The Autism Elephant in the Room

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I have noticed that sometimes autistic children who have the most pressure to act neurotypical come from autistic families. I'm talking about scenarios where like the kid is having ABA and getting weird injections to force the autism out but the people doing this to them are undiagnosed, unaware aspies or the children of undiagnosed aspies.

Has anyone else noticed this or had personal experience with it?

My mother has always been histrionic and neurotic, and probably lacks at least some ability to feel pleasure (a salient characteristic of some people with autism).

With me, always, she's had an overriding, overarching interest in me seeming "normal" at all times. Even to the point where she gets hysterical if I forget the salad fork/regular fork distinction.

She makes me into an elephant in a China shop sometimes.

Come to think of it, my diagnosed as bipolar mom has some autism characteristics, but I wouldn't say she's autistic. Maybe she's in this BAP population. She refuses to acknowledge that my little bother is autistic and is enraged at my research. I think some people have an inner feeling that they are not normal and their reaction is to force themselves and their kids to be as normal as possible, instead of just letting themselves and their kids be a little different.

There is a sizable genetic component to autism...so people with ASD are much more likely to have kids with ASD. You could also imagine that people with some ASD traits but perhaps not diagnosable might still carry some of the genes of ASD. You could also imagine people with ASD being well suited to one-another, which again increases the potential genetic likelihood that their children will also be on the spectrum.

There is a bit of research on the topic of parents with ASD raising kids with ASD, but generally it's an anecdotal thing that people in the treatment community talk about. It can be challenging to teach parents in general to effectively (and kindly) raise a child with ASD. If the parents have their own difficulties, be it ASD, depression (also linked with having children with ASD) or anxiety, it adds another layer of challenge for the professional.

I don't imagine parental ASD status would make a difference with regards to choosing interventions for the children. Hopefully people on the spectrum would be a bit more rational about the process and less likely to try new and untested interventions. I would also hope that parents with ASD would have a special kind of empathy for their children, and would avoid putting them through things where the benefits don't outweigh the cost.

I also want to address your comment about ABA. I know that a lot of people have had bad experiences with ABA because the way some people have practiced it, it can feel more like torture than education. I would like to point out that ABA is still a new field of study, and the early incarnations of it were certainly clumsy, and they emphasized conformity over quality of life. There are still "bad" ABA teachers and institutions out there, but there are also people who use it effectively to teach non-verbal children language and basic social skills - and the kids enjoy the process. For the time-being, it is the best researched approach to teaching language and social skills to kids on the spectrum, and it is the foundation for many of the newer approaches. I call what I do "positive behavior support" because I emphasize the individual child's quality of life by setting goals that are meaningful to a child and using methods that are agreeable to the child. It's essentially ABA+humanism, but I still recognize that ABA is the best researched method of teaching non-verbal kids language, and I recognize that it is the basis of what I do. Anyway, I'd like to encourage people not to write off ABA as an inhumane approach to autism, and consider that the ABA you experienced may not be the same as the ABA that is being offered in your community. This is especially true if the people offering that treatment describe other more modern ABA brands such as Pivotal Response Training, TEACCH, Positive Behavior Support, or Verbal Behavior.