This is the end of Autism Awareness month

I worked really hard to post regularly this month (i know, i didn't hit my one a day goal, but i came really close) to help raise awareness of the things that not only a family with autism goes through but the things going on around us in the blogosphere.  It feels like the train to getting our kids well has actually left the station this month.  There is awareness like I've never seen before.

I'm seeing people without kids posting now on facebook about the dangers of vaccines, and I'm seeing far fewer people spouting back the "CDC says vaccines are safe, so we will be sheeple and get them without questioning" and more people, especially new moms asking the right questions in advance about the safety of multiple vaccines.  People in my parents generation, who really remember how sick measles and mumps made you, who remember the damage of polio and smallpox who had valid reasons for being pro-vaccine (aside from actually trusting the medical industry) are starting to wonder why the schedule of required vaccines has more than tripled in 25 years.  Its not like there's that many new virus's on the planet.

I'm seeing news articles and tv stories teaching the public what its like to have a special needs child.  That the out of control child they may see is not choosing that behavior, but instead has brain chemistry (excitory neurotransmitters) so out of balance that he must constantly engage in self stimulatory behavior, or constantly run, or constantly hum... all of these things are not choices, they are the only way these kids can get their physical needs met.

I'm reading about parents taking back their power.  The Thinking Moms Revolution has begun.  And once this particular pandora's box proving that a generation (or more) of children has been physical (mitochondrially) damaged by an industry that the government has made untouchable, the lid will never go back.

You all get to go back to not having to be aware... but those of us with damaged children do not get that luxury.  This month we've had up days and down days. I've tried to show how that rollercoaster takes us along for the ride in my posts.  You've gotten to see more angst than I normally share - because that is my life.  Some days are horrible, and I come home physically exhausted just wanting to sit on the sofa with a book.  Some are pretty positive.  In general, Dominic is making steady progress with speech and behaviors.  We haven't found the magic bullet yet, but along the way we've found things that help.

We got a glimpse yesterday of what our future could maybe hold - one of Dominic's peers from Alpine who is a few years older than him was over for the playdate we had, and required more supervision than Dominic currently does... from turning every one of the gas burners on the stove on to going for the (adult and pointy) scissors we have stashed on top of the refrigerator.  And constant moving around, with zero interaction with anyone around him.  We hope that we are able to offer appropriate interventions that we don't have that same outcome, but who knows. Its a possibility.