AuntyCC wrote:
Thank you for the replies. It's quite clear that everyone who self-diagnoses, and even many who receive a professional diagnosis, go through a long process of learning and questioning whether they really do have it.
The thing that made me ask was a conversation I was having elsewhere and someone who works in a school made the comment that parent-diagnosed Aspergers children take services away from genuine sufferers. I have heard this kind of comment before (not least here on Wrong Planet), but I am beginning to think that it is very widespread. I wondered what happens to a child who has been formally diagnosed, statemented, sent to a special school and then finds that the school staff think he/she is merely spoilt. It seems to me that that is potentially even more damaging than the old days when AS children just got to sink or swim in ordinary schools.
I'm wondering whether it would be possible to get an article into a newspaper or magazine or radio programme that is read by the sorts of people who say these things. Something describing the process of finding out about Aspergers and giving more information about what it is (I hear people say "Aspergers is not just about being a bit shy", but they don't seem to actually know what it really is about). Have people seen stuff like this already? Was there any really good articles about it?
Interesting point. I think it is also teachers who need educating. In Australia there are many teachers who adhere to a very outmoded understanding of ASD's. They assume there MUST be poor eye contact for a dx - which is simply not the case, and they are not very aware of the spectrum model. It was really interesting to hear teachers contribute and talk at the Women and Girls with ASD Conference in Brisbane last year. There were just a few. Some of them attended the conference because they had a daughter on the spectrum. One teacher who had a teen daughter on the spectrum recounted her experience with the education system and its utter ignorance in regard to ASD's and particularly girls with ASD's.
I personally have also experienced some similar things and I know of another person who has had to absolutely FIGHT some staff at daycare who do not understand her kid's issues as a child with HFA. She keeps telling them to just let her wear her long pants and sleeves even in the summer heat. It makes her feel ok. She's come back to the daycare and found the staff have re-dressed her in cooler clothes and she is absolutely distraught. Absolutely terrified and distraught in the different clothes. Poor little thing..... Her mum wants her to get into cooler clothes too, eventually, but she knows how to do so in a way that her child can manage and process in her own time. They just FORCE her and it's not ok.
14 Jan 2010, 5:20 am
