Autism Awareness 2016

I kind of have a funny relationship with autism awareness month. I remember back when it first became a thing I was kind of hopeful that it would mean more awareness and better acceptance of and support for autistic people. Now every year I wonder what it is autism awareness month is actually making people aware of.

When I talk to people, nice thoughtful well-meaning people, who admit that they little to nothing about autism they invariably know three things about autism:

1. Vaccines are involved somehow.
2. The “modern” diet is involved somehow. “Modern” is in quotes because it seems to be code for whatever is readily available to the average American.
3. There didn’t used to be as many autistic people “before.” “Before” is in quotes because it seems to be an arbitrary time period dependent on the age of the speaker.

Often some mention is made of toxins and/or chemicals in connection to one or more of the afore mentioned big three that everyone seems to know about autism even though they don’t know much about autism. This is what the fullness of the lives of my children and the lives of thousands of other children, adults, and their families and friends has been reduced to. Err...
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Here are a few things that I would like people to become aware of this autism awareness month.

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