Tag: autism

When most people think of anxiety, they picture how it effects adults and possibly themselves. For a long time, anxiety was thought to only be an issue adults faced. Did you know children experience anxiety too?

Even if your child is not diagnosed with an anxiety-based disorder, it is extremely important to teach calming techniques to your child. Telling someone to just calm down is never effective, though I am sure we have all found ourselves asking our children to do just that at least once in our lives. The following calming techniques are easy for children to understand (and work for adults too!)

When your child is first diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, your world can be turned upside down. You and your spouse will both learn new ways to cope with emotions, balancing appointments, and more. Siblings of autistic children have an adjusting period as well. There are many questions, feelings, and concerns they will have. Explaining autism to siblings in a positive way is extremely important.

An autism diagnosis can leave us paralyzed with fear for our children’s future. However, these six things will help you and your family survive autism:

1. Don’t be in denial for too long. We all do this. My denial cost us valuable time. We all hope our kids have been misdiagnosed and want it to be anything else. Back then I didn’t think autism was treatable. I was told there was no cure, no recovery or hope with autism. So I convinced myself that my son didn’t really have autism and he probably was the next genius like Albert Einstein or Thomas Edison.

Autism awareness has risen significantly across the past decade. In this day and age it’s challenging to find anyone who doesn't realize that autism significantly impacts youngsters and their families.

Unfortunately, most adults with autism lack the correct diagnosis. Robison (2019) estimates that only 3-10% of adults on the autism spectrum are accurately identified.

Are we too clean?

Consider this hypothesis: Asthma, autism, cancer, arthritis, obesity and MS could be on the rise not only because of improved diagnosis, but also these illnesses seem to correlate with the rise of anti-parasitic and anti-bacterial living.

Apparently, dirt is part of the delicate balance of healthy living. While this shift in disease occurs on the physical plane, what about "dis-ease" on the emotional plane? Are depression, anxiety and stress more prevalent nowadays because we drive ourselves crazy with too pure idealizations and perfectionism?

The good news is that autism awareness and diagnosis have improved by leaps and bounds over the last decade. Detection is now possible at a very early age. In fact, the American Academy of Pediatrics encourages screening for autistic features as early as 18 months.

The bad news is that autism recognition initiatives have almost exclusively focused on early childhood. Low diagnosis rates of autism in adults who missed early detection have created a significant gap in our ability to provide vital assistance throughout the lifespan.

In his blog, Lost and Tired: Confessions of a Depressed Autism Dad, a father wrote about why he believes it’s important for him to hold his boys—all three of whom are on the autism spectrum—accountable for their actions. Justly referring only to behavior he knows the boys can control, the dad explained that having autism shouldn’t mean his boys get a free pass when it comes to abiding by the rules that help keep our families, schools and communities intact and civil.