Fundamentalists That Have Children On The Spectrum

[Austin]

I agree, kb2. I think it's good to be very circumspect when discussing specific children, and I don't believe in snarking on kids, but that's not what we're talking about here. It was just a question that perhaps didn't come out quite right and the OP has edited the original post and the topic title significantly, so I believe the OP has responded to concerns of some posters.

I really don't see this as some sort of hanging offense.

[Cliodna]

My youngest is on the spectrum, he's 14 and high functioning. My niece, 20 is severely retarded, and very autistic, she speaks some, and currently lives in a group home with two other young women. My husband's grandson is 14 and severely autistic, pretty much on grade level across the board, but nearly mute. He uses American sign language for communication. I am not offended in any way by these comments. The epidemic is just a sad reality of our times.

[Rosa]

It's not just fundies - i was hanging out with a friend & her mom & our two kids - hers has autism, mine is maybe on the spectrum but who knows? (we're still working on a diagnosis. It's something, but every expert thinks it's whatever they are expert in.)

Anyway, the kids don't always respond when spoken to. And grandma says "I wish he would at least look at me!" and i said, well, that's an autism spectrum thing. And she said, "I don't really believe in that. In my day we all had good manners, none of these labels for plain rudeness."

I couldn't believe it.

[ladypuglover]

What about the lady that had the crazy diet blog, saying her kids were allergic to rice, and people here disputed that--weren't posters here acting like they knew more about her own kids' health better than she did?

Off topic, I just want to say that in my bio family that some of my family members are extremely alergic to rice, mostly white rice but some to all rice. I also know you may not have been the one to say but just catching your qoute.

[Beeks]

Off topic, I just want to say that in my bio family that some of my family members are extremely alergic to rice, mostly white rice but some to all rice. I also know you may not have been the one to say but just catching your qoute.

My son is allergic to brown rice. It's possible for sure.

[Beeks]

It's not just fundies - i was hanging out with a friend & her mom & our two kids - hers has autism, mine is maybe on the spectrum but who knows? (we're still working on a diagnosis. It's something, but every expert thinks it's whatever they are expert in.)

Anyway, the kids don't always respond when spoken to. And grandma says "I wish he would at least look at me!" and i said, well, that's an autism spectrum thing. And she said, "I don't really believe in that. In my day we all had good manners, none of these labels for plain rudeness."

I couldn't believe it.

That's sad. There's a lot of that nowadays. People love to spend 30 seconds with my child and then tell me he couldn't possibly have anything wrong with him and I must be a helicopter mom. This after we've been through 6 months of Early Intervention and me doing therapy with him EVERY SINGLE DAY. It makes me angry when people deny that the issues are real, but at the same time I think that is there misguided way of trying to say something nice. They don't want to think there is anything "wrong" with a member of their own family, so they try to tell you that YOU must be the one who's got it wrong. So frustrating.

[kb2]

My son is allergic to brown rice. It's possible for sure.

I mentioned it because I liked the whole discussion. I, personally, don't trust that lady to have diagnosed a food allergy correctly. But on the other hand I think it's interesting that you could be allergic to rice. If people weren't allowed to pooh-pooh the rice allergy, stories of actual rice allergies would never be mentioned, and I'd just go on thinking the lady was crazy but never knowing that rice allergies exist in a significant enough number for multiple FJ members to have encountered one. I learned something. I like that. I wouldn't have learned that if we couldn't criticize how people treat their kids' health issues.

[Koala]

It's not just fundies - i was hanging out with a friend & her mom & our two kids - hers has autism, mine is maybe on the spectrum but who knows? (we're still working on a diagnosis. It's something, but every expert thinks it's whatever they are expert in.)

Anyway, the kids don't always respond when spoken to. And grandma says "I wish he would at least look at me!" and i said, well, that's an autism spectrum thing. And she said, "I don't really believe in that. In my day we all had good manners, none of these labels for plain rudeness."

I couldn't believe it.

That's horrible :( Poor kid...

[FundiesInMyFamily]

My son is disabled, he's 16 but cognitively functions at a 7-8 year old level and is considered 'on the spectrum'. I have worried about some of these families and their extreme views about science and medicine. I don't know much about the Maxwells, honestly I have been much more concerned about little Josiecat. What these people don't understand is that the evil public school system has early intervention programs; they started sending a teacher to my home 3x a week when my son was just 3, then sent him to a special needs preschool, and he has recieved physical and occupational therapy and ADL (activities of daily living) in school ever since, and will be in the 11th grade in the fall. The godless evil system has been a *blessing* for me!!!

While I would never speculate from a tv show or a blog picture who does or does not have issues, I do worry about any of these kids (or wives for that matter) having any kind of mental, physical, emotional, or educational concerns.

[Beeks]

My son is disabled, he's 16 but cognitively functions at a 7-8 year old level and is considered 'on the spectrum'. I have worried about some of these families and their extreme views about science and medicine. I don't know much about the Maxwells, honestly I have been much more concerned about little Josiecat. What these people don't understand is that the evil public school system has early intervention programs; they started sending a teacher to my home 3x a week when my son was just 3, then sent him to a special needs preschool, and he has recieved physical and occupational therapy and ADL (activities of daily living) in school ever since, and will be in the 11th grade in the fall. The godless evil system has been a *blessing* for me!!!

While I would never speculate from a tv show or a blog picture who does or does not have issues, I do worry about any of these kids (or wives for that matter) having any kind of mental, physical, emotional, or educational concerns.

Yes! We've been getting EI since my son was 15 months old. We love his therapists (who come to our house) and he'll be starting at a special preschool in the fall. They have been a huge blessing to us as well and I often say I think EVERY new mom should have such wonderful support. "The system" has certainly been working for us in this situation =)

[Black Aliss]

I think people with certain variants of ASD are drawn to fundamentalism of one stripe or another because, wow, there are all these rules! And things are either black or white! And there are all these people who think the way you do.

There was an interesting story in last week's New York Times about a young man who had flipped from being a gay activist to fundie Christian, with a few stops along the way to try on other belief systems (and for him, being gay wasn't just an orientation or identification, it was a full-on belief system. It kind of confirmed my belief that all fundamentalists are, fundamentally, the same.

[lilwriter85]

IIRC at the beginning of the Duggar's fame, some people speculated that John David had Asperger's.

I have seen this topic discussed on different sites. I don't know too much about Asperger's but I remember people on message boards or comments section saying that John seemed socially awkward on the show and had trouble communicating. He does seem shy. But it's hard to tell..

I remember last year on one site when the Duggars released a picture of Josie, a person on a news site said that she worked with kids with autisim and that Josie showed the signs because of her head and premature birth.