Aspies For Freedom

I think we could slap the crap out of Dr. Phil today, and trust he will fully earn it tomorrow...

In 2004 the Dr. Phil Show aired two episodes on children's mental health and parenting. The September 22nd show highlighted a family whose nine-year-old son was smearing feces on walls, being cruel to animals, acting violently toward siblings and was having intense tantrums. Dr. Phil informed the parents that their son did not have a behavior problem -- that his problems were the result of poor parenting. He continued by informing the parents that their child had 9 of the 14 characteristics of a serial killer.

He did an episode called “Parenting with Pills” for parents with children of ADD/ADHD.  He discouraged parents from giving medications and plugged a book on alternative treatments.

Families of children with special mental health needs expressed outrage after the two shows aired.

In 2006 he did a show about bipolar disorder. In a bipolar forum it was pointed out that on Dr. Phil's website was listed a "Special Thanks" for Dr. Frank Lawlis and the Lawlis Peavey Centers; Lawlis being "the primary contributing psychologist for the Dr. Phil television show”. They are PhDs; neither is an MD. Their website link offers a 2 day assessment “Dr. Phil Special $7495.00”

I’ll be curious to see what he says about autism and whether he’ll be plugging somebody’s professional services or someone’s book on it.

hm, according to TVGuide.com, it doesn't seem to be on today, or any day.. did it air before?

Here's proof: http://www.tvguide.com/detail/tv-show.as...pisodelist.  When will anyone ever listen?  Are they too hardened?  Have they gone blind?  Are they deaf?  Maybe an advocate can at least try to get on Dr. Phil to try and convince others.  Otherwise, they'll just walk stupid.

Brian Williams: "On tonight's broadcast, we look into a strange new phase of the war on Austim.  'Curing the curbie', a new turn of phrase, which some believe means 'putting some common sense in advocates of those who want to cure autism'.  We have hear our chief science correspondent, Robert Bazell, to talk about what this means."

I remember seeing the episode that he did on AS and I also found that it mainly focused on the really bad meltdowns etc... which automatically premotes the whole false theory of:

Aspie = Evil Child

I hope his show on Autism is better,  cuz even thoguh I definately at times am a little like (not as nearly as bad tho) that doesnt make ppl like me/us evil.

Step right up. Yessir, folks. He walks he talks he barks like a dog and he crawls on his belly like a reptile. Step right up, folks, only one thin dime.  

/sarcasm

Erich refused to watch it, but I did.

As always, it started of with videos of the kid's tantrums and violence. I didn't feel there was any recognition of the little boy as a person -- he was presented as nothing but a nightmarish tantrum-generating machine. Then it was all me, me, me, me, me from the parents.

Dr. Phil really knows nothing about autism, then they pointlessly presented a pediatrician who knew even less. As M said, Phil is a family/relationship counselor, so if he's going to do a show on autism, shouldn't we here from somebody other than two know-nothings and a couple of disconnected egocentric parents?

Then there was an odd bit toward the end where parents were accusing a special education teacher of beating on the children.  

The overall tenor of the show was cheap and shallow. Typical.

Applause for violet_yoshi! From a mother of five and grandmother/step grandmother to four, most of whom are on the spectrum. And wouldn't dream of expecting anything other than congratulations! (i.e. Don't you DARE feel sorry for me - my kids are perfect!)

Funny how the thing about dummies keeps coming up! My eldest sucked his thumb, even before he was born.

Number two was desperate to suck his fingers, but, being even more prem than his brother, couldn't unroll his fist. I gave in after a few days and bought him a dummy. Bliss! After a couple of weeks he found his fingers and never touched the dummy again.

My daughter got oral thrush at three weeks and had to be changed to bottle-feeding. She wanted that dummy of hers - I finally bribed it off her at the age of three (she only had it at night after nine months) but she promptly started sucking her thumb.

All these three carried on thumb/finger sucking until their late teens.

With the twins, they got dummies almost straight away, used them for a few months, gave them up and never sucked anything again.

I no longer make any assumptions whatever about dummy use.

btw none of my kids had any sucking-related mis-alignment of any teeth, either.

Sorry! I just re-read what I posted, and I suppose it could have been seen as a criticism of your post.

I just meant that I have had such a mixed experience with dummies that I no longer hold the strong views I had before my second child was born.

Indeed, I find it personally abhorrent to see a child who is awake with a dummy in their mouth.

However, I wouldn't dream of criticising the parent, even in my thoughts, because it might well be that the dummy is more pleasant than the head-banging they would be doing without it! My youngest sister was a head-banger and my mother would have given in to anything to make her stop.

You are correct!

Dummy, aka soother, pacifier, dummy-tit, that horrible bit of plastic that the baby is always chewing....

I pretty much loathe all of them - because the babies/toddlers aren't using them as a comfort aid to get to sleep, or to self-soothe in distressing circumstances, as far as I can tell from the pictures.

But I agree that some of them look worse than others, although those were the least offensive that I found when looking for pictures.

There are some really hideous ones around!

one more thing i forgot to mention, the show was mainly focused on parents that don't want their kids anymore, and isn't it ironic he is now supporting an organization that promotes this very thing for autistics and that allison singer (a high up at autism speaks) wanted to kill her kid because she didn't want her anymore?  i was seeing if he mentioned that anytime during the show, but i bet he didn't because it would make autism speaks look bad.  it's okay to not want your autistic kid and throw them away like nothings, but if they are nt, it's totally bad.