Everyone has a story. While researching on the Autism Society of America Website, I found some touching stories of people with autism spectrum disorders and family members of people with them. These stories show personal growth in people, important accomplishments, and struggles people dealing with autism had to go through.

One story that really jumped out at me was a story about a 21 year old named Rory. Rory is in a band called Rudely Interrupted, and what's cool about this band is that everyone in it has a disability. This band is very unique and was actually the first EVER indie-band to be invited to play in New York to mark the International Day of People with Disabilities. Rory says in the story that he named the band Rudely Interrupted because "it feels like my life is consistently being interrupted". He says that band helps him deal with situations in his life and put everything in his life into perspective. One of my favorite lines from the story is "just because I have a disability it doesn't mean I can't ROCK".

All of the stories I read were very inspirational and I encourage everyone to at least take the time and read one. I'm sure you will be able to connect to one just like I did with Rory.

Throughout more searching on the internet, I have found yet another great website about autism spectrum disorders. This website is the Autism Society of America and like the other website I have been on in the past it shows research about autism, treatments, provides stories, and even has a way to get involved with their programs. If anyone is interested, they an click here to directly go to the website!

While searching through this website, I found a ton of useful information. One thing that I found really interesting is that the website actually offers a course called Autism 101 to help people gain more knowledge about autism spectrum disorders. The course is said to take about a half hour to complete and after a person completes it they can print off a certificate that shows they completed Autism 101. This online course introduces autism spectrum disorders, describes possible treatments, transition to adulthood for people with these disorders, and provides people with more information and resources to get information on. All that a person needs to do to register for this course is be a member with the Autism Society Web site.

Another thing I thought was very cool about this website is all of the ways a person can become involved in helping to support autism. While on Autism Society of America, I signed up to get a newsletter mailed to me directly about information on everything the website has to offer. A person can also sign up to get e-mail newsletters sent to them on the computer. Signing up was simple and took about two seconds of my time. I encourage everyone to sign up!! You will gain more knowledge about the Autism Society of America and all of the great things a person can get involved in.

Get involved today! I really encourage it, and it is a lot of fun. As each post goes by, I become more and more involved with autism groups and communities. It feels great to be involved in such a good cause!

April 2nd 2010. This was a very important day... do any of you know why?

Well, for those of you guys that answered no, I didn't know either when this date was brought to my attention. I was actually laying on a beach in Florida when this day passed. But to my surprise, I recently just found out this day was World Autism Awareness Day.

After some research, I found that this day was just recently recognized in 2007. This day was recognized all around the world and the purpose of it is to raise awareness of autism in society and to encourage early diagnosis and intervention. This day shows the world that autism is a growing global health crisis affecting millions of people. This day is to celebrate the talents and different skills of people with autism and embrace these people with the many events happening around the world. The website I found said that World Autism Awareness Day is to bring all of the autism organization groups from around the world to give millions of individuals who are undiagnosed, misunderstood, and looking for help a voice in the world.

While on the main website for World Autism Awareness Day, I had a chance to look at all of the organizations involved in this great project. There is a whole page that is absolutely huge of groups that contributed and participated in this day. There were groups from all around the world, from Australia to the some places I have never even heard of! The list of groups that participated can be found here.

This was an amazing day and a great event that many groups and people participated in all around the world. I plan on participating next year so I can learn more about World Autism Awareness Day.

A lot of people may be wondering... How is Autism Diagnosed?

I admit, I have wondered this since I was a young child. I always wondered how my parents came to find out how my brother was different than the other children my age. I recently just asked my dad how my brother started showing signs of being different from the normal toddler. His response to my question was shorter than I expected. He just shrugged his shoulders and explained to me how he learned to talk two years later than the normal toddler, he didn't potty-train very well, and he wasn't as social as a normal boy his age should be. His answer sparked an interest for me to look how the doctors actually diagnose Autism and Autism spectrum disorders..

I went back and did some research on my newest favorite website Autism Speaks. As you all know, I just found this website a few weeks ago and wrote about it in my previous post. This website has everything! I was thrilled to find out it actually had a section about how autism is diagnosed in children. Now, all of my questions could be answered and cleared up.

To my surprise, I found that there was actually no medical test to diagnose autism. Behavior tests and psychological tests are conducted on the children to see if there is some sort of delay in the child's development. The website suggests that all children from right when they are born to the age of about 36 months should be screened for developmental milestones on routine visits to the pediatrician. If the doctors have any questions or doubts about a child, the child should be referred to some sort of specialist. A child can go through tests such as hearing tests, lead exposure screenings, and something called the MCHAT. The MCHAT is the Modified Checklist of Autism in Toddlers. This tests includes simple questions about the toddler.

In my next post, I will go into more detail about the development of toddlers with autism.

Everyday that I come home from school, I follow the same routine. This routine consists of eating a snack, talking to my brother, and getting the mail. Every now and then this routine has some surprises in it, things that catch me off guard. When I came home one day and got the mail in the house, I decided to look through the mail. What I saw was a letter that really sparked my interest. This letter was from Autism Speaks, and I found out my mom subscribed to receive letters from this organization. I wanted to find out more about this organization, so I did some research.

I was very impressed with the information I found on the website for this organization. This organization was only found a few years ago, in 2005, but it is the nation's largest autism science and advocacy organization. This is very impressive in my opinion. This organization is dedicated in every aspect to increase awareness of autism, find treatments for it, look for prevention for autism, and so much more. This organization was founded by Suzanna and Bob Wright.

The overall mission for Autism Awareness is "to change the future for all who struggle with autism spectrum disorders". The organization funds many different projects to find research about autism, look for prevention for it, raising awareness of this disorder, and so much more.

I really encourage everyone to check out this website and get involved in all of the great things this organization has to offer!

CLICK HERE TO GO TO WEBSITE!

Asperger's Syndrome and Pop Culture

The popular book and movie Dear John describes a father-son relationship when the father is believed to have a mild case of Asperger's Syndrome. I recently saw the movie and thought it was pretty good. My favorite part of the movie was how the relationship between the father and son played out. In my opinion, that was the best part of the movie. Of course it is a love story between a man and women, but the father-son relationship was more interesting to me. The audience gets to see how the father and son relationship plays out through the course of the son's life. It was interesting getting a visual and kind of seeing what a person with Asperger's Syndrome goes through on a day to day basis. It showed the routines people with this syndrome go through, how people with Asperger's feel awkward in certain social situations, and their lack of communication skills. After watching Dear John the movie, I was intrigued and bought the book to see if it was anything like the movie.

To my surprise, the book was even better than the movie! It goes into so much more detail than the movie and it is a lot easier to get into. The book explains more about Asperger's Syndrome and provides even more detail of the unique father-son relationship. While I was reading, I highlighted a passage I found that describes the difference between Asperger's Syndrome and autism. Part of the passage read, "A person with autism lives in his world, while a person with Asperger's lives in our world, in a way of his own choosing." I thought this was great information and a great way to describe the differences between the two disorders, especially since people usually think the two are the same thing.

All in all, this is a great book and movie. I highly recommend reading and watching the movie, especially if you know somebody with Asperger's. Dear John may really open your eyes and help you understand this commonly misunderstood disorder.

Can Certain Vaccinations Be Linked to Causing Autism?

Recently in my college writing class, we were asked to do a paper on a controversial issue in our world. I decided to choose writing about the link between vaccinations and autism. I researched many different articles and found two that really stuck out in providing me great information about this topic.

The first article I found opposed the link between certain childhood vaccinations being a cause for autism. The article, "Public Health Officials Fear Parental Suspicion of Vaccinations", by Deborah L. Shelton and Deanese Williams-Harris describes the negative effects of parental suspicion of these important vaccinations and provides information to prove that autism and vaccinations aren't related. I felt, though, that it didn't provide enough information proving that there was no link between this disorder and the vaccines. All that the article really stated was that "careful scientific research has found no link between vaccines and autism" (3). I feel as if that isn't enough real evidence to prove there is no link. It also doesn't go into a lot of information about thimerosal, the mercury-based ingredient in vaccines that is said to be the ingredient questioned in causing autism. Although, this article does do a good job describing the negative effects of children not receiving their childhood shots. It provides information about loss of immunity to certain diseases and how certain outbreaks of diseases could result if children do no get their needed shots. Shelton and Williams-Harris also described how the overall choice is up to the parents if the shots are safe or not, and I feel that is a very valid point.

The other useful article I found was in favor of vaccines playing a role in causing autism. "The Promise of Chelation", the article written by Sarah Bridges does a fantastic job describing the negative effects of thimerosal, the mercury-based ingredient in vaccines that is said to be the trouble ingredient in causing autism in children. This article gives great statistics and provides a lot of proof of the negative effects of thimerosal in children. It shows a drastic change in numbers when the shots were introduced to children and how rates of autism increased dramatically. Bridges also states that thimerosal was ordered to be taken out of the vaccines because they were declared unsafe for the children. That is proof enough for me that they played some kind of negative role in the kids' health. Also, this article describes a mercury detoxification process of Chelation that takes huge amounts of mercury out of kids' bodies who received the vaccines with thimerosal in them. After this process of Chelation, the kids had a lot of positive effects!

All in all, although further research needs to be conducted on both sides of the issue, I believe autism is linked to certain childhood vaccines in some way.