Highlights for World Autism Awareness Day

It's World Autism Awareness Day.  Along with millions of people worldwide, I am, always, hopeful that today (and the awareness week and month) will help highlight what autism is and is not and how fabulous people with autism (like two of my kids) are along with how challenging life can be for them and those who care for them sometimes.   The hope is that awareness leads to acceptance - that's the real goal. So here's my top four autism awareness posts from my over the last year sharing all sorts about autism in our lives and over the last year. 

Come and get your love

Autism almost crept into our lives. We loved the boys and thought they were great people long before the words autistic, autism or the acronyms ASD or even ADHD were in frequent use in the home. When their diagnoses came, they helped us understand and support them, support us and in some ways admire them for what they do everyday to get to the end of it. 

Often people see the challenges or meltdowns, which can be truly heart breaking. They don't often get the chance to see how easy it is to love our kids. One of those chances is when Alexa plays Redbone... and we all dance in the kitchen.  

Read about the joy of dancing to 'Come and Get your Love' with my autistic son.

Why my autistic kids can become frustrated

My kids can become frustrated for a variety of reasons and it isn’t always easy to pinpoint the underlying cause of their emotions.  Two of them have communications difficulties, but even our daughter can struggle sometime to explain why she's feeling frustrated.   As a parent of autistic kids I've learned to behave like a detective - what's causing the issue?  

Almost all of my kids outbursts are a way of communicating something so I to try and ascertain what’s triggering their upset.  Sometimes it's the simplest of things.  See a few of them here. 

Giving our autistic son a COVID19 test 

Get tested. We all know it. But when a child has autism it’s not the easiest thing to do. One day this week I missed a call from David’s school. I always pick up the voicemails quick - he'd been coughing in school. Some parents may worry about their child falling behind. 

Well, when your child is already four years behind when they are in Yr5 you don’t want them missing a single day of learning. So we decided to get him a test so we could all return to school and work easier.

Because if like us every time we are able to do something unexpected or new without drama is a major success  - this is the one to read.

Will the pandemic slow down autism assessments?

Imagine your child reaches three years and still doesn't say a word. They don't point to anything, comment or smile. They sit and repeat patterns of play over and over again and get upset if they are disturbed.   You seen a few programmes on TV or perhaps have read or seen something somewhere and think that your child might be struggling because they might be autistic. 

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So, you try and make an appointment with your GP.... and that's just for a referral.  The process for getting an autism diagnosis has not doubt been affected by the impacts of the pandemic but that doesn't make their need any less great.  

Find out more about this and what you can do as a parent if you think your child might need help or a diagnoses here.   If you are having difficulties getting others onboard with a recent diagnosis, medication or therapy this post from the last year might also be helpful. 

I hope these posts may raise some awareness and offer support.  If you have any questions about what's it's like in our autistic and neurotypical family, please feel free to get in touch.