Well, it's has been a different sort of week for this blog, but when I first saw that autism awareness week was coming up, I did want to say a few things about it to help those who want to know more about what is after all a very common condition and to show it's very okay to talk about autism openly, so that for you gentle reader, the more you know about it, the better it is not just for you, but for my daughter M as well.

I know that yesterday's post may have been a hard slog to get through and there is something more I want to say about it for those of you that troubled yourselves to read mom-mos and Jim Sinclair's posts and that is none of us are right or wrong about what we said, we simply hold alternate views. I completely understand what it is they're saying, for me, what I saw in their posts was acceptance of autism; accepting it as a valid part of you or someone you know is one of the most powerful and motivating things you can do when you are dealing with it, it enables you to move forward in your life.

A lot of people get stuck for a time in thinking about how unfair, cruel and capricious nature is in giving their child or children autism, some people with autism can also think the same way. Unfortunately, it's a very destructive way to think and it's also wrong. Nature is none of those things and doesn't care at all what we think, nature is about continuation of life itself and will do it any way it can, our concepts of fairness have nothing to do with it. Autism is like a lump of clay that you can shape any way you want. No one fully understands autism and the part it plays, but it most definitely has a part to play in our lives, that apart from notable exceptions such as Bill Gates and Temple Grandin, we largely don't hear about. Autism's footsteps are all around, helping shape our lives.

Autism also enables us to examine ourselves. I've lost count of the number of parents of children with autism that say at some point they can identify an autistic feature within themselves. When children are assessed for autism, some of them do what is known as a CARS test, which basically scores them on a range of behaviours and abilities, the score for autism is somewhere above thirty points. But what if you score just below this? It means you have a lot of autistic features, yet you are not autistic, but the thing is it's perfectly possible to say you are on the spectrum. If it is that some of us possess these features yet are not autistic, is that not a window into how the mind works? That autism is in fact a normal, though not well understood, part of the human condition.

We shouldn't be alarmed that autism seems more prevalent these days, with a given rate of about one in 160. Some researchers think the rate may well have been constant for a long period of time, it's just that we are better at diagnosing it these days, so more cases are coming to light. So what is autism exactly? Who knows, I'll leave that to the scientists and researchers to figure out. I'll just play with my daughter, read to her, talk to her, be with her, love her. That's all I need to know.

I would like to say a big thank you to all those readers who have stuck with me this week and special thanks to mom-nos, kitchen wench, limes & lycopene and I think I have a recipe for that for all recently pointing readers to me, thanks guys, it meant a lot. And very special thanks to Tanna, whose constant support is such an inspiration.

For those of you who have come here through autism links, just to let you know I only do occasional autism specific posts, though I do talk about my daughter M quite a lot, she is an extra thread I weave into my writing.

Right, now I'm off to bake a cake!

Labels: understanding autism