How do people not "believe" in Autism?

[MissPollyHadADolly19]

Just that really, bit of a rant more than anything.
It's not the tooth fairy or Santa, it's a recognised disorder!!

Relative struggling with her DC who's on the spectrum and partner believes it's just shit parenting (obviously not from him cos he's perfect, only the mother gets blames of course )

How do people really not believe in Autism? Or any mental illness for that matter.

Autism isn’t a mental illness. I’ve only ever heard people not believing in adhd and thinking that is down to bad parenting (I don’t agree before I get flamed) not heard anyone say it about asd.

I’ve heard people say it about ASD.

It’s because they don’t want to acknowledge that some things are out of your control. So they can say “it’ just bad parenting, I’d never allow my kids to walk all over me” or similar. Then they can continue to live in their bubble of bullshit.

I think some people prefer denial because otherwise they see it somehow as a slur on their genes. My best friends ex was certainy like that when she took dc for assessment. He was all 'not MY son. Not in MY family'. After diagnosis he refused to acknowledge HIS son was autistic. Blamed it all on her parenting, the school etc etc. Seemed to think it was a worldwide conspiracy to suggest his sperm was at fault. He is a major twat!!

Her partner or your partner?

Some people are fucking arseholes.

Fin

Most people argue ‘well it was none of it going around when I was a kid’. As if it’s something you catch. But they don’t grasp that we have the knowledge about it now, that is why we can diagnose earlier. That is why we can put preventions into place earlier.

Because they are ignorant but what worries me is the amount of teacher who don’t “believe” in it. See also dyslexia.

If the partner is or isn't the father it's also possible he 'doesn't believe' so he can use it to slag the mum off and belittle her.

Because the wilfully ignorant always believe they know better than any amount of experts.

Same as PP, I’ve heard it said about ADHD, less so about Autism. I suppose I can understand someone questioning a diagnosis in some rare cases, but not the existence of autism itself - that’s just being wilfully ignorant. But struggling to behave because due to autism and struggling to behave due to inadequate parenting are not mutually exclusive things.

Because they are stupid more than ignorant and stupidity should be penalised!

Yep, my daughter is what used to be called high functioning autistic so people don't "see" her autism. They think she's just very bright or quirky. They don't see all the overwhelm and anxiety and the meltdowns when she cant cope with change/hiccups/feel of something....

School have been ace (but I know for many school isn't) but famiky/friends/guide leaders less accommodating as they dont see it... making a fuss etc.

I had a woman from the dwp tell me that my asd ds would "grow out of it"
This was when discussing his dla

Sorry bad phrasing, I know ASD isn't a mental illness but in general some people don't believe in mental illness aswell as not believing in LDs( that aren't visible.
@Thingsdogetbetter that's exactly how her DH is, total twat!! He is also refusing to give consent to medication which would benefit the DC hugely. The child is 9 years old and has only had a formal diagnosis but he refuses to accept it and whenever there is a meltdown he will completely ignore his DC and my relative for days on end as "punishment".

I knew people were ignorant to ASD but when it's so close to home it hits alot harder.

I used to really wonder about ASD and now I have a daughter who is severely disabled including ASD. It's definitely a real issue, I know more about it now and can only say that my once brief pondering was pure ignorance.

Honestly, it may be because it’s only been known by most of us in the last 10-20 years or so. I had never heard of autism until I was in my late teens, and it was a few more years until I knew anyone with autism. Nowadays everyone seems to have a relative with autism.

I don’t know if the rates of autism have actually increased, or if it’s just getting diagnosed more now though

I know a primary HT that doesn't believe in ASD. I've had the growing out of it comments, the ones about bad parenting, the blunt "I don't see what the issue is" ones, the we're all on the spectrum ones.

Some people are trying to be supportive, some don't understand at all and some are complete dicks.

As someone else said, we didn't have DC with autism in school in the 1970s, nor were there any children with food allergies.

So either they were seen as 'naughty', went to special schools or I don't know what, but it seems to have come into prominence in the last 20 years or so.

Both ASD and ADHD are neurological differences to the frontal lobe/ front part of brain. It's not a disorder it's just their brains are different. DS perfectly well behaved has both (ADD so without the H) ihe can appear to be just a quirky kid but they lead to huge difficulties. People like my DS would not have been diagnosed until very recently. Given their are drugs for ADHD that work well on many children shows that it is not shit parenting.

A women in my work doesn't believe either (or ADHD for that matter) and spouts off about it at length.

We work in the NHS, and have all had equality and diversity training, so she should know better.

I swear to God if I hear her mention it again I am going to ask our manager to have a word with her. I have 2 children with ASD and I'm not prepared to listen to her ignorant shite any longer.

BiL reckons it's just personality

ASD is a disability so she needs to be careful spouting that crap at work as it could be seen as as harassment- "unwanted behaviour linked to a protected characteristic that violates someone’s dignity or creates an offensive environment for them"

@Moonshake

When I was at primary school in the early 80's the headteacher didn't believe people should be allowed to write left handed and also dyslexia was "made up" to excuse lazy or stupid pupils. Sadly I think each generation will have something that they have to fight for awareness, knowledge and tolerance.

Autism Act 2009 & the fact that who had any Mental Disability (catchall term used by Social Model of Disability - includes Mental Health & LD) were likely to be excluded from the community in Asylums until about 1990's - the DSM - iv which is the diagnostic manual (APA American Psychiatric Association) was the first to include "Aspergers Syndrome" rather than the more profound "Kanner Syndrome" hence it was not acknowledged until late 1970's but of course there was resistance (& still is across the world) & the term refrigerator mother was implied & used - Psychoanalysis has a lot to answer for - a lot of families have this issue of one person denying there is a problem & strangely it tend to be the parent of the male persuasion!

As someone else said, we didn't have DC with autism in school in the 1970

That's a really ignorant comment. Right up there at the top ignorant. A bit like back then when doctors reserved the autism label for the severely developmentally delayed and thought it was a rare thing. How many lost generations have we had because of that ignorance do you think?

I see people in the 60s getting diagnosed now. Did they just suddenly develop it out the blue?