for these children. And God bless those teachers and special educators that get paid peanuts at the schools to treat and care for these children and attempt to make them somewhat independent.
Please, if you even suspect something is wrong with a child you have or know-tell the parent!! Look for help immediately! Every day you wait to get help and a diagnosis, is months’ worth of cognitive ability down the drain! Denial will not help. Get help now!
Though I would have written this article from more of a father’s perspective, I share the sentiment.
My 11 year old Autistic son is a little chubby and very joyful so I refer to him often as a “Cherub”.
My wife and I, and his big sister, do make compromises but we also look for ways to enrich his life.
Often Matthew 25:45 comes to mind for me:
“Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’
I believe the reason an autistic person has such incredible concentration, is that his thoughts are extraordinarily agile and disorganized. Instead of a trains of thought, reasoning through to conclusions, his thoughts are more like a school of tiny fish, all swimming at the same time. If he is able to be extremely organized, and apply that through enormous concentration, they all swim in the same direction. If not, they dissolve into chaos. Organization is his ally, and repetition helps organize. There is nothing he fears more than the loss of order, because that means his mind can’t function.
The upside is that the innate level of chaos allows him to very quickly see problems from directions that very few other people can, suggesting solutions that many are unable to reach, certainly not that quickly. With that, however comes a difficulty in easily weighing solutions against each other. All solutions are of equal value, and he must go through a process to evaluate each, where others instinctively know. He will not think on his feet well, and compensates by restlessly exploring the scenarios ahead of time, so when the time comes, he’s already thought it through. His mind is a vast collection of facts, which can be fit together in innumerable ways.
He is incredibly creative in problem solving, but painfully not in interpersonal relationships. It’s not that his emotions are absent, but rather represent a loss of order, and therefore must be managed through focus on other things.
Thanks for the post. As a step grandfather to a 4 yo autistic otherwise healthy lad I see what a family has to go through on a daily basis. It is tough on the entire family but what this writer describes is very much reality. Thankfully there are many advances being made although sometimes it seems very slowly that can and do help these children.
My only wish is that you would have posted the article in its entirety on the thread rather than looking for a click to your blog. I feel it may have reached a few more readers that way as some or many will not click through to read a blog post. I am that way and only did it because of my interest in the subject due to its impact in the family. Again thanks anyway.
This is a huge pet peeve with me. I am uncomfortable with how generously the term “autism” is bandied about, labeling mostly young boys who act outside the “norm.” My nephew is severely autistic he is now 21 years ol. I know what autism is. But I see some of these boys that are labeled autistic and I have to say that it isn’t even close to what autism is. It’s apropos that the term agenda was used in the first sentence of this article, but it’s not the young boys’ agenda I’m worried about.
There is strong evidence that the autism epidemic is the result of people having children way too late in life. I can cast stones because my wife and I waited too long to our great regret. Although we have two healthy children, we opted not to have anymore due to severe complications with our third attempt.
This is a serious and growing problem with our society. People delay adulthood way too long. Children keep you young and help one realize that the universe does not revolve around oneself.
It was not too long ago when the normal childbearing age was the late teens. This appears to be what nature intended. The risks start climbing exponentially for women past 25 and men past 30, which means that you need to start trying to have kids sooner especially if you want a large family.
Here are some facts:
“Study results show that a mother’s and father’s risk of delivering a child with autism steadily increases as they get older. Women ages 40 and older showed a 30 percent increase in risk for having a child with autism (1 in 123), when compared to moms between the ages of 25 and 29 (1 in 156). Men ages 40 and older had up to a 50 percent increased risk of having a child with autism (1 in 116), when compared to their 25- to 29-year-old peers (1 in 176).”
mark
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