Autims and cures...another distrubing thing on autism speaks

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Well I'll tell you what, it didn't take long before I started finding stuff that disturbed me after checking out the forum.

I cruised by this gem and it kind of peeved me...
http://www.autismspeaks.org/community/f ... php?t=5428

Opinions...? People seem to think that people like me (and Bill Gates) need to be cured... Maybe I'm taking it the wrong way though... I'm not terribly upset, but it does makes me sick what the mainstream society has come up with...
*tsk* *Tisk*

The person who posted that is a closed-minded twat. She claims she's curing her daughter via chelation and Lupron, when in fact she's not.

Pay no attention to her.

I think it's more that they don't see you as the typical autistic. They are focused on children who can't communicate, who are 6 and haven't potty trained, who suffer from extensive rashes, and the like. Someone like you isn't even entering their line of vision. While they can intellectually accept that you are also on the spectrum, emotionally the difference is too wide, and their heart assumes you are not part of the discussion.

They are also focused on the symptons of autism, and considering what people in this forum would refer to as illnesses that minic autism, or are associated with autism, as BEING autism. I was just given that description in a blog discussion: everything that meets the diagnostic criteria is autism, and since many conditions create similar symptons, the causes of autism are many and varied. That is their position.

I think you are onto something DW... People see the news stories, "Ooh pity this poor child suffering autism and he will never function in society..." And then they read textbook like reports of autism written by PHd's that likely haven't even spent a day talking with an autistic person, let alone lurked a community.

I've adopted a new slogan, "Autism is like Europe. If you go by the dry textbooks you read in high school, you don't get a good perspective. Now if you go to Europe and meet people who lived there, you get a much broader perspective."

Some day I hope to visit Europe. That'd be nice.

Last edited by MJIthewriter on 29 Mar 2008, 6:12 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I hope you will

I've been thinking a great deal about this since that vaccine court decision re: the child with the mitochondrial disorder.

While I can sympathize with a parent who is trying to grapple with something that is seemingly so random and incomprehensible (as a mitochondrial disorder), sometimes, there is simply nothing and no one at which one can place blame.

I really believe this is a major problem in American (and perhaps others) society today: always seeking an object upon which to place blame. Random stuff happens. Good, bad, indifferent - it happens. Sometimes, a committee gets together and gives it a name, sometimes not. Yet I believe it is a rather slippery slope when, as you have intimated, if something seems like something else, it must be that something.

Correlation is not causation.


2

PS I found it funny (in a sad, pathetic way) someone on that thread was wishing their autistic child (children) to grow up being normal 5 year olds and normal teenagers.

Oh man, DO they know what a NORMAL teen is like??? Meet my sister who invites crowds of friends over to our house. They like to hang out for long hours outside of the house... Ask her "where are you going"
her answer, "I dunno. We're going out."
"where?"
"Tonight?"
"How long"
"I dunno!"

Ehhh if that's what they want... I feel bad.

ROFL!! !!

Yeah, I was one of "those" once upon a time. SO glad I outgrew it; NOT looking forward to my NT daughter's teen years AT ALL.

Just one of the reasons I'm kind of glad my daughter's autistic. Not looking forward to my NT son's teen years, though...

I wasn't potty-trained at 6. I didn't walk or talk as early as most children did, either. I never had any real therapy aside from speech training through elementary school, and I'm doing just fine now. Those nuts at Autism Speaks are just a bunch of paranoid idiots. Autism is not caused by vaccines and it is not reversible.

I like the Europe analogy. So true.

Thanks everyone for your support. I honestly believe many parents have the best intentions, but some are misguided.

I'm not going to stand in the way with special diets, riding horses, or whatever other crazy inane therapy within reason... (besides if I tried to tell them otherwise they won't believe me) If the parents believe it helps good for them.... But when they expect a "cure" or their child to "recover" I don't want to bust their bubble... Okay maybe I do...in as polite of a way as I can... I want them to get realistic. *pulls out super long cartoon pin*

I get worried though when parents start drugging their children and doing harmful things because they believe it helps... That gets disturbing...

Funny I never see any mention or DSM IV diagnosis for people who compulsively bully others. It's always the victims that need to be "cured" I find that odd really... Maybe all bullies should be cured. I support that cause.

Or remind her that Lupron is the drug that assists with chemical castration! Way to pursue eugenics!

A diet has really helped a friend of mine and I think that it may be possible a slightly less stringent diet may have helped me
However what has helped me more imho is love and patience that and my own aspie stubbornness and perseverance

the problem is when people from both groups [NT and ASD] do not understand all the Autistics who make up the spectrum of Autism,there is usually judging from own experience as being that of everyone,or judging from a few as meaning the entire spectrum.

some do not understand that autism does cause suffering for some [which is unhelped by adaptions,full support,full training of those around,medications etc],the ones who denie autism outside of severe autism have probably never heard of aspergers or BAP [can't spell the full words,but it's the term am have seen used for very HF ASD when theres no impairment and not enough traits to be diagnosed with a ASD] so they wont even know about Bill Gates having something to do with Autism.


re. riding horses as therapy.
this is something that helped am very strongly through RDA [riding for the disabled association] sessions,am have a profound connection with horses that is not there with humans,it also calms, and reduces meltdowns/headbanging but did not help am with language/speech like it does for others.
Am recommend trying RDA sessions or mainstream sessions,if it does not have a therapy affect on HFAers/aspies,it will on exercise.

Oh well said! Learn about other people's experiences to get the whole picture. Otherwise you really don't know.