Making Sense of Autistic Spectrum Disorders

People.

"I never thought much of the courage of a lion tamer. Inside the cage he is at least safe from people." George Bernard Shaw

"Man is the only animal of which I am thoroughly and cravenly afraid of." George Bernard Shaw

George Bernard Shaw was autistic.
http://www.2-b-well.org/famousautistics.html

"But I want you to know one thing: that 80's tough love bullshit, it doesn't work. It's not real. It doesn't work. I should have let him -- we all should have let him -- have his numbness. We should have let him have the thing that made him feel better, that made his stomach feel better. We should have let him have it, instead of trying to strip away his skin. You go home and you tell your parents, "Don't you ever try that tough love bullshit on me, 'cuz it doesn't fucking work". - Courtney Love-Cobain

I have no trouble understanding the Columbine shootings, none at all. Because not a day passed in Hoquiam schools where I did not think of doing much the same thing. It's fortunate that when the snapping point occurred, all I had available was a brass padlock. But to say that proves that students should be expelled for being armed misses the point. Yes, someone would have definitely gotten their head blown off had I been armed with a gun. And they would have deserved it.

Or if not precisely deserving it, nonetheless, it was a logical and predictable consequence, statistically, that such a thoughtless, cruel and dangerous behavior pattern would get SOMEONE'S head blown off.

That is my point. It seems to me a valuable life-lesson for schools and administration personnel to pass on - that threats and violence in support of social norms - bullying, in other words - is every bit as despicable as any other sort of violence, and that no form of it should be tolerated or encouraged by the schools, no matter who is doing it and no matter what the social goal is.

http://www.astraeasweb.net/politics/bobkurt.html

"If I had gotten Hitler here at U.C.L.A. at the age of 4 or 5, I could have raised him to be a nice."

In other words:

"I'm a bigger bully than Hitler and quite proficient in the art of bully techniques. I'm King of Bully Hill when my opponent is 4 or 5." No thanks Lovaas. I found somebody better. Marc Gold has a heart of gold.

I want to wash my hands of Behaviorism, Skinner and Lovass.

Write another article? - A happy one with the good guys in white hats like Marc Gold!

You are my dance partner. I step on toes so wear your steel toe boots! :o

I can't make any sense of Kelly C@sh's comments.

Here's my feedback for what it is worth.

ABA has come a really really long way since those days of Lovaas. What started in correcting behaviour somewhat cruelly, modern ABA is gentle and fun for the student. I know because my daughter is autistic and she has been in an ABA program for over 2 years. She loves the program, loves her therapists and the results have been utterly astonishing. She went from an extremely unhappy 2 year old who threw 90 minute tantrums several times a day to a much sweeter disposition. Whilst she is still sensitive and still gets upset her tantrums are short and not intense at all. She is finally able to communicate and interested in making friends. She wakes up with a smile and her anxiety has reached a level where it is completely manageable. If she didn't love ABA I wouldn't make her do it. But she does it willingly and faces each challenge her lovely therapists present.

I would recommend ABA to anyone that has children with ASD. As long as they can afford it. Here in Australia ABA is not provided by the govt or private health insurance. It has cost us nearly $AU100 000. But I would pay double to see the results that we have. ABA has saved our daughters (and my husbands, and my other daughter's, and my own) life.

Self Awareness And The Difficulties of Being Different
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/aspergers-diary/201010/self-awarenes...

The scene opens up on a sad, silent boy, his parents, and three official looking doctors, who state: "We have concluded our consultation, and being of one mind (the best in all medicine may we add), we have come to the conclusion that your son will not nor cannot, speak, communicate, nor indeed, relate in any way, to the world around him." Does this description sound familiar?

"Puff the Magic Dragon," was a story about an autistic boy who is "cured" by an adventure with a magic dragon.

Remember the night sea journey that made me autistic at the age of four? My connect and envision brainsets tell me there is a very BIG relationship between "Thor battering the Midgaard Serpent" and "Puff the Magic Dragon." Puff is a much friendlier serpent than the one recorded in my memory.

I found the thread that goes with the Great Disruption Needle. I need you to sew. Write me "An Epic Fathering Story". It's your turn to play a part on the world stage. I'll give you the script and role: Nestor - a Senex. In your wisdom you told me history. You helped my puer energy to gain grounding and substance. Shelley Carson is Athena. BTW Just so you know, my new role model is Lisbeth Salander: "The girl with the dragon tatoo", "The girl who played with fire", "The girl who kicked the hornet's nest." She's a grown up Aspergian Pippi Longstocking. She is so me. With her I got my identity crisis resolved.

"Thus Athena sends Telemachos to Nestor, the oldest king of the Trojan War. "[I]n his wisdom / he will tell you history and no lies," says Zeus’ daughter (3. 23-24). In some Latin versions of the poem, Hillman reminds us, Nestor is called “Senex” (Puer Wounds 237). The old Greek Lord tells Telemachos the story of the Trojan War, as well as the fate of Agamemnon, Aegisthos, and Orestes.

Archetypally, what this meeting is suggesting is that history, as a positive aspect of senex consciousness, helps the puer energy gain grounding and substance. It situates it in a continuum of time and thus facilitates its actual participation in the world. It is history that can make the puer consequential and effective. Only by establishing this link to time (Kronos) and past can the stagnant situations properly move forward. “Our task is to discover the psychic connection between past and future, otherwise the unconscious figures within us who are as well the archaic past will shape the historical future perhaps disastrously” (Hillman, Senex and Puer 31). History gives both substance and structure to the puer’s otherwise erratic and ethereal energy.

The thread solution to the world needle problem is here. It's your turn now.

http://journals.sfu.ca/pgi/index.php/pacificamyth/article/viewArticle/17/52

Changing Education Paradigms http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U&feature=channel

21st Century Enlightenment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AC7ANGMy0yo&feature=channel

Where good ideas come from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NugRZGDbPFU&feature=related

You'll need this information to sew an Epic Fathering Story!