"The kids who beat autism"

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http://www.donotlink.com/framed?513405

This sounds like a load of hogwash to me. Any thoughts?

Yeah, that is almost like saying
'i used to have aids, but this herbal tea cured me up in no time'

I'm getting so tired of this. And yes, there *are* people who think just drinking some kind of weird tea or taking like 90 vitamins a day will cure AIDS and other life-threatening disease. Or even stuff that's not threatening like a cold. "Hey, I took this alternative medicine and I got over my cold in only 7-10 days!"

Sounds like another person trying to cash in on scared parents, of ASD kids, looking for answers. They should be ashamed.

Yeah... these kids are still living in their parent's homes; they do NOT have full adult responsibilities. Show me how they cope with adulthood before saying they're "cured."

Also, look at the criteria they use: They're teaching kids and teens to mask their symptoms and telling them that if they can fake being "nonautistic" then life will be smooth sailing.

I WISH that were true

A guy I know was originally diagnosed as autistic, but as he gained coping and social skills his diagnosis was amended to Asperger's. These days, you almost wouldn't know he was ASD. Is he 'cured'? Nope. He has become very good at 'being normal.'

i used to be real good at being normal enough, too. but lately, as the years go by it seems to be getting harder and harder. i seem to be moving more toward the autistic end of the spectrum.

I just kind of skimmed through the article but it almost seems like an advertisement for those particular ABA therapists. There are tons of Autistic kids using ABA programs. If they were that amazing I think we would hear a lot more stories like this. The fact that we don't says a lot. I also wonder why they don't give the kid's name or the parent's names but they give the name of the other kid. Just curious.

+1

Many conditions, if diagnosed early and met with effective intervention, can be "overcome" (sic). With autism, if it's not severe, it's a matter of learning adaptation and coping skills. You're still autistic, but you learn to effectively deal with how it affects you.

Coming soon: "The kids who beat being dead" and "The kids who beat having amputated limbs." Congratulations are in order for the people who turned Autistic kids into robots, who have no idea why they should repeat the behaviours they have been taught, or what's good about that. They just know that pretending to be something they're not produces rewards. Some kids have "Locked-in syndrome", which has many of the same symptoms as Autism but goes away as they grow up. Most of these kids were probably misdiagnosed. This kind of article annoys me because it gives people false hope. Thank goodness my parents recognised that I have to be me. Although, I suppose this article was more even-handed than some of the ones I?ve read about ABA treatments. Seriously, this article makes me angry.

These critiques are not really about the article but about how autism is defined.

Regarding ABA, the article clearly states that interventions that worked for one boy did not work for another for no observable reason.

Regarding the idea that the autism isn't gone but the people are just coping well, by the diagnostic definitions now in use, if you don't need support, you are not autistic.

Yes, this does mean that a person can go from having diagnosable autism as a child, then learn coping skills that take them into adulthood as fairly self sufficient and functional person and lose the diagnosis. The same hypothetical "cured" person might regain the diagnosis if a change in circumstances reduces their ability o function later in life. That may some low nonsense that flies in the face of the concept of a PDD, but that is the way the medical establishment has defined autism.

The article is actually worth reading all the way through.

[edited because I wrote the original on an iPhone...]

I think it's sad instead of flapping put your hands in your pockets. Or the use coupons to talk about dinosaurs then change the topic. The kid was a walking encyclopedia on them! Future PhD archeologist but NO! Not normalish teen geek into tech (which is fine too). Still flaps during sports games so again still there but getting into the aspect of hiding it in your pockets SHEESH!

I was starting to presume I was on my way out of the spectrum and into NT land. I was fit, confident and happy and thought my 'symptoms' were behind me. How wrong I was! I have learned to accept my limitations and understand I will always have to live with the sensory issues.

This is why I'm not wasting my time or money for a diagnosis. I was told it's a life-long condition but you can use it if you cope. So I guess by that logic, I went from moderate AS to NT to mild AS to NT and now back to moderate/mild AS. Gimme a break!

I think the reason I crashed just like I did at 20 was the fact I felt like I was wearing a "NT" mask 24/7 until I could not take it anymore.

its impossible to change diagnostic places on the spectrum;people either are classic autistic or aspergan-aspies will never meet the significant speech and language impairment of classic autistic criteria and classic autistics shoud never be rediagnosed as having aspergers just because they lose the speech and language issues and no good specialist will do this as asperger criteria doesnt allow for people who had had a classic autistic developmental history.

but....its highly possible for stress and other factors to outweigh coping skills and make things harder and more obvious,its not that people are regressing its that they dont have the coping skills to put up with what theyre dealing with and it will grind them down until the stressors are no longer there.

That was all too long for me to read. I guess I'm "less" autistic then I used to be. Or maybe they over diagnosed me. I do seem to have adapted well to different things. There is one kid my age on another forum who says he used to be severely autistic, but from what he posts autism doesn't seem to be any kind of issue for him now. I will have to PM him and get details. Personally I think it is more a matter of adapting. And when stressed out and stuff, I do become "more autistic", but that's because the progress I've made takes a lot of effort and all that can crumble for a while.

Next they'll start talking about vaccines again, or going back to the Daily Mail 'article' about a mother who claimed who cure her child's autism.

Absolute nonsense.