The rates, clearly, are increasing dramatically.
What has changed?
A great deal of time (and money) has been spent on the study and reporting of autism in America, but what has been left out of the conversation has been what an autistic child actually looks like.
When you read the sentence “1 in 88 children are diagnosed with autism” you might expect to see a room full of child-versions of Dustin Hoffman playing Rain Man. And, if you found yourself running into a Dustin Hoffman for every 88 people you met, you would certainly have reasons to be alarmed.
Having taught school for 25+ years (never you mind exactly how many) as a regular-education teacher, I have met and worked with a lot of different children. Some were actually in special-ed classes when I met them, others would be diagnosed later. Having met them, I would like to say something about what a child diagnosed with autism might look like.
(Is this a compete list? Obviously not — you might have a few examples to add yourself, probably from members of your own family.)
Let me tell you what autism looks like:
- Intellectually Disabled: (originally — Profound Retardation) Child of 8 cannot speak at all and cries constantly.
- Developmentally Delayed: (originally — Mild Retardation) Child of 12 very good at chores and can answer simple questions but cannot read.
- Laziness: Child can read exceptionally well but won’t [or can’t] answer questions about the text passed the recall level. Also he hides his math homework because he’s afraid of it.
- Stubbornness: Has asked you the same question 17 times and is currently asking the same question right now.
- Nerdiness: Honestly how long can this child talk about Fantastic 4? He’s quoted the whole movie to me and it’s only 11:30.
- Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: Moths moths moths moths moths moths. I tried to teach this child how to google-image moths thinking that would be a great thing to do but he couldn’t stop talking about moths long enough to learn.
- Just Plain Spoiled: You can go outside AFTER you do your work. AFTER you do your work. AFTER you do your work. AFTER you do your work. Clearly you are badgering me about this because you think you can get out of doing your work, not because cause-and-effect sentences are lost on you.
- Shyness: Can do the school work but nearly impossible to get her to talk except for one-word answers to basic recall questions. Could be worse, last year she would pee herself before asking to go to the bathroom. But she smiles ALL THE TIME so she must be happy at school, right?
- An Awkward Phase: Child gets good grades but how can anyone be so clueless? Maybe they will grow out of it.
- Weirdo: Good grades and everything he says is logical but nobody likes him - and it’s really hard to say why - almost impossible to put your finger on it.
- PTSD: The child comforts himself by hiding under a table, covering his ears and rocking back and forth, clearly someone is abusing him.
- Insanity: Child walks on toes constantly and babbles at people that are not there.
Now in the OLD days ALL of these kinds of school children would have been misdiagnosed. Some would be placed in the wrong special-ed class, others would struggle through school without help.
TODAY we know that these children are autistic. Are the rates of an autistic diagnoses rocketing? You bet they are - NOT because of a new toxin being introduced into our environment, but because we JUST RECENTLY - I mean just like in the past 10 years — found out what “autism" is.
Now, is it logical to hypothesize that vaccinations, a new factor recently introduced into the population, could be linked to the newly diagnosed condition of autism? Of course it is. And that’s why it has been, appropriately, studied to death.
The GOOD news (and it is good news) is that the more information about educating children we have the better educations they will receive. The old model (from the good old days) of putting your confusing child in an institution and forgetting he exists has been, happily, abandoned. Does this mean more autistic children — even severely autistic children (the kind that don’t talk) — are in the public school system? Yes, it does.
And that is a good thing.
All children have the right to learn.