jerrynewport wrote

That's the story of my life!

You made a very good point that the quality of life for an autistic person born into the upper/middle classes can be a lot different to the average aspie/autie situation. The combination of autism and being working class can be a very unattractive scene.

When I read "Thinking in pictures" by Grandin I got the impression that she was very much an advocate of the autistic point of view, and a strong advocate of developing the strong points of autists rather than emphasizing developing the weakest points to a "normal" level, which is what most NTs seem to want to do. I also thought she is a fine example of how far an autist can go career-wise, given the optimal support and some lucky breaks.

It looks to me like she is saying that there are some autistics who need therapy of some kind, so that they can become more independent. I don't think she meant to put aspies down.

I often jump from one thought to another thinking that the missing links are obvious or have already been stated. It confuses people, and I think that is what happened with Temple's statement. She was saying that even though mild aspies don't see any use for therapy, it can be of use for auties who are elsewhere on the spectrum. I think.....

      I think you are right about what Temple means. Too many of us see our own experience as defining the spectrum and that just isn't accurate no matter who we are. It is like parents who say, " if you aren't like my kid, you can't possibly be autistic or ever have been."

                               Jerry Newport

Apart from the financial impost of the treatment talked about here, how many parents could afford 40 hours a week to implement the therapy? Most families have two parents in paid work these days. Also, what about the siblings (if any) of the child? Won't they resent losing out on attention from their parents?

As an Aspie who writes far better than she talks, what is the big deal about making children talk? Is it because the people down the road don't approve of a child who doesn't talk. I think the main thing is that the child can communicate in some way, particularly with their own family.

I also think it rather despicable for the promoters of these treatments to raise the spectre of parents being forever "stuck" with their autistic child. The truth is, that due to the discriminations against autistics (even high functioning ones), some of them will always be at home.

I got a degree but during the time at university, was already suffering from a lot of depression due to my verbal communication difficulties (I can speak okay but just can't seem to get people to understand me sometimes) and social ineptitude. Thus, I didn't get the result I should have but still passed.

My mum always told me I would be "snapped up" by prospective employers due to being highly intelligent but this certainly didn't happen. I only got a job by doing the public service tests which relied on high IQ
and I wouldn't get into the public service now as they rely more on body language and "social intelligence". If I hadn't been diagnosed with AS 2 years ago, I would have lost the job as they were targetting people for redundancies if they didn't have good social skills.

Anyway, after years of being told "not to talk to strangers", my parents suddenly wanted me to start "doorknocking" prospective employers. I was only too happy to write them a letter and send my CV along to them but anyway, there weren't many jobs that I thought I'd like. Definately not door to door sales!  :roll: Toilet cleaning would have been preferable to me and I'm a person who is very sensitive to smells!

Anyway, I have digressed a lot. I don't know if Temple Grandin meant to be insulting in her comments. She does seem to have had advantages in life that some people haven't. I would also be very nervous of any kind of therapy that requires little children to spend some much time in therapy. For goodness sakes, just let them be children.

I guess it is a matter for the parents to decide after they have studied the matter as much as they can but they shouldn't let themselves be "buffaloed" by experts and their "BS". Parents are the ultimate expert on their own child as they know them better than anyone else.

Temple said something about "professional auties". I don't agree with that as these people are just trying to raise awareness of autism in society and that is a good thing.

wrote

Even now in the state of Australia were I live there is a barrage of advice to parents from the govt and various kinds of "helping" professionals that argue that deviations from "normal" development, including speech development, are caused by a poor environment for the child, even emotional deprivation.

We have had high-profile Australians (Fiona Stanley, Mem Fox, Mark Latham) pleading in the media for parents to read books to their kids, and they really do seem to believe that this kind of intervention prevents all literacy and language difficulties before they start. These people don't seem to know anything about dyslexia or SPLD or autism or any other neurologically-based condition that can delay or compromise language or literacy development, or else they assume that these conditions are too rare or unimportant to bother considering. So this gives rise to a common belief in the populace that kids who are a bit slow or different in development are being neglected or mistreated by their parents.

"Apart from the financial impost of the treatment talked about here, how many parents could afford 40 hours a week to implement the therapy? Most families have two parents in paid work these days."

Sadly many parents feel the pressure to get the therapy as their child is 'lost in autism' and they take out loans and get into debt to pay for it, we have seen numerous sob stories on how in debt some of them are. They also lobby their governments to pay for the therapy. There was a recent case in Canada that refused to fund it, they are appealing.

"My mum always told me I would be "snapped up" by prospective employers due to being highly intelligent but this certainly didn't happen."

My mum had that attitude about me, I suppose parents want to see the best in their child and think that others will see that too. When it became apparent that I was failing every interview, after about the 30th one, she became critical that I must be not trying, and when I eventually managed to get a very poor job, she was extremely critical that I 'could do so much better'.
As if I wanted to be refused so many jobs :roll:

Times have changed, too. When mum was 12, she had prospective employers wanting to hire her as she was dux of the school. She was one of the few children in her small town who went on to further education.

As for the interview thing, I could tell I would do badly in interviews after I'd had a few (it wasn't a matter of being negative but of being realistic). I couldn't put myself through that kind of thing. That is why I never apply for promotions where I work and am one step up from the base level in the Australian Public Service.

What is a dux?

Dux: top of the class. That kind of thing doesn't seem to matter so much to prospective employers these days as it seems to be mostly about "social intelligence". The advice to kids to put their heads down and study to get really good marks only tells half the story.

I was brought up in a time when as long as you got reasonable marks at school, it wasn't too hard to get a job.

I have to say, for the people promoting ABA. I don't really feel I should include the parents, they might be conned into sending their kids to these programs, and just not know any better.

They're no better than Nazis.

So true, they are like vultures preying on the fears and doubts of parents.
I can think of worse things than having a child who doesn't speak - as long as they can communicate so they can be understood, that is the main thing.

I think having a child get cancer or get killed in an accident or have something else terrible happen to them like getting put in prison for life, would be far worse.

I think Temple means to her ABA is only useful for helping 2 to 5 year olds with language problems develope language skills, and anyone else would not benifit from ABA.  She also seems to believe those of us against ABA are more functioniing and that we would benifit more from developing are strengths like she did rather then focusing on our weeknesses like some of us do.  That by developing our strengths we could be able to get jobs and be able to support ourselvies like she did.

Or put another way stop focusing on such things as bad eye contact, inability to read body language and being the odd one out and start focusing on what you can do like for example develope complex thoughts in your mind, ability to focus on a single task for hours and hours on end, and develope these strengths to help you get a job like being able to save a company money by not haviing to spend so much time testing things because of your ability to test them out in your head and determ what will and won't work, and being able to last longer without needing a break which means being more productive which means more money for the company, etc.  At lest thats what I think an example of what Temple means.

Having a full time job and being an NT "clone" doesn't even suit many of the higher functioning people. Also, if there aren't enough jobs to go around even for people with no disabilities, how on earth are people with disabilities even going to get a look-in? Seems rather silly to me.

I have yet to read Temple's book, but I can relate to not making it through interviews, but fortunately I'm getting the support I need after finally being diagnosed with Asperger's. I know that once I get a job, I'll be able to become fully independent, even if I never become as famous as Temple Grandin.

I read books to all my kids, every day, every night before bed.  My oldest was reading on her own at 4yo.  My almost-8yo still cannot read (dyslexia).  I did nothing different in how they were exposed to words, books, and reading.