We as parents in our position are constantly looking into the future asking questions like will my autistic child be ok?
In this article I’ll explain my thoughts around this difficult question and hopefully provide some hope for all readers.
What defines “ok”?
The first question rattling around my mind is, what defines ‘ok’?
It’s a very personal question and there may be a fair few readers who are even offended by the word ok itself.
Some would argue that their child is already ‘ok’ and always will be.
Others will have the view that yes we love our children but worries for the future still creep in.
So to answer this very personal point, my barometer of my son being ‘ok’ is… can he live a fairly regular life and look after himself?
That’s my yardstick, yours may be slightly different.
So will he be ok?
Well here is the crux of this article and in our position I think yes he will.
To give some context, our son is nine years old and he is currently in a specialist school setting.
He has some challenging needs but is developing at his own pace. He can read to the level of a 6/7 year old and can complete basic maths.
He’s not one of these autistic children who are academically gifted but that’s just fine.
Socially he struggles and generally likes to play alone.
If I am doing a good enough job painting a picture then I am sure you’ll gather he is quite typical of a child with autism.
With that being the case I hope that many of you reading will be able to relate to my prediction of the future.
So will my autistic child be ok?
Yes I believe he will, and here’s why.
A changing world
As society moves on through the ages we are becoming more and more tolerant of special needs.
Neurodiversity is taught in schools and workplaces with the wider public very aware of the needs of autistic individuals.
Giving a practical example, today my son is on his way to spend the day with some sixth form students at a college.
Every year the children from his school make the same trip and are looked after by 17 or 18 year old students.
The purpose of these trips are to support both the autistic children and the neuro-typical college students.
It helps them learn and adjust to the different types of people they’ll meet in society.
This is just a small example but there are wider campaigns of awareness everywhere you look.
Depending on the size of your workplace you may have been subject to neurodiversity training, I certainly have.
Could you imagine that in the 1970’s?
People barely knew what autism was, let alone spent any time or money learning about it.
The point I am trying to make is that our children will grow into a world a lot more tolerant than the one we grew up in, and that is a fantastic thing.
Support of his parents
Although my husband and I are no spring chickens we will support our son as long as we can.
I often laugh internally at parents of neuro-typical children counting down the days until they move out.
For parents of children with special needs that day may never come and that is fine with me.
The fact that our son needs us more is actually a warming feeling for me. He’s not going to fall in love with a stripper and move to the other side of the world as a dramatic example.
We will always be close and we will always support him whilst still building levels of independence where we can.
His education
Our sons school is doing an amazing job preparing him for the future. They learn less about Shakespeare and the periodic table and more about making lunch and doing laundry.
Again some parents may see this as a negative but I don’t.
I don’t think I have ever used trigonometry in my adult life, so why would my son need to learn that?
His school is preparing him for adult life in an amazing way and this gives me hope for the future.
External support
As our lives roll on it amazes me what support mechanisms are out and about for people with autism.
Depending on where you live in the world one thing which can really help is the government.
In the UK they provide all sorts of financial and social assistance to people with autism. This ranges from accommodation to just spending time with autistic adults.
If you add that to the support from places like forums, websites like this one and social media, there are many avenues for support for our children as they grow.
My son
I cannot understate how proud I am of our boy.
Nothing comes easy to him but he finds his own way to adapt and be the best person he can be.
When he was younger I worried about his future terribly, but as time goes on this worry is being erroded.
He will be able to cope with life in his own way, just like how he has been able to cope with school and everything else thrown at him as yet.
That is a good way to wrap up this article in that I believe he can do it and so can your children.
Summary – Will my autistic child be ok?
I would wager that every single parent in our position had asked themselves this question.
Naturally the answer is very personal and individual to the child. It would be wrong to just brush off such a sensitive question with a “yeah sure” answer.
But I do think that this world we live in provides hope for all of us and our children.
In a tolerant world with layers and layers of support, I think we can all to some degree confidently say that our autistic children will be ok.
