Lily_cat wrote:
The hill makes me think of the 'changeling baby' theories of old...
you know the ones that went 'baby acts odd and cries a lot? huh must be a faerie child'
The sole advantage to the modern interpretation is that at least nobody's urging the parents to leave the baby in the woods, and force Autism to bring their real child back...
My daughter is autistic. Full-blown Kanner's autism - a spoken vocabulary measured in two digits at most, little if any comprehension of abstraction in speech, no sign she will ever be toilet-trained (at the age of 7), the whole deal. Yet somehow, she manages to communicate her needs to us, and show affection. She doesn't run up to one of us, announce her love, and cover us with hugs and kisses - instead, it's more like purposefully sitting next to one of us on the couch, even leaning up against us. She knows how to ask for milk, juice, and most of her favorite foods, and usually remembers to follow that with "please". I don't think she knows what the word means, she just knows that if she uses it, she gets what she wants faster and more reliably.
She isn't "hidden" behind some "wall" - there's no "real child" stolen away from us by the great demon Autism. She's right there in front of us, trying to communicate in the ways available to her. The fact that the ways aren't always the ones favored by humanity at large does not, in my eyes, devalue her as a person.
I rather like one of the shirts at cafepress.com: "I communicate just fine. It's not my fault you don't understand my language."
_________________
Sodium is a metal that reacts explosively when exposed to water. Chlorine is a gas that'll kill you dead in moments. Together they make my fries taste good.