One Boy's Way of Knowing

I admit to being in denial about autism as an epidemic, in spite of the tsunami of loud voices to the contrary— including expert-authored analyses in medical journals, countless magazine and newspaper articles, documentary films, TV specials, and memoirs. “Autism rates are exploding!” the alarm sounds, though opinions vary widely about what combination of environmental toxins or genetic predispositions are the cause or how much the increased numbers can be attributed to better diagnostic methods. Since our son’s diagnosis, the projected the rate of autism has more than doubled—going from 1-in-200 to 1-in-166 to 1-in-100. The National Institutes of Health puts the rate even higher at 1-in-88 and claims it affects one in 54 boys. Our immediate neighborhood mirrors these numbers, first there was only our son and a grown man I thought might be autistic, but within a year, three more young boys. At school “every classroom has a child on the spectrum somewhere,” the school district officials argued when we fought to get a classroom aide for our son. How was it that I had lived for 46 years with only the vaguest Rain Man notion of autism? I hadn’t recognized what I now see as autism in my own childhood friends. Few gave it a name back then, or they kept it close. Now there was no getting away from it. Continue reading →