to think rising levels of neuro diverse children in society is partly due to rising ages of pregnant mothers?

[staydazzling]

im not condeming anything here btw, i would like to make that clear. and i know this may not go down well on here, donning hard hat but whenever theres discussions about how neurological diversity in children has risen ASD, ADHD etc in society, the conversion is often about MMR Ipads or diet, discipline etc which of course all important variables but i feel its unhelpful that a lot of would be mothers are not informed of the risk past 35, of downs syndrome, autism etc, its obviously much better financially to be older and have a family. aibu to feel its the elephant inthe room regarding rising levels of children with ASD, ADHD, Etc??

So to that poster who says she knows ‘for fact’ that people have lied, you really don’t.

Just popped back to reply to this. If you are referring to me, and the teenagers and parents I know who have lied about having dyslexia, then yet again no, you are wrong. I actually do. Something in you and others doesn't want to believe it, that's clear. For whatever reason you want to desperately think I am lying to make you feel better about yourself. How, I honestly don't know. There are children and parents cheating the system with fake dyslexia claims to get extra time for exams. Fact.

Why are people on MN so utterly unkind!??

I don't know, you tell me. Why do posters obsess so much about their own individual situation, extrapolate every comment to be some attack personally on their situation, then deny other people's experiences, then claim other posteres are liars and have some hidden agenda, I wonder?

I have increasingly found that professionals aren't reporting facts but their own agenda. I don't ask for it be changed because of benefits. It's because it's wrong.
As an e.g.

Things vvvvv bad for DS3 (6) at school. He was DX with ASD aged 4 and immediately signed off. Go back to GP for a referral want to investigate sensory issues OT and/or possibly ADHD. dS3 Part time timetables/disruptive behaviour even exclusion going on.

Paediatrician from the off made it very clear that her remit as to signpost and possibly refer but as he already has ASD dx no point looking at other DX. Very reluctantly agreed to give questionnaires for sensory and ADHD

The paediatrician said even if he had ADHD with his age she not be recommending medication.

I said something like, yes I can understand not sure we'd want to medicate.

Letter/report comes back saying "mum said would not medicate for ADHD" and goes on to say no point assessing because of that.

Conveniently omitting she lead the conversation on medication.

And the school does it, the LA send manager, the EP..., I literally have 5 recent examples of professionals reframing discussions.

I don't claim DLA for my 2, I think it would be used against me if I did.

So quality of sperm also declines with age and is linked to autism, but yeah, let’s blame mothers....

@Devereux1 ok I accept that of course you know your life and I don’t.

I guess what I’m asking kindly is that people are careful in making generalised statements about SEN. It can be damaging on a personal level to those who are trying desperately to get their child’s needs met and having to live the fallout in the meantime of them not being met.

Your response to my question of why people are unkind is quiet angry, don’t know why!

Sorry that meant to say ‘I don’t know the situation

OhDear2200
@Devereux1 ok I accept that of course you know your life and I don’t.

Thank you. I'll take that as a sort of apology.

I guess what I’m asking kindly is that people are careful in making generalised statements about SEN.

Fair enough. But nobody is. There is a nationwide scandal about the increase in the number of students without SEN having extra time in exams. This is fact. Pointing out that I know this to be true from personal experience of some families, as I did so in a reply to another poster who referrred to this fact, has been met with some pretty hostile and accusatory posts, hence my kindness reply.

Deveraux1 - what nationwide scandal of students without SEN getting extra time in exams? Can you provide a link?

Iamatwatofthehighest Just google it, loads of articles out there on it.

I have. Lots of articles but all saying that extra time is granted by the Joint Council for Qualifications to for a student on a variety on grounds. These include learning difficulties, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder or a mental health condition; for which evidence is required with strict guidelines.

Nothing at all about a 'nationwide scandal' where students without SEN are being granted extra time which is why I was askinh where you'd got that idea.

Has anyone ever heard of the 'social model' of disability?

This suggests that disabilities are fairly substantially defined by the environment and the demands it places on the individual. For example, four or five hundred years ago, 'dyslexia' would have been so much nonsense in a world where the majority of the population couldn't read. Now of course we are routinely expected to read and write at a level of fluency that even medieval scholars might have found challenging. It's not surprising that a significant number of people find these skills hard to master.

Similarly I think modern life puts way greater social demands on us than a lot of us were evolved to handle. There is much higher population density, smaller families, more stranger interaction, more noise, more sensory stimulation, more requirement for handling situations at speed and a greater requirement for following apparently arbitrary rules and regulations to deal with a far more complex environment than our hunter-gatherer, or even Tudor, ancestors could have imagined. This sort of environment leaves no room for the tolerance and flexibility that neurodiverse people perhaps might have been allowed in a tribal society. It also amplifies the stresses and problems these people can have by not allowing them space to process their perceptions. I also wonder if sensory overstimulation, coupled with less opportunity to socialise naturally, increase the risk of autistic spectrum conditions becoming problematic.

SonEtLumiere

In some schools one quarter of the kids have a diagnosis.

I cannot post the link to this report, as it just goes straight into the report, but see The DfE's report "Special educational needs: an analysis and summary of data sources" May 2019, which says:

"The number of pupils with SEN increased from 1.24 million pupils in 2017 to 1.28 million pupils in 2018. The proportion of SEN pupils has been decreasing since 2010 (21.1%), however in 2018 the proportion increased to 14.6% from 14.4% in 2017."

Given the government's own figures admit 21% of children had SEN, its not surprising by your own reckoning some schools have 25% of SEN children. There won't be an even distribution of SEN children, because schools in more deprived areas; or those who welcome SEN children will have more than schools, which are crap at SEN, or are positively unwelcoming.

2010 is coincidentally when the Conservatives came into power, and the cutting of funding to LAs and the NHS in the name of austerity started - a reduction in resources to diagnose and fund the education of SEN children is going naturally to lead to a tightening of the criteria to get through the gatekeepers.

Deveraux1

Why do posters obsess so much about their own individual situation, extrapolate every comment to be some attack personally on their situation, then deny other people's experiences, then claim other posteres are liars and have some hidden agenda, I wonder?

One word. Confidentiality. Posters can come on here and talk about their own children however much they want. They cannot talk about the cases of other children, they have dealt with.

There is also a suggestion it's Vitamin D deficiency. https://www.spectrumnews.org/news/vitamin-d-deficiency-pregnancy-tied-autism-risk/

I have my theory that majority of children with these conditions have had hard births and in most cases baby was in distress/ lack of oxygen

This sounds very plausible. And although you said in your experience the mums were under 30, I wonder if older (and very young) mums are more likely to have harder births, especially first time round.

I'm firmly convinced pollution is a factor in many conditions too, including dementia, so if dementia, why not other conditions affecting the brain.

RunningAwaywiththeCircus
The only “scandal” I can see is the clusterfuck that passes for SEN provision here.
The only scandal you choose to see. That's fine, your choice, but so what?

Maybe you should be getting your knickers in a twist over that instead of the perceived advantages conferred on fake dyslexic kids?
Why do you think you need to dictate to others what they're concerned about? Why are humans not allowed to be concerned about more than one thing in your world?

RunningAwaywiththeCircus Mon 06-Jan-20 12:57:03

Be concerned about whatever you like @Devereux1**
Oh good, thanks RunningAwaywiththeCircus, I'm so glad I have your permission. It was just when you said Maybe you should be..., you were beginning to sound like an imbecilic mind dictator, but I'm so pleased we cleared that up.

Has anyone ever heard of the 'social model' of disability?

I absolutely agree with the above explanation posted by ArthurDentsSpaceTowel.

Many, many people in our population would have had an "easier" time of it in the past. You could leave school at 14 or later 15 and get a manual job. There was plenty of farm work. Neither of these required a high level of literacy/numeracy. Just manual skills. Post-war my grandfather's farm employed 50 men. Being a small community quite a few of these people had LD caused by decades (centuries!) of in-breeding but they were well-suited to farm work. When my grandfather died in the 1980s the farm employed... two men.

I work in a "low achieving" school - 99% poor white. I look around at these boys struggling with academic work and hating it, and feel for them that we are in a post-industrial economy.

Devereux1: No, you said there was a 'nationwide scandal' of students without SEN being given extra time in exams and you've provided no evidence of a) a scandal b) students without SEN being given extra time in exams.

People have provided the evidence that it is not individual teachers or schools that give extra time in exams but the Joint Council for Qualifications which has very specific requirements for referral and process of evidence of SEN which even WITH a diagnosis of a SEN needs evidence of 'significant and persistent difficulties' yet you persist with this claim that no evidence is needed and parents/students make things up and are given extra time in exams.

And you simply cannot back that up.