#1. Lacking Acceptance
One of the most common mistakes that parents make when raising an autistic kid is not accepting their child for who they are. Even after a doctor diagnoses their child with autism, parents tend to ask for another opinion. There’s usually a process of denial.
The only way to go forward is to accept that your child is autistic and move on from there. You need to resolve that you’re going to do the best that you can to raise your child.
It’s important to figure out quickly what to do if your child is diagnosed with autism. Start treatment immediately. Early intervention is important.
#2. Coddling Autistic Children
Another common mistake is that some parents baby their kids too much. When caring for your autistic child at home, you want your child to be age appropriate. So if he’s 16, he should be dressing himself and going to the bathroom by himself. Some people want to do too much for their kids and forget that if you train the child not to do anything, then that’s the way that they’re going to be when they’re an adult, and then what are you going to do?
Let’s say you have a little petite mother, and her son grows to be 6′ 4″. What’s she going to do when he starts hitting his head? If there’s no behavior plan in place that’s effective for the mother, what will she do? He could actually end up hurting his mother, and even though it would never be his intention, he wouldn’t understand. He would just be doing what he did when he was a toddler.
That’s why I won’t let Ross behave that way at all. That’s why I tell the caretakers to be firm and discipline him. Don’t let him behave like he’s 5 when he’s 30. Because of our consistent policy of discipline, Ross knows how to behave appropriately. Otherwise he has to go and sit in a chair on his own hands, and then we put through a whole series of commands until he calms down.
Sometimes they do have to restrain him. That can be dangerous, especially if the child is put on the floor; children have died from that. We will give him a basket that he has to hold, or that kind of thing. At his age, Ross knows when he’s going to go off. He usually will lay down himself. We’re trying a weighted blanket, things like that.
Some of the young children who are just first diagnosed have these behaviors, because the sensory integration system is still off, but you can put a weighted blanket over them and they’ll calm down immediately, or you can bear hug them and they’ll calm down. Then with the communications interventions and behavior interventions and all the therapies and ABA, they’ll hopefully never get to the stage Ross is at.
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