Parenting Autistic Children

Behavioral Therapies, Stereotypes, and Changing Attitudes

The pride I feel for Adam motivated me to form The Autism Acceptance Project and begin a blog titled The Joy Of Autism. Adam, who is now five years old, was diagnosed at 18 months.

Despite challenges and hurdles, Adam's affection and affable nature motivates everyone in our family to focus on quality of life . Most of us are unequipped to deal with autism, unless borne to a family with disability, or if we went to school with disabled children.

I pictured a son detached from me, rocking in a corner. Isn't that what most of the world thinks of autism? A child who is among us, but "not quite with us?" With so much uncertainty, I had to keep going back to Adam for answers when there were few to find. Adam has been my guide.

The diagnosis was in December of 2003, and we began our prescription of 40-hours of therapy per week by mid-January of 2004. Adam was now nineteen months of age and I heard "look at me," in what I now have learned to call therapy-speak or "dumb-speak." Working with Autism Play and Behavioral Therapists

Adam learned how to play ball with me before the therapists arrived. I hired an independent therapist, who really is more like Adam's friend and teacher and who is with us still. Together, we have forged ahead to develop and mold ourselves to Adam and his learning needs. We've been through the gamut of play and behavioral therapies, and found success and solace in our own.

As long as Adam was going to be viewed as pathology, I would always keep moving on, learning, and teaching Adam at an inclusive private school. Adam has shown us that he can learn and become comfortable in setting and now goes to sportball and music classes. Every year, there is some other program that has learned to include and respect autistic children.

Changing Misconceptions and Stereotypes

Adam has lead me to fascinating individuals throughout North America - fellow parents, researchers, educators, philosophers and ethicists, as well as artists - many of them autistic. In meeting individuals with all different kinds of needs - some non-verbal and needing more support than others, I began to lose the preconceptions and accepted the fact that no one could predict Adam's future.

In meeting autistic adults, I no longer saw "autism," bur rather the unique personality, dreams, and a desire to connect with me. Many are generous in sharing their lives and experiences for which I am truly grateful.

One can be an advocate for "treatments" - the word alone having negative implications for individuals often viewed as unable to "progress" without intervention. The other way to advocate is to lobby for various accommodations autistic individuals require.

I curate exhibitions and staging lectures about autism with autistic people, but I worry about negative representations of autism in the media and the "prevention" and "disease" mindset. I don't believe my son is diseased. He has tuned me into a visual world, made me sensitive to the "noise" of modern life - the obtrusiveness of the man-made environments.

Autism will change the way we view people with all kinds of disabilities. People who were diagnosed with mental retardation, schizophrenia and emotional disturbances, are being diagnosed with autism. Today, we hear labels such as learning disability, ADHD, and so many other labels, including autism. We are learning to understand difference not as aberration, or someone void of intelligence.

I continue to be vigilant about how people reference and think about autism. I believe we will see more autistic people attending colleges and universities in the future, not because we have cured them per se, but because we are learning what "accommodating autism" really means. Adam has, at the very least, taught me that.