Autism isn’t cut and dried; there is no cure and there is no known reason

There is a lot of hype out there; a lot of different news reports, speculations, theories, and ideas about why there is such a huge influx of autism diagnoses in the world in the last twenty years.  However, Autism isn’t cut and dried; there is no cure and there is no known reason as to why there are more and more diagnoses out there...or even what causes autism altogether.  In the last twelve years I have read varied reports from different agencies and organizations about where and why there is autism…the truth is there is not answer and they are even farther from a solution since there needs to be a cause in order for there to be any advancements in a cure.

Certainly there is a lot of documentation about vaccinations (some just about the vaccination on its own; some about a preservative that was used in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s), some others about genetics, others about mercury rising in various places (water, food, the ground), still yet others related to diet (gluten, corn, dairy all seem to top a list), even others about the vast over use of chemical pesticides on our food.  The reasons could be as simple as none of the above to all of the above or just variations of the series of each theory put together…who knows?  I certainly do not and I started realizing that my independent search for a ‘reason’ was wasting my time and energy towards a problem that there is not real solution to.  I don’t disparage or think that parents are wasting their efforts that are looking for that elusive reason; on the contrary, we all have different ways of coping with a situation that we feel helpless in addressing.  My theory has always been:  if it doesn’t hurt the child, then what does it hurt?  Do what makes you feel better and what helps you cope with watching someone that you love more than life itself struggle in a world that relatively ignores him/her, judges him/her, or just doesn’t understand him/her…I am a firm believer in supporting people not bringing them down because what I do is different from how someone else might do it.  

I am extremely pragmatic and systematically look at most situations with a logical basis in deductive and sometimes (very rarely) inductive reasoning.  I saw that each claim was just that a claim; there was no basis in tangible or categorical scientific proof to substantiate them; not yet anyways (except the genetics course; however, not all children on the spectrum have Fragile X only some).  Just recently some courts have determined to accredit some of autism to the use of vaccines; however, just two years ago those same courts decided that it wasn’t the cause.  I don’t hold stock in courts that are ruled by men who are not scientists, often juries are not really those of ‘peers’ when determining a case outcome, and the fact that only scientists and other people of such education can really answer our questions for certain.  Until that time happens, the courts will flip-flop back and forth without really scientifically proving anything.  It is a system that just cannot be trusted to find the problem, when the scientific understanding is very limited and left unproven. 

At the end of the day, and as I have said many, many times in the last decade or so:  I am not a scientist, I cannot control or determine the course of how/why my sons are autistic; instead I will focus on what I can control.  I will try to socially educate the rest of the world a community at a time about these amazing autistic people and children who are being diagnosed these days in droves.  Attitudes have to change about how to deal with the situation now.  Sitting on our laurels waiting for a cause and a cure doesn’t help the families now that spend most of their time alone in the world; we are often excluded in the most basic ways.  No one means to; they just do not understand the difficulties in raising even one child on the spectrum.  Changes in the education system, in social attitude, and acceptance are what we need to focus on; let the scientists figure out the rest.  I would rather focus my time enjoying my sons rather than worrying about what I cannot change or control anyways.