Boys are nearly five times more likely than girls to have autism.
I'm keeping things short and sweet this year. There are plenty of good people out there who have direct experience of living with autism. People who are far more eloquent on the subject than I could ever be.
My lovely fellow author, RJ Scott has spoken openly and with humour about her lovely, clever son Matt, and continues to work to raise awareness of this condition.. This annual blog event, one that I'm always happy to take part in, goes some way to ensuring that we all learn something. That autism isn't just about a blinding ability to draw a city-scape from memory, or solving complex equations in a heartbeat, it's an everyday thing with its own heartaches, practicalities and worries. Autism isn't contagious, you can't give it to your kids if they have the necessary childhood vaccines. It's just one of those genetic flukes that happens to good people and good families. Love, understanding and support can go a long, long way.
Much love from me.
Her blog post for this year's event is here.
I'm giving away an e-book from my back list to a random poster, an answer to the this question:
How did you learn about autism?
lovely post. i learnt mostly from my mother and sister who work in early childhood in those years that autism starts to get discover in children - but really I learnt more from last years blog hop
ReplyDeleteGreat post. I interact with many children, including those who have autism. And when it became more and more common for parents to forego vaccinations for their children, I did more reading.
ReplyDeleteI first heard of autism through my sister whom worked as a therapeutic therapist (can't remember if that was her title or not) with autistic children. I really started to learn about it following along on RJ's blog tour two years ago.
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I remember first hearing the term in a March of Dimes PSA when I was a kid. There wasn't much explanation in the media until a few years ago, though.
ReplyDeleteTrix, vitajex(at)Aol(Dot)com
Great post. Autism and other mental disabilities are not known well enough by most of the people, and that leads to prejudice and misunderstandings. We really have to work at shedding light on this topic, to make the world a better place.
ReplyDeleteYou know I don't remember how I learned about it. I do know that when I was in college over thirty years ago that I had considered going into psychology and studying autism. It was considered more of a mental thing back then rather than genetic I think. For some reason autism fascinated me, not as a freak show, but why it happened, what did those with autism 'see', I wanted to know why. I think I already had an inkling that autistic people were very sensitive to things more than most people. Don't ask me how I knew, but I did. So I would say I've been interested in autism way before it was well known and for over half my life and part of me still wishes I had pursued my interest in the study of autism.
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Thanks for the post and for being part of the hop. Autism became more known to me when my best friend had her son and started noticing things that might put him on the spectrum. I have since learned more just because so many other people I have met over the years have children that are autistic.
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I have heard about it for years but not really understanding it. My daughter has a CPS child that has been diagnosed with a mild case, so trying to read all that I can to understand what they are going through.
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I have known about autism from a young age, but I did not really understand it until I started working in the education sector and from the students and friends who are part of the wide and varied autism spectem. I think that the key thing is that is a hidden condition, that each person is unique and that there are so many myths surrounding the condition that people most certainly need to be enlightened. One myth is that people with autism don’t feel emotions, when in fact they autism feel emotions intensely & can be overwhelmed by the emotions of those around them.
ReplyDeleteThank you for being part of this blog tour and for a chance to win one of your books :)
I do not really know how I found out about autism... I guess my mother explained it to me, or at school. I think I've always been aware there are people who are different, but I've always love difference, so...
ReplyDeleteI don't actually remember the first time I learned about autism's existence, but the first time I actually learned any facts/details about it was when I was doing some reading in preparation to start my own family (which ended up taking a lot longer than I anticipated).
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