This Is My Autism: All That I Will Never Know
So much of my mom job is hindered by autism. How can I alleviate fears, instill confidence, comfort worries if I don’t know what they are?
So much of my mom job is hindered by autism. How can I alleviate fears, instill confidence, comfort worries if I don’t know what they are?
I had read that children on the Autism spectrum often suffer from medical issues and have nutritional deficiencies and gut inflammation. But I had always brushed it off because my son never physically showed any signs of medical issues. I decided to look into this some more.
Autism. I used to not be able to say this word out loud without my heart sinking just a little. It made me sad (still does sometimes) and angry (still does sometimes). You see I have a son with autism.
Autism often comes with a laundry list of medical issues that interfere with development and weigh our kids down. One day could be perfect with the next day a complete disaster. I root for the good days, but we’ve had our fair share of disasters, like this day from a few years ago:
Someone I know who recently had a baby posted on social media about how overwhelmed she is. She said that she was in “Survival Mode.” She’s totally right, but I had to laugh a little. Because we autism parents are constantly in Survival Mode. But Autism Survival Mode is forever.
This was the moment I lost it. We have been fighting now for almost five years – sacrificing everything (literally) in order to help my daughter recover and heal. My daughter’s health has done a 360! I started crying happy tears, thinking about how far she had come…
The whitewashing of autism comes not only in the delusional declaration that it has always been here, but also the claim that the autistic brain is simply wired differently. There is a growing body of science that is much more grim and sobering.
Next time I share that my son has “autism” and someone asks, “Oh, so what is his gift?” (Think Rainman and how everyone assumes that every “autistic” has an incredible ability that somehow overshadows that fact and makes it magically ok that they are severely affected by that “autism”…), I can answer that his is being fearless.
It’s World Autism Day, so let’s talk about the World of Autism. The real one – the secret world of autism that not many people see. As an autism parent, this is the world I live in. I feel it necessary to shine that bright blue light on the secret world of autism.