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Autism Speaks To Leave Canada

I completely understand why so many self-advocates detest Autism Speaks. I agree.

And while the despicable ad was despicable, it did describe the reality of autism for many parents and siblings, given the lack of knowledge and services available. So many of us are born with severe comorbids; intellectual disability and incontinence are not the worst, by any means.

Most marriages do not survive - although that is sadly true across all disabilities in my experience. Siblings are neglected and feel rejected by the parents. And even this is not the worst.

The worst are the violent and extremely dangerous behaviors engaged in. One example: I had a child who would beat their head against a wall - hard- more than 40 times per minute. Continuously. It pains me to consider the hell that child lived in which would make head banging preferable.

We do not know how to treat this child, to make their life more livable. Between a very strong Disability Rights advocate and me, we got this kid looked at, assessed and treated by the best people in the state and then in the nation.

This is just one example. The existence and pain these people endure should not be ignored just because these are comorbids. There are so many people with autism and this plethora of co-morbids we cannot continue to ignore them. These parents do not see the co-morbids separate from the autism.

This is why parents want autism cured. Why they want an identifying gene to provide the option of aborting the fetus. This is why ABA is used on so many children because no one knows what else to do.

Just my 2c
 
Never been abused, bullied, Never knew I was on spectrum, have nothing that needed fixing, happy with who I am. Could be defined better, also what is different about us and why.
 
They're such weasels. "Were not trying to eliminate Autism (up until 2016 when they dropped the cure bit from the spiel on their website, as the article notes). Theyre only collecting DNA to "understand" us haha. Autists who support this are Turkeys voting for Christmas.
 
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@WhitewaterWoman, my ASD2 son was laughing when he did his head-banging. I would not be so quick to assume that [each case] is an expression of frustration toward mistreatment.

We do, however, suspect that our ASD3 daughter's routine anxiety attacks arise from her frustration at not being able to communicate.
 
Crossbreed said:
@WhitewaterWoman, my ASD2 son was laughing when he did his head-banging. I would not be so quick to assume that [each case] is an expression of frustration toward mistreatment.

We do, however, suspect that our ASD3 daughter's routine anxiety attacks arise from her frustration at not being able to communicate.
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I didn’t tell the whole story…he was also screaming and crying with tears running down his face.

But more important here…there was no mistreatment going on. This child was loved and cared for and was one of the very, very few where the parents stayed together and the grandparents on both sides were loving and supportive.

The reason this is so important, I think, because it illustrates the extent to which the neurology can be disrupted. What got mismatched to the point that all stimuli are intolerable?

I think there are definitely times behaviors can be misunderstood (I did see a fair bit of this) but this was not one of them.

And yes, it is quite likely that some of the “behaviors” seen arise from in inability to communicate. Another horror story if you think about it. The stories of apparently comatose individuals whose brains still function and they can’t communicate they are still in there.
 
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WhitewaterWoman said:
I didn’t tell the whole story…he was also screaming and crying with tears running down his face.

I think there are definitely times behaviors can be misunderstood, but this was not one of them.
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Was he verbal?
Did he have bodily signs of abuse?
 
Crossbreed said:
Was he verbal?
Did he have bodily signs of abuse?
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I can’t really go into any more detail without starting to put in identifying possibilities.

There were lots of professional people from many private and public organizations with eyes on this kid. Child protective was involved, but not because of abuse or neglect by the family.

I’m not going to say anything more about this child.

And I really was pretty good at my job.
 
I will not press, but if accidental identification is that easy, it must be a high-profile case...
 
IMG_7466.webp

Bye bye, Autism $peaks Canada! Good riddance, eh?
 
Gerontius said:
Is Canada taking applications for citizenship, by the way?
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Generally speaking, no. We have really dialed back immigration after having overdone it for the past half decade. We have a massive housing shortage and all of our services are overwhelmed. Those without critically needed skills are being encouraged to look elsewhere.
 
WhitewaterWoman said:
The reason this is so important, I think, because it illustrates the extent to which the neurology can be disrupted. What got mismatched to the point that all stimuli are intolerable?
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I find it hard to believe that nobody of us higher functioning adults here can't relate to this one. This is the one truly debilitating symptom.
 
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Ronald Zeeman said:
Never been abused, bullied, Never knew I was on spectrum, have nothing that needed fixing, happy with who I am.
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My childhood sucked because of abuse and bullying and inability to understand humour or read social cues and body language. Throw in sensory issues for some fun as well.

I have gotten a handle on things as an adult. Figured out how to work around hard wired issues that have no off switch, and I put some effort into reading other people and learning about humour. Now I can at least recognize a joke even if I don't connect with it. Oh, and masking skills. Important to have.

Now my life is pretty good and I have no desire for a "cure" as I am happy with who and what I am now.
 
velociraptor said:
Generally speaking, no. We have really dialed back immigration after having overdone it for the past half decade. We have a massive housing shortage and all of our services are overwhelmed. Those without critically needed skills are being encouraged to look elsewhere.
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We did the same thing here, in a 5 year period our population jumped from 24 million to 27 million but infrastructure and services haven't expanded at anywhere near the same pace.

If you don't have skills we deem necessary you can't migrate here.
If you're over 44 years old you can't migrate here.
If your country doesn't have a reciprocal healthcare agreement with Australia then it's going to be very expensive to migrate here. Preference is also given to people from countries with reciprocal healthcare agreements.
 
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