Autism Awareness Month
What is Autism?
As the mother of twin sons with autism, Karla Akins, author of A
Pair of Miracles: A Story of Autism, Faith, and Determined Parenting (Kregel
Publications), hopes to help create a greater awareness and understanding of
what autism is and offer encouragement and reassurance for families living with
the effects of autism firsthand.
Below is an excerpt from the chapter “What is Autism?” from A Pair of Miracles by Karla Akins ©2017
by Kregel Publications.
When the
doctors first diagnosed my twin boys with autism in 1998, the only thing I knew
about it was the character Dustin Hoffman played in the movie Rain Man.
It sounds incredible, but I honestly wasn’t aware that there was a diagnosis
for people with developmental disabilities who acted as my boys did. Society
was just beginning to be more aware of a growing group of behavioral
characteristics called autism. Looking back on people I knew growing up,
I can now understand that they may have had autism, when I thought they were
intellectually disabled. I didn’t understand that, just because someone
couldn’t express themselves, it didn’t mean they weren’t intelligent.
Defining
Autism
When my
boys turned two, I realized that something wasn’t “right” with them. They spent
most of their time biting themselves and each other, screaming, and hitting me.
They didn’t play with toys and were just learning to walk. They didn’t babble
and only cried. It was a constant guessing game trying to figure out what they
wanted. They were simply miserable.
So was I.
All I had
at my fingertips for support was a rickety, 1980s-era IBM personal computer. As
a pastor’s wife, isolation was an issue for me. Because of my husband’s church
position, I couldn’t openly share what we were going through as a family (I’ll
share more about that later).
That’s how
I wound up in an AOL autism chat room, filled to the brim with mamas and
grandmas who had children with autism. In those days, proper citizens didn’t
post selfies and Facebook was nonexistent. (Founder Mark Zuckerberg was then
only thirteen years old.) Most people protected their privacy, so it was easy
to remain anonymous. I spent hours every evening sharing my struggles and
reading about others who fought the same battles. It was truly a blessing from
the Lord to make these new friends. I don’t know how I would have managed
otherwise.
What I
learned from my desperate search for answers is that autism was, and continues
to be, a complex condition not easily understood by researchers. Even though
they had gathered and studied data, it was fragmented. There were (and continue
to be) as many disagreements on how to interpret the data as there were ideas
about how to treat it.
Since the
twins were born in 1995, technology has advanced from landlines to cell phones
and wireless computing. NASA has landed a rover on Mars. We’ve seen the
invention of the artificial heart, YouTube, and iPads. You’d think there would
be more progress regarding how science perceives autism, but there isn’t.
Experts are still puzzled about the disorder and there are no one-size-fits-all
answers.
However,
the signs to look for in a young child have remained consistent. According to
the United
States Centers for Disease Control, a toddler with
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) might:
• not look
at what a parent points to
• not
notice or point to unusual objects, such as an airplane flying overhead
• avoid
eye contact
• play
alone
• not be
aware when people talk to them
• repeat
or echo words instead of answering questions appropriately
• repeat
actions over and over again
• have
trouble with transitions
• be
oversensitive to smells, tastes, textures, or water that touches the skin
• lose
skills they once had (such as language)
• not play
“pretend” games, such as feeding a doll or playing house
• prefer
not to be cuddled or held, except on their own terms
If your
child or grandchild has any of these symptoms, I urge you to make an
appointment with your child’s pediatrician and ask for a referral to a
developmental pediatrician or developmental psychiatrist. The earlier your
child begins appropriate therapies, the better the chance of “rewiring” their
brain.
A
Neurological Condition
People
with autism vary in IQ. They are not all cognitively impaired. In fact, some have
quite high IQs. Autism has nothing to do with intelligence. It is a
brain-based, neurological condition. It has less to do with psychology and more
to do with biology. It is not a mental illness. It is a developmental
disability that appears during the first three years of life, is five times
more prevalent in boys than in girls, and respects no racial, ethnic, or social
boundaries. Family income, lifestyle, or education levels have no effect on its
occurrence.
Autism is
often referred to as an “invisible disease” because you can’t see autism by
just looking at a person. But if you watch someone with autism, you may see
that they interact, behave, and learn differently than most people. This
spectrum is extremely broad and ranges from those with giftedness to the
severely challenged. Some adults with autism can live independently, while
others need constant supervision and support.
This brain
disorder affects a person’s ability to communicate, reason, and interact with
others. The fact that it’s a spectrum disorder (meaning it affects a wide range
of conditions) makes it even more difficult to treat and understand because it
affects individuals differently and to varying degrees of severity. As with my
adopted twins—who were also diagnosed with fetal alcohol disorder, apraxia (an
inability to manage coordinated movements, including their speech), and
intellectual disability—autism is often found in combination with other
disabilities.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Karla Akins is the mother of five, including twin sons
with autism. She has a bachelor’s in special education from Western Governors
University and a doctorate in Christian education from Kingsway Theological
Seminary. She has nearly four decades of teaching experience in homeschooling,
private school and public education.
Akins has also served in ministry for more than 30 years
and is co-minister at Christian Fellowship Church in North Manchester, Indiana,
with her husband, Eddie. She is also a popular speaker at conferences and
retreats. In addition to A Pair of
Miracles: A Story of Autism, Faith, and Determined Parenting, Akins is the
author of four other books.
Akins loves hearing from her
readers. Her online home is www.KarlaAkins.com, and
she is also on Facebook (KarlaKAkins) and Twitter (@KarlaAkins).
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