Autism "help" groups.

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There are so many, and all they do is provide referrals. Ugh. Most of the information they provide is useless. They spend so much money on staff and stupid think tanks and give no actual help. It is very frustrating. I am so sick of reading that they provide education. All you need is a computer and google to get information. Your pamphlets do nothing to help my family.

It's exhausting, isn't it?

YES! LOL It is dishonest.

I dealt with a lot of this when I first diagnosed. It took years before I felt up for trying to navigate seeking help again.

I got too busy with other stuff to follow-up, but I might have found more useful groups the second time around.

I was diagnosed as a child and even then there wasn't much help. Probably a good thing because back then all the therapies my mom took me too suggested ABA type things.

All the therapists out there are for children and all seem to be ABA. *sigh* I am currently trying to find one for my son to talk to. He expressed an interest. I just want one who understand autism and might have a better time making a session useful for him. He has a very hard time talking about feelings, etc.

I have tried multiple times. Every one of them points to the same places, and most of employment programs out there seem to be for people lower on the spectrum. My son is incredibly smart. He can do more than work at McDonalds or Walmart. He can do many jobs that would support him, but it is difficult for him to maneuver the hiring process due to his anxiety and difficulty with interviews.

My mom wanted me to see one for talking but they were all ABA and I knew this. I had too many bad experiences with them telling me NOT to talk about my special interests or trying to change my core personality.

It is difficult for parents. We want our children to be accepted and have an easier life so sometimes we make the wrong choices. With my eldest we would turn his head to have him look at us. He can look at people now, but he looks so uncomfortable. Now I think I should have just allowed him to not make eye contact if that was what made him comfortable. We didn't know a thing about autism at the time, didn't even think he was different than any other child. I do sometimes ask my younger ASD son to change the subject when he has been going on for a long time about Roblox or another video game. He will usually verbalize that he wants to finish his specific thought so we say OK, finish this one and then we are moving on. LOL We don't play the games and it is all gobbledygook to us. I much prefer the outer space or physics discussions. It is crazy what comes out of that boys mouth.

My mom never really minded my special interests either. She had heard about some therapists taking a child's special interests and holding it hostage to get the child to do whatever you wanted them too. My mom felt this was too cruel. But most therapists were like that. Special interests were/are my strongest autistic trait and the more people tried to make me do something non special interest related or give them up, the more I rebelled. Once people got off my back and accepted the fact meerkats are essentially part of my identity, I felt safe enough to eventually discover other special interests. BUT, I could not be forced and making me have to give up one didn't help.

You can train a person to do pretty much anything, but you have to think about the amount of energy it is costing.

Sure, you can get an autistic person to look at another person's eyes and appear to be listening, but it is stressing them out so much, they probably aren't actually taking anything in. That is why many people suggest looking at a person's forehead or nose instead. But really, if you are asking someone to be truly productive, let them look away and think so they can focus on the other person's words.

I think it's better to work around the things that are challenging for a person to do and to push forward on their strengths. Let's say you have a young person who is awkward in person, but can compose good emails. That person should apply for jobs that do not require many in-person meetings and is in either a work from home or fully-walled cubical-type environment. That way they don't have to look at other's people's faces and can send emails to communicate. A way to get that across would be to say in the interview, "I communicate best in written form, so I can organize my thoughts."

And BTW, the reason there are limits to the type of "help" for autism, is because insurance companies will only pay for certain types of "help." No one bothers unless they will get paid. Sadly.

They're either there purely to make money off scared parents of autistic kids, or they're founded by people who think they want to help but will never actually put any effort into looking into what actually helps, so they thrash around making things worse.

One thing I always ask about any group or service which portrays itself as offering autistic help: what percentage of the governing board, senior executive, or founder(s) are themselves autistic?

Because the answer is usually zero. And when it's not, the next most common is that there are one, maybe two people with diagnoses who have titles but aren't actually involved in running or setting policy for any of the business or social aspects.

Autism help/social skills groups are basically the autism equivalent of gay conversion therapy.