Living with an autistic child
Only in very rare cases, parents recognize from the beginning that their child is autistic. Autism can appear along with other disorders, which make the child’s disability apparent already when it is born. Often, babies with autism look perfectly healthy and sometimes even particularily „loveable“. Around the age of 30 months, peculiarities become apparent. These children show a strange way of interacting with other children and their development of speech, in almost all cases, presents noticeable particularities. They do not want any changes, often show rigorous eating habits and love repetitive activities. They often play with their toys in a way that is different from that of other children of their age. For instance, they like to turn wheels or they would play only with one part of the entire toy. Rituals and stereotypies narrow their lives.
If you have the suspicion that your child might be, the diagnosis can be made by doctors or clinical psychologist using certain methods. This diagnosis can only help parents, who then are at the beginning of a long and hard way, if they try to see it as an opportunity of perceiving the nature of their child, that seemed so strange at the beginning. This perceptional diagnosis can enable parents to find ways of entering into their child’s world and to learn about the structures that mark it. People living with an autistic child can open ways through the love they feel for this child. It is also them who are going the most important therapists. Eventually, they will learn that an autistic child will turn their lives „upside down“ but that it can nevertheless be a life absolutely worth living and full of hope. Counselling talks with experts, seminars and specialist literature can help parents to achieve the necessary expertise.
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