Autism
What we should keep our eyes out for...
There has been so much in the press lately about autism it hard not to think it. First image that comes to mind is the character Dustin Hoffman portrayed in the 1988 movie “Rain Man”. Not a very comforting image when it comes to your children. Because it has been in the press so much we thought it might be a concern of fathers.
Not sure how open people are to discuss this topic? The more and more you talk to parents, you eventually hear about a couple that has an autistic child. Other than images in the movie “Rain Man”, can’t say there is general knowledge of autism. What’s the cause, how do you detect it, is it hereditary, etc? In the news, lots of reports say that a vaccine preservative thimerosal may have some impact – who knows what causes autism? We may never find the cause, but we do know there is a significant impact on families.
The web is a great source of information we found plenty of pages that give detail on autism. One site was http://www.cureautismnow.org/index.jsp . Easy to use and has a section called “AUTISM RESOURCES” on the right side of the page. We don’t promote specific sites, but this was one of the first ones we came across and was easy to navigate. Also check out http://www.autism-society.org.
Posted on Friday, September 21st, 2007 at 9:29 pm.
Filed under Daddy Blog, Daddy Needs to Know.
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September 22nd, 2007 at 5:58 pm
Yes, the statistics you cite are very alarming. Unfortunately, there are a block of individuals out there who are insisting that the large spike in autism rates is due to better diagnostics or greater awareness. In my opinion, this is highly unlikely. There has been some sort of environmental factor that has caused the dramatic rise in autism cases…….what that is remains to be seen.
September 29th, 2007 at 3:12 am
its interesting, there is so much to learn about autism. what causes it, how can it be treated, etc…
then jenna mcarthy comes out with her story about her child. again very inspiring and fills people with hope. it just brings up more of those questions - why did her son just seem to change, how did the treatment help him - why would that treatment not work for others? it just adds more questions that i wish we had answers for!
my heart goes out to all those who have to battle this on a daily basis. reminds me to take everyday with my children as a blessing!