I am a good parent. There, I said it. Sometimes, admitting that you are actually doing a good job can be as hard as admitting you need help. Don’t get me wrong – I am not perfect. I have felt so exhausted that I have given in and handed over that cake, or turned on CBeebies. I have wondered whether autism is an excuse.
But I have also followed a steep learning curve with parenting, especially when dealing with an autistic child. You know what? I am pretty damn good at dealing with my son. I can anticipate his reactions in a split second. I can work out which deviations from routine will completely overwhelm him, and which he can work through. I have reserves of patience far beyond what I thought possible. I am an expert on my children.
There are people who will watch my son and think I am a bad parent. I have heard someone express the opinion that Asperger Syndrome, and HFA, are ‘just an excuse for arseholes to behave like arseholes’. There are people, reading this now – yes, even you – who have seen situations similar to the ones I am about to describe and they have thought unkind and ungenerous thoughts. They have wondered whether my child is autistic or a spoiled brat.
‘That’s quite the scream. I wouldn’t stand for that. No child of mine would be making that noise in a public place – I’d march them straight out, so they knew on no uncertain terms that kind of behaviour isn’t acceptable.’
Now it’s time for you to admit it – you’ve had those thoughts. Autism or spoiled. I know you have; I had them too – before. So I want you to imagine this…
You join the queue at a coffee shop and are confronted with a small boy flailing his arms and gritting his teeth. His mother is trying to hold him, stop him lashing out and hitting the class cabinet of glistening pastries. She whispers reassuringly –
“Sweetheart, I am so sorry. They don’t have a muffin. But you are still such a good boy, mummy is so proud. You can choose a different cake, I promise.”
The boy screams.
“Nooooo! Muffin! I wanted a chocolate muffin mummy!”
Autism or spoiled brat, hey? It’s almost like a scene from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
BUT
An hour ago, my son was in a barber’s chair, sitting so, so quietly. He finds getting his hair cut very distressing. Any deviation from the routine or unexpected event is absolutely terrifying for him. I do not use that description lightly. Think about what that means for a second – absolutely terrifying. But he has behaved impeccably; I am so proud. I promised him that if he was a good boy, he would have a chocolate muffin. He skips along, so happy and excited by my praise.
“Mummy! Mummy!” he shouts as he reaches for my hand, “I have been such a good boy! I can have a muffin!”
My heart breaks for him when, for the first time in memory, they do not have chocolate muffins; he thinks he has not been a good boy after all.
As you make your way through the aisles of clothing, you hear a boy screaming. You can’t help but search around to see what the commotion is. Finally, you see him, spread out on the floor. He is half sobbing, half screaming, kicking his legs violently as his mother tries frantically to scoop him up. As she does, his legs and arms hit her in the face and body. She ignores it and struggles to lift him. It is a huge effort to get him out of the shop; he is not small and those kicks and flaps are hurting her.
Wow. That’s pretty violent, right? I mean, he didn’t deliberately hit her but perhaps that child needs to know that those kinds of physical outbursts are not the way we behave?
BUT
Outside, on a bench, away from the stares, my son clings to me. Between sobs, I have finally worked out what I said that upset him so much that it was akin to physical pain. I said the hat had ‘The Cookie Monster’ on it. But the hat was covered in Cookie Monsters. For my gorgeous boy, mistakes, inconsistencies – they cannot just be shrugged away; they are a cigarette held to his skin until the relief of the correction comes. “Mummy, I was so sad. I was so sad because you said it wrong. It was wrong mummy!” he sobs. I stroke his hair. He is no longer flailing; he strokes my arm for comfort – my dear, loving, sweet boy.
“I know bubba. Mummy said it wrong. There were lots of Cookie Monsters. What a silly mummy, to make such a mistake.” His whole body relaxes in my arms.
And there are dozens of others I could describe –
Once, the sunshine made shifting shadows on the path and he was too scared to walk. After trying for an age try to calm, to persuade, I carried him, screaming, through the National Trust Gift Shop…
Once, he found a toy car park at the Children’s Centre, identical to the one at home, but with one horrifying difference – part of the spiral track was missing, forming a hole. Tormented by the other children sending cars down the track and into the abyss, he pushed them aside and sobbed and sobbed and sobbed…
Once, at a pizza restaurant, we forgot his special cup – the ONLY one he will drink from. And we could not make the screaming stop. He screamed and screamed and daddy ran back to the car, ran to the shops down the road to try to find an identical cup – but none could be found. The screaming only subsided after an hour, first turning to sobs, and then finally to whimpers.
I am not a bad parent. My son is not a naughty boy. He does not deserve for anyone to question: autism or spoiled ? He is sweet, honest, and affectionate.
And he suffers, every day, in ways that you – and even I – can barely begin to understand.
So if you see my boy in despair, if you read this and you still judge, still see bad parents and naughty children, if you think autism is an excuse when you have little idea what the reality is – well let’s just say it’s not my four year-old son who is the arsehole.
To read more about our autism journey, take a look at ‘To my son – your stimming is beautiful’.
Autism or spoiled: an excuse for bad parenting?
Someone's Mum 
Thank you for writing this. You have expressed perfectly what probably a lot of parents wish they could.
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What a wonderful post and I really do understand. We are going through a diagnosis process for our son and even though his behaviour only happens pretty much at home at the moment, I have to constantly reassure myself that I am not a bad parent. People are so quick to judge but you are right, we shouldn’t because we never really know what is going on
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This is the very first time I feel like I really get what Autism is. I’ve heard it explained a thousand times, but a small part of me (as you say) deep down felt they were just being naughty…even though, rationally, I knew that wasn’t true. Easy to feel that when I have 2 kids without Autism. But this article really got me. I never imagined it as a pain that won’t stop. Thank you!
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Thank you for this, I needed to read this this morning. It was a rough morning, with my 4 yr old autistic sweet little girl. She wanted the back seat of the bus but she plays with the emergency door so she is not allowed to sit there anymore and it was chaos to get her to move. I felt like no one understood, even the special needs bus driver. I felt alone and my muscles ached from trying to lift my precious little girl and make her understand that another seat was just as good. I finally got her to calm down. She’s the sweetest thing but sometimes, well, you know, you’ve been there. It would mean so much if others would say something nice, or help in some way, or even an empathetic smile would be so helpful. I wish more people would understand what we go through with our special children. I hope and pray that someday we won’t have to explain why our children do what they do, but rather get a helping hand, or a kind smile instead of a judgmental grunt or groan.
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As a parent of an ASD/SPD child, I can identify with everything you say here. You just have to ignore the indignant reactions of strangers and do the best you can for your child in that situation. I’ll openly admit that I used to be embarressed but now I have hardened up and it is the judgemental people that should be embarressed by their lack of understanding. Keep at it, keep smiling, it is worth it, even on the toughest of days! x
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Sending love, been there so many times, oh so very many times. You are the best mum, and he is the best boy. Everyone else can just take a running jump;-)
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You write so beautifully.
I don’t even have an autistic child but still experience a few of these issues when things don’t quite the way my son expected. Motherhood is hard!
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I’m willing to bet that you are probably one of the best mum’s ever because you always have to anticipate what might go wrong. Well done, it looks like you’re doing an amazing job
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What a beautiful article. I am a SENCO and every time I hear or see those behaviours you have described I always think to myself ‘they might have special needs’. I have even trained my husband to think this way as he used to look in the supermarket or the sandwich shop. But there was a time, I will admit, when I didn’t think this. I am in awe of parents of children with special needs. You do an amazing job.
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As the mom of 2 boys who both had communication impairments, I feel what you are saying, and why I wrote this page of how to answer “what’s wrong with him?
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Yes. Just yes. Thank you for sharing.
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Hi. My daughter had definite traits of HFA – we wait to see if she will choose to seek a diagnosis and have spoken to her about it etc. Just wanted to mention the times we waver in our own beliefs/knowledge about our children and judge ourselves! I think especially with articulate HFA. Other people or just our own prior experiences with neuro-typical siblings make us doubt and we pause and consider what we are doing…. “have we got it right? Is this behaviour deliberate? Are we right to make reasonable adjustments?” (E.g. Taking daughter to school rather than her getting school bus) It can be a tricky path at times and one we tread carefully. We should remember that most of us do our very best most of the time and we should forgive ourselves when we get it wrong!
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I have shared this with my mother. It is so reflective of some of the grief she has been given raising my brother who has autism too. Very interesting read
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The next time you have doubts about blogging…remember this…the more I read the more I learn…and the less judgmental I become…
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As someone who has Asperger Syndrome, I can relate to how this kid feels, I haven’t screamed exactly… but I have done things similar, I can’t leave the house without wearing a Hoodie and a rucksack on my back as it doesn’t feel right at all, but my Mum wouldn’t believe me, in fact she refused to let me leave the house to go to College if I was wearing a hoodie, her reasoning was because it was sunny; however three hours later it was pouring down with rain… I didn’t even get a full on apology, just my Dad calling me saying to make my way down to Subway where he was there with a Hoodie for me at a Car Park halfway down, and my Mum responded when I came home saying “I was just thinking about you, I realized it was raining and went “Oh dear,”” but that wasn’t a full-on apology…
I’ve corrected people for how they mispronounce words and they have a go at me for it, when I say I can’t help it, they just don’t believe me and think I like pissing them off, but I do it out of habit, I see people misspell on social media websites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and I just want to correct them so badly, I literally twitch at the errors.
Whenever I walk into my Town, or wait for the bus, I always put on my headphones, the only time I take them off is when someone is talking to me, or when I talk to Staff at a shop, while no-one has questioned me about this, they just think I’m antisocial, when that’s not the case, the music calms me, I like to think creatively and when I listen to music, I just picture myself in a world where everything I create becomes a reality, it helps me get through the day all the time.
People say I use my disability as a way to justify my actions, but I’ve rarely brought up my disability out of fear of how they react. Yeah, I’ve been bullied because of my disability, but that’s because no-one understands what it is and thinks it’s an infectious virus.
What this Mum is doing, is brilliant, it shows that she has learnt the understand how her son would react and hasn’t snapped at him for his actions, nor has she tried to tell him to shut up or quiet down because they’re in a public place, she deserves way more respect for what she’s doing and I hope other parents will learn and understand their Children if they have Autism also 🙂
I’m sorry for essentially making this comment all about me… I’ve just not had the chance to talk about it, and considering this is relevant, I thought it would be good to type it in to see how others deal with their Asperger Syndrome and what they do.
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Thank you so much for taking the time to share your experience and for your kind words. I love to hear from adults with autism as my son is so very small and it is not always easy to figure out how things may feel for him. I am so sorry you had such difficult experiences with your own parents. Unfortunately, there are sill those who do not understand autism and Asperger’s today, even when their children are diagnosed. It is a steep learning curve. If parents mistake some behaviours for just bad behaviour or overreacting then it can be really harmful, though they may not mean it to be. That is why I think it is so important to be open and honest and share information, from all perspectives – so thank you so much for doing that for me today. I wish you well.
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I know how you feel. I have 2 children that way. I get embarrassed how they act. Because how others act. They really don’t realize what is happening.
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The NAS used to produce little cards with a brief, positive explanation of ASD and links to more info. I’m not sure if they still do, but it would be easy to tailor make some with whatever words you feel are right for you. I would hand them over to the judgey people with a big smile and a “Thank you for your understanding”. It helped.
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All the behaviours you described – I know them very well from my own childhood. And I also remember yearning for physically challenging activities which were denied me on the grounds of my having asthma and allergies (my mother – most probably an aspie herself – was somehow oblivious to the fact that I would run with other kids like crazy with no symptoms at all), and yearning for an emotionally neutral and decisive father (my father is an artist, and autistic himself, with narcissistic emotional display – I’ll come back to this later). I wanted to be heard out intellectually, but most of the time my adult comments were not heard, and I was insistently expected to behave and talk childishly, which left me severely frustrated and morbig for weeks on end.
I suffered from having to learn the slow way, like other kids at school. The resulting boredom would literally kill me – leaving me lifeless and depressed for whole days. I was especially interested in music (specifically vocals, keys, and drums) as well as dancing (which to me came so naturally I responded to seeing dancing figures, whether on TV or live, at such a visceral level that I wouldn’t even know what they were doing was called dance – my whole body and mind were that excited). Unfortunately, my depressed and sexist mother and grandmother (as well as other authority figures in my early environment) punished me not only for dancing, but even for single slight displays of graceful movement, which they (predominantly married women) saw as girlish and not becoming of a boy. I saw, and felt, it as an attack on my very vitality (movement was on my mind all the time, and I automatically imagined every system about which I learned at school, whether chemical, mathematical, biological or geological, as flow). But I warmed up to school subjects and I’d get passionate about pretty much every thing (though I loved languages the most – espiecially for the sound, but also, as I realized later in life, for their being somewhat exotic objects to me, and secondary to life).
One thing I can definitely, after years of turning the matter in my head, connect with my sensory sensitivity and excitability is being bathed in hot water as a child, and having to accomodate to too hot and stuffy air in winter – it made me sluggish and restless, whereas cold to moderate room temperatures were soothing to me. Another thing which wrought havoc on my system was having to eat early in the morning within less than one hour from wake up – I would rarely feel hungry before 3 hours after wake up.
I didn’t like being touched on the top of my skull, kissed on the forehead or on the cheeks by family members, and I remember responding fiercely at being scolded for avoiding it. I’d get angry when adults laughed when I demanded they ask children to do things – the way they asked each other to do stuff (instead of ordering us to do them). I also remember being embarrassed for the men when they behaved chauvinistically around women, or spoke disparagingly of them. All forms of unfair, unreasonable, and unfettered behaviour were acutely displeasing to me, and sometimes I’d lash out at people who displayed it, very vehemently, with no regard for age or authority.
I’d rage whenever adults laughed at me for behaving in an adult way, bc I spoke to them as another human, and not as a child at all, and I expected them to react to the content and not the form of my message. In fact, I can say with full consciousness there were moments when I’d slip into childish mode quite abruptly, as if I changed seats on an airplane or moved between being an actor and a member of the audience. There were moments I’d identify primarily as an adult mind within a child’s body, but when I acted in an unpremeditated way (as when laughing, singing, or dancing), I was a boy alright.
Being squeezed at the sides and even crushed in my mothers arms felt good (until I developed fear of it as a result of her violent and erratic behaviour). I hated touch that was too soft bc it’d send flashes throughout my body, and I was ticklish into my early thirties (massage and exercise, especially strengthening the core, helped to diminish it).
As for the facial expressions recognition, in my case it was not so much that I didn’t understand expressions as such, more than it was their inaproppriateness – the expressions that accompanied declarations of emotion and intent were, to my mind, studied, artificial and exaggerated, in short – unnatural. But I also saw them as unbecoming, ugly, stupid and insincere – most of the time. Watching the social drama was unbearable at times because I could see people were hiding things from each other, or that they would speak in nice tones while in fact having mean underhanded intentions. When I’d speak out about it, I’d be invariably severly chastised and accused of being an arrogant and unbehaved kid (alas, I could see through my accusers sense of horror at my acute awareness just as easily). Of course, I wasn’t always right, bc I was blind to sense of humour most of the time. I only laughed at absurd jokes, puns, etc. On the other hand, like anyone I could tell when people were being mean telling jokes. Only I was
By way of clarification, I was born in Poland, in late 70s, and grew up in the corrupt social reality of the last years of the Communist era, in a poor, shabby neighbourhood of Kraków (then the 3rd largest city with the population of about 500,000). Emotional coldness and / or lightness, so untypical of the war- and early Communist terror-traumatized, post-feudalist Polish society, was always prefered with me. I was often acccused of being heartless (or a haughty aristocrat) only because I acted and felt peaceful and because I gave people around me advice on how to solve the communcation clashes that caused emotional upheaval in them, and on how to avoid distress in the future, in a collected, calm manner (the very thing which in an adult facing an angry kid, a violent attacker, or a distressed patient would be seen as perfectly proper). What I in fact felt at such occasions was boundless sympathy and compassion.
Being scolded for behaviours over which I had no control was to me an unnecessary cruelty which could have been avoided if only the adults doing the scolding would pay more attention to me (both studying my behaviour and listening to what I had to say about my difficulties – as I was their keenest observer myself), and which made me engange in the unwanted behaviours even more – out of stress. Very often the haranguer would vent their own personal dislike and frustration on me, which I saw as totally unacceptable and was outspoken about (until silenced with repeated physical violence, threats and insults).
Having been repeatedly faced with accusations of heartlessness and threatened and denigrated for behaving calmly, I at one point decided to learn facial and bodily expressions that would be more suitable in the eyes of people around me. I did a bad job of it, and it ended in even more severe accusations on the part of my mother – for being ‘unnatural’, and ‘acting’. Those left me perplexed, confused, and subconsciously upset and terrified for days on end. Because I didn’t feel the emotions the majority of people around me displayed for reasons which in me would only provoke an intellectual, problem-solving mode, I thought (in my childish stupidity) that maybe trying to induce those emotions in myself would make my display of them more natural, which, inevitably!, led me to getting more and more entangled in false emoting, and vulnerable to emotional enmenmeshment with my parents, to the extent that I forgot who I was and ended up nearly entirely dissociated from my real emotions and my body (typically for an aspie, I had a hard time feeling and recognizing my emotions in the first place). I believe that’s exactly how my father learned his narcissistic emotional display.
When I heard the word cosmopolitan explained to me (at age 8 or 9), I immediately responded, “That’s me! I’d feel at home everywhere.” And sure I did – wherever I went I was receptive towards local cultures (which doesn’t mean accepting of local stupidities of custom and prejudices), even if homesick.
I can relate to Tommy Williams’s story about his putting on a hoodie on a sunny day – I often felt strong intuitive urges to do or not do certain things, and were left with no apologies from those who stopped me or told me it was a stupid thing to do when turned out to be right later on. I remember telling people intution was a rational thing (only expressing itself subconsciously), and women would feel offended when I told them there’s nothing inherently feminine about it (I couldn’t give a reason but I later realized it’s violence and aggresive use of formal reasoning that blunts intution in men). Generally, the whole notion of masculine and feminine behaviours was stupid and backward to me ever since I can remember – I saw it as creating unnecessary divisions between couples and putting an unnecessary social and cognitive strain on people in general. A sort of war, and to me war, and even competitive debate, was intrinsically stupid.
Again, I can’t emphasize how socially and emotionally crippling was for me the lack of an adult-acting, compassionate, detached male role model – someone to give me responsibilities, teach me manners and self-possession through example, and above all, supply me with graded physical, social and intellectual challenges, so that I could control my violence and aggression in an intelligent manner and enter life among people without losing my dignity and individuality.
I wrote so much about myself bc I believe personal perspective helps to understand things by making the common dynamics stand out in difference. I hope this helps you in some way.
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Thank you for telling your story, I now feel less alone. What helps me deal with what you and I have lived through, is a realisation, that by experiancing suffering, I am now able to understand and soothe the same pain in others, that it has contributed to ne becoming a proffesional care giver and that the world needs me
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Your son sounds amazing – all I saw in that post was love. I’m so sorry some people judge.
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This is the most honest, insightful post I have ever read of a child and parent’s experience of autism. It can’t always be easy for you to write so openly, but I think it is a great service to provide a true picture of what autism is. There was a time when the sort of behaviours demonstrated by those who, we now know to be, on the spectrum would have been misguidedly punished, but, thanks to mums like you, those times are changing, thank goodness.
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Wow Danielle, such a beautifully written, heartfelt post. I am so sorry that some people clearly display ignorance to Autism. I think honest posts like yours will go a long way towards to changing those views. Keep up the good work x
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If a child screams in public, I might be one of the ones casting the sidelong glances, with the pissed-off face, who eventually gets up and leaves, looking angry and probably judgmental. I might have made a comment while I was leaving.
I’m casting the sidelong glances because I’m trying to work out where the sound is coming from when it’s all-encompassing, why it’s happening, and when it might stop. I’m doing it so many times because I can’t easily read your body language or what you might be going to do. I probably look pissed off, and that’s because I feel like knives are stabbing me in the ears and I can’t concentrate on making the right facial expressions. I get up and leave, with my food still on the table or the shirt I was looking at abandoned, because I can’t bear the pain or inability to think any more. I might have been able to get a few words out, if it’s a good day, but because I’m so overwhelmed, I likely haven’t been able to work out how to phrase it correctly – it could have come out as, perhaps, “I can’t bear the noise, I’ll be outside”. I might not have been able to control the volume I said it at. I needed to let the person with me know where I’ve gone and why; this has taken a long time to learn; for many years I would have bolted and hidden somewhere. I’m not angry, except at myself – I’m in pain and need to escape. I’m probably very upset that something unexpected has happened. It might take me an hour to recover. I’m disoriented. I don’t know where I am. I feel sick and I’m shaking. If it’s a bad day, once I’m alone I might be hitting my head or biting my hands to make the feelings go away. I’ve learnt how to to stop myself doing that in public. It takes a lot of self-control. I know it’s not your fault, or the child’s fault. I assume you were doing your best. I think, it’s my fault, there’s something wrong about me, everyone else can manage, why can’t I? If it’s a really bad day, and I was already stressed, I feel I’m a bad person – I try to explain what’s happening to the person who’s with me, but the words won’t come: “I’m a I’m a I’m a I’m a FUCK I’m a I’m a I’m a I’m a FUCK I’m a I’m a I I I I I’m a I’m a I’m a FUCK FUCK I’m a I’m a I’m a FUCK FUCK it’s the it’s the it’s the it’s the it’s the it’s the FUCK” When my thoughts recover, I start thinking more clearly about the situation and how I’ve really hurt someone by acting how I did. I feel terrible and guilty.
I’m not a bad person. I’m autistic too.
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Thank ever so much for taking the time to share things from your perspective. I do understand – I am currently undergoing assessment for autism myself. I do know that there are times when a child behaving that way is going to be difficult to cope with. My post is more directed at the people who think autism does not exist. It was inpsired by someone who literally told me that it was “just an excuse” for my child to “misbehave”.
I do always try to give people the benefit of the doubt and understand that there can be things going on in their lives that I cannot know about too.
You should not feel guilty for things that are out of your control. Thanks so much for reading and stopping by.
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Oh, no, I’m not arguing with your post at all! I think it’s a very important point to make, and sometimes it’s really obvious when people have the attitude you mention.
I guess I’m trying to reassure people to some extent that not everybody who reacts the way I do is judging them – I know it can feel like that.
(And also slightly to defend myself, but that’s human nature :-D)
Thank you for writing the post, and also for replying to my comment and allowing me to clarify!
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This made me cry. My son has asd & every line was like a flashback. The worst was in my local shop, almost 10pm & I was desperately searching for an identical copy of Thomas the Tank Engine to replace the one he had rammed so hard into the DVD player it snapped, he wouldnt sleep without watching Thomas 1st. A guy walks up to the stroller holding my now stimming 4 year old, gets to eye level and before I could shout out a warning he reached out and grabbed both sides of the stroller. Que my son melting down, kicking, screaming, the lot. The guy jumped back and I tried to sooth my boy in the only way I knew, but it was too late, he was too far gone and I was quickly & thoroughly headbutted in the face. As i sat on that shop floor cradling my son in my lap, rocking back & forth, trying to sing ‘our’ song through the blood that was free flowing from my nose & lip, this ‘person’ looks me straight in the face & says “Shit girl make that s*****c shut up or dont bring him out in public.” He then made some comment about how he would have terminated such a child. I was 21, sleep deprived, suffering from what I now know was PTSD & my son was, for a very short time at least, a twin. I’m not ashamed to admit I wasnt the only person to go home that night with a bloody nose, courtesy of a tin of beans, I’m only ashamed that I did it in front of my child.
What made it even more unbearable, was the 5 other people in the shop who all saw/heard the encounter and yet said nothing, DID nothing, other than tut at ME or give ME looks of disgust. I make it a point now that, additional needs or not, if I see a parent struggling, I will stop & depending on the situation I will either offer words of encouragement (let them know they are doing great etc) or I will ask if there’s anything I can do to help them. Whether that’s keep people away, act as a human screen to stop the starers or to make assholes back off so that the parent can concentrate on the most important thing, their hurting child.
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Well, the alternative is to smack your kids til they learn that repressing themselves is less painful than the smacks… I’m not convinced that this is a bad thing more than the alternative, as it’s one sack of pain versus another… but thanks for trying the non-violent way. My family is into shame, denial, repression and masking. No thanks.
My Mum (arrogantly in the end) tried so hard until everything fell apart then blamed her AS-diagnosed child (now an adult). She still does. She hasn’t told me she loves me for decades. We can’t talk about things. She is likely on the spectrum herself and cannot fathom any alternative to masking and manipulation. I see this replicated in many women I meet, who aren’t ‘out’ as on the spectrum, whether diagnosed or not. I tried to start a dialogue to explain the pitfalls of being closeted (masking) about it, but they arrogantly thought they knew better because I’m not some impressive salesman, and am a bit abrasive in my approach for obvious reasons.
Even Tony Attwood’s son is apparently AS and he (!) didn’t even notice, he was too wrapped-up in his work (a form of selfish egotism, whether beneficial to the world or not).
So, good luck, and better to be judged for what you’re doing and who your son and you are than for failure to mask it. Always remember that. Good luck with coping strategies, they’re the key. I used to be a really fussy eater and now I’m not, for simple example, so it can improve on a practical level.
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Waiting on an assessment result, my family say I’m too soft, my 9 year feels overlooked, so so anger when the pre school said bring him for an assessment, father in complete denial, I’m not sure, havnt a clue, I want and hope it’s me, that’s the best outcome for me, I can work on me and my son will be fine, scared to death!
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So, what about those of us who are trying to understand but all we know is we were bad and it was our fault for not behaving in a way our parents could understand when thats how we felt? When every day we didnt know what inconsistancies we would get caught in like traps and never learned to trust even though we were never truly abused? Where are the resources for adults that learned to hide their differences so no one would know they didnt deserve to be alive?
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Autism and all the other names they give things now days are not something that developed in one generation.
Ever since discipline and lines not to be crossed have been removed then this is the result.
The animal world does not stand for bad behavior from it’s off spring, yet we think we can talk to them and get kids to understand problems when they have nothing to compare anything too.
But History repeats itself and these kids once parents will probably result back to the extreme parenting our Grandparents were quite used too. Mark these words…
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kids with autism are human and shouldn’t be pampered. You should dicipline and forget about Autism speaks
most people have problems. I find autistic kids get to much attention. I don’t see what the big deal is
if they’re bad. Most likely they grow up to be bad people. Co-workers they are bad to, they have no families, no friends, no connection to people.
You are not going to get anywhere being irrational. Teach them the world is real.
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