Year: 2013

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Disability

Parenting in the Park

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arbitrary I took both of my children to the park the other day. It shouldn’t be some sort of big announcement that a mom takes her kids to the park, but I was by myself with my two children, who have very different, needs, wants, and abilities, and I am a chicken. There. I said it. I am a scaredy-cat when it comes to taking my kids out into open, uncontrolled situations by myself, unless Jack is buckled into his wheelchair. He has escaped my grasp so many times, wrenching my shoulder as he goes; there are dangerous situations around every corner, and he is fast. And as mature and amazing Katie is at 5, she really is still a small child who deserves to be looked after on a busy street, or a park… but it is summer, and my children are convincing, so I took them. Katie providing…

Disability

Imagine

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David M. Davison fightingforhope.wordpress.com Imagine needing order in a disorderly world. Imagine creating order, and being laughed at for doing so. Imagine needing precision in an imprecise world. Imagine being precise, and being told it is often unnecessary. Imagine needing structure in an unstructured world. Imagine creating structure, only for people to tear it apart. Imagine needing words to have their literal meaning. Imagine taking words literally, only for people to consider you stupid. —- Imagine order is innate, and you have to work out when order is not required. Imagine precision is innate, and you have to work out when precision is not required. Imagine structure is innate, and you have to work out when structure is not required. Imagine taking words literally is innate, and you have to work out when the meaning is not literal. —- Imagine becoming anxious when you see the ‘Random’ button on your…

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Disability

Alternative Autism Science: Don’t Believe the Hype!

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Shannon Des Roches Rosa www.squidalicious.com My son has had a challenging few months. We have been scrambling, hard, to figure out the best ways to support him, help him feel comfortable and settled. Medical treatments have helped, as has a forensic approach to figuring out stressors in his environment, as has looking back through his daily record for patterns in sleep, illness, exercise, and routine. But when he’s still unhappy or dysregulated despite all our best efforts plus the efforts of his extended team of doctors, educators, and therapists, I feel like I’d do anything to help him. An autism parent at such a loss is in a potentially dangerous spot. Their autistic child more so. Because if mainstream medicine and legitimate therapies and approaches can’t provide answers, that’s when parents tend to look elsewhere. That’s when they risk exposing their child to therapies that can cause physical harm (e.g.,…

Disability

Autism Is Not Just An American Thing

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Emily Willingham emilywillinghamphd.com You’ve heard of autism, right? Thanks to ubiquitous blue puzzle pieces, TV shows and movies, and daily headlines in English-language news media, a lot of people in the United States have some awareness about autism, even if it’s a caricatured version presented to gain donations, viewers, or readers. In fact, in the US, many autistic people and their allies have sought to move on from awareness and talk more about acceptance. In non-USian parts of the world, though, autism doesn’t necessarily get this level of attention, much less acceptance, despite the fact that autistic people are everywhere. One of the largest epidemiological studies of autism identified it in 2.64%% of South Korean schoolchildren, and anecdotal assertions to the contrary, autism does exist in countries like Cambodia. Autistic people also live in Yemen, where a lack of awareness can seriously affect outcomes. As Yemeni mother Fam Um Ahmed said in…

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Disability

Rethinking Unhappiness

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Ariane Zurcher emmashopebook.com I was alerted to an article written by Dr. Michael Oberschneider entitled Ask Dr. Mike: Expecting and Anxious About Autism. In the piece he writes, “Some of the happiest parents I know (both personally and professionally) have children on the Autistic Spectrum.” In the comments section people weighed in with their thoughts. Many parents wrote of their outrage (and a few of their disbelief) that Dr. Mike suggest “happy” parents of Autistic children even exist. They seemed to equate happiness with a lack of concern. A number of parents suggested that Dr. Mike was simply wrong and refused to believe that he could actually know such parents. One person went so far as to suggest he was trying to trump up more clients, which is an interesting idea, but the logic of that argument eludes me. Before I go any further, I have to say this — there was…

Disability

The End of April Doesn’t Mean the End of Autism Acceptance

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Karen Bower railman.blog.co.uk I’d always had niggling feelings about Harry, but I remember with absolute clarity the day I knew. We’d moved to the other side of town and, driving home, it made sense to use a different route. Harry lost the plot every time. For hours, he would rage at me. I didn’t understand. Was it the move? The house? His new bedroom? One day, to avoid the otherwise inevitable meltdown, I took the ‘old’ route. Harry was perfectly pleased with this. It had taken me weeks to understand that he had no issue with the move or house (Though, two years on, he still calls it New House). It was taking a different route. Ironically, since then, he’s never had a problem with it. Whatever the problem, he’d worked it out. I knew, right then, I had to work it out too. The time until we got a…

Disability

Letting Tears Flow

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Melody Latimer asparenting.com At some point, everyone will have to deal with loss and grief. Whether it’s the loss of a pet, relative, or friend, it can affect us in ways we never expected. I recently suffered a loss that was unexpected and quite possibly the hardest thing I’ve ever had to endure in my life. We hear sayings like, “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger?” and “There’s a purpose in everything.” In the moment, these things can sound like, “You’re making a bigger deal out of this than is necessary.” I’ve been lucky to not hear any of those dismissive statements. But there are some lessons I have learned: Take your time. There’s no set amount of time that you are supposed to handle getting over the loss of someone or something you care about. Sometimes, you never get over the loss, and it’s just a matter of…

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Disability

Join Today’s Autism Positivity Day Flash Blog!

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Today is the last chance for April — Autism Acceptance Month — to matter, to help further acceptance and understanding of autistic experiences, happiness, and rights for autistic people of all ages and abilities. We hope you can participate in today’s Autism Positivity Day Flash Blog. Details and links below.  -TPGA Editors From the Autism Positivity Day Flash Blog site: Last year hundreds of bloggers came together in a show of support and solidarity in response to an anonymous person’s Google search “I wish I didn’t have Aspergers”. The posts that came flooding in from all over the world were a beautiful example of the power of strength in numbers. With so much negativity still surrounding Autism and the misinformation and misconceptions that continue to abound, we invite each of you to share one, or two, or more “Ausome” things! We invite all of you, anyone who is Autistic, anyone…

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Disability

Inclusion is NOT Social Action

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Lisa Friedman jewishspecialneeds.blogspot.com We want April — Autism Acceptance Month — to matter, to help further acceptance and understanding of autistic experiences, happiness, and rights for autistic people of all ages and abilities. We will be publishing Autism Acceptance posts and pictures all month long. -TPGA Editors In a recent post, Inclusion is NOT a Program, I reflected on the notion that while all of our synagogue’s programs, classrooms, and worship opportunities should be inclusive, inclusion is not a program.  It’s not a one-time workshop or training session. Inclusion is an attitude, it is something that is just naturally woven into the fabric of what we do. At least it should be. Today I was reminded of something significant that I have learned from one of my mentors in the world of Jewish Disability Awareness and Inclusion. Rabbi Lynne Landsberg, Senior Advisor on Disability Issues at the Religious Action Center…