Interesting experiences

Since Little Bug has been diagnosed with ASD, we have run into a quite a few families that have someone on the spectrum. We have found that, in our experience, people fall into one of two camps:

The first is the incredibly compassionate community that we have found through the internets and Little Bug's school. We have met several parents who are willing to share, support, celebrate, and console each other. They realize that we are all in this together.

The later is a more frustrating beast. Recently, we have run into highly competitive know it all parents who make us want to scream and stim in the corner. These are parents that extol the virtue of what works for their child and whatever you do for your child is wrong. They deny that your child has ASD because your kid is on a different place on the spectrum than their kid. They are incredibly competitive about who's cross is heavier to bear.

What I want to tell these parents is that it's okay. We may never understand your hardships or challenges. We may never see eye to eye about the myriad of treatment options to chose from. But, I want to support you and work with you. I want you to know that I empathize with you and care about your situation. I want you to know that this isn't a competition. Trust me, we have too many hurdles- school districts, insurance companies, and ignorance- to fight with each other.

In a community that often has children demonized as monsters and sick by the very groups that are supposed to have our children's best interests in heart, we must stop fighting each other. We must stop belittling each other's experiences. We must stop discounting other people's experiences by denying a diagnosis or treatment.

We must work together.

I know that personally, I have very little time. I work 40 hours a week and commute another 12 on top of that. I work with Little Bug every day on items directly after work. I then read the laws, websites, and books that affect my child. I fight with the school district and coordinate all of Little Bug's therapies. This leave me little time to be a good partner to Nick, sleep, eat, bath, and occasionally have a social life. Nick works part time and goes to every therapy with Little Bug. He cleans, cooks, runs the house in general, and does most of Little Bug's therapy during the day. He reads all the same material I do and supports me in our fight with the school- the only reason I do it is I am loud, pushy, and don't have a problem with people not liking me.

I don't have time to fight with other parents of children with ASD. I don't have time to worry about whether you think some one's kid *really* has ASD. Trust me, its none of your business and quite honestly, how would they fool all of those people. I don't have time to fight with you about GFCF diets, supplements, therapies etc.

We can acheive so much more if we simply stop fighting.