Saturday, June 30, 2007

Into the world of the Autistic

Hi, this is my first blog. I am the 43 yr old father of 7 fantastic kids...... 4 of these are autistic. My kids range from my recently graduated 17 yr old the twins at 3 yrs. As every one has been made aware Autism is the #1 growing "malady" in the pediatric medical world. The numbers from the government reflect that 1 of 150 to 166 kids will be born/diagnosed as autistic. I choose to label them as autistic instead of having autism or ASD (Autism spectrum disorders) because as this is becoming more and more clear that this is not a neurological or an environmental "disorder" but more of a genetic disorder we will need to address the idea that these kids are something special, something beyond the normal plane of consciousness that we as human beings are used to address. Now saying this I am not one of those people that believe in "star children" as an excuse to deflect the reasons that our kids are Autistic. No I am a devout Catholic that at this time realize the blending of creationism and Darwinism as a viable and actual fact. Now this does not help my kids that are Autistic deal with our world but maybe it can help us see into their world a Little bit clearer. When my first child was diagnosed as Autistic after many months I told my older kids that now that he was diagnosed we all had Autism. Not because we are at the level of the Autistic mind but that we would have to be the voice, the advocate for our Autistic family member in a world that they do not live in, or can verbalize any understanding of, our world.

I will add additional thoughts to this blog as they come me. And when I can get on the computer.