rogert · HackerTrans

há 12 anosdiscuss

Hah! I wish my autistic kid was merely spoiled and undisciplined. On the contrary like many autistic kids my kid is very quiet, too quiet, in fact doesn't even respond to pretty much anything going on in the area. I envy parents with spoiled kids, at least those kids can express a personality.

rogert

há 12 anosdiscuss

Perhaps at high-functioning end of the spectrum you can get plenty of misdiagnosis, but certainly for the bulk of autistic people you can tell that by the age of 3 when a child simply ignores everyone around them as if people around them don't exist, can't answer simple questions, can't express needs, that something is really wrong.

rogert

há 12 anosdiscuss

Yes, but there's a significant percentage of people on the autism literally can not follow instructions, or cannot the focus to listen when spoken to, or cannot comprehend language. They require life long care, employable for small tasks perhaps, but not independent.

rogert

há 12 anosdiscuss

As another parent of a child with autism who is barely verbal, I have to agree, this is not the same as Aspergers. In fact, I think you'll agree, we hope our kids will one day only be diagnosed with Aspergers!

The problem with classifying autistic as "intelligent" and "obsessive" and "introverted" hides the truth that there are the other half of autistic people on the low-functioning end of the spectrum cannot live independently. And no, they're not exceptional at counting cards at Blackjack table either.

Young autistic children require many hours of direct speech and behavior therapy everyday just to get them to basic level of communicating what they want. This is the only known effective treatment for autistic children, but it has to happen every day for years, and it is extremely expensive. Trivializing autism causes insurance companies to put caps and limits on covering direct therapy because they don't see it as essential, but parents of autistic kids know that direct intense therapy is essential and makes a big difference.

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