A Cloak of Shame

Have you ever worn a cloak of shame?  I guess I didn't realize I did until recently.  I've always said that I've been hiding under my giant "autism rock."  But the real truth is, I've been wearing a cloak, and when anyone got too close, I'd yell in a loud voice, "UNCLEAN!"
Hard to believe after 22 years I'm just figuring this out.  Just a slow learner I suppose.  I had a pretty rough afternoon with Britton this week.  Oh not because he did anything unusual, it was just that a group of young girls wouldn't stop pointing and whispering, etc.  We had gone to the movies and he was super excited.  Jumping and flapping, and running back and forth.  Sometimes when he's super happy, and there is hardly anyone around, I just let him BE WHO HE IS.  Perhaps I shouldn't, but we all need moments of freedom.  He has so few.  Well these teenage girls were just excited to have someone else to gossip about.  Someone else to be the target of their pointless teenage drama.  BUT.. they followed us into the theater, and sat on the same row as us.  (The theater had TWO people in it besides us!)  I got up and asked Britton to move up a few rows not to bother them, and so they promptly got up and followed us.  NOT okay with this momma bear.  Britton is autistic, he is NOT STUPID.  He realized what they were up to, and so he tried to sit lower in the chair.  He eventually took off his sweat shirt and covered his head.  That's right, HE COVERED HIS HEAD!  This just gave these young ladies more fuel, and they laughed and pointed.  I was done.  Yep, here goes...
I slid down the aisle of chairs to them, and said,

"The truth is, YOU ALL should put your jackets over your heads!  The Shame you should feel for what you have done today is so sad, and so disappointing!  The hard part is, to believe that your parents haven't taught you better!  To believe that somehow abusing someone who cannot defend himself makes you laugh, and makes you happy.  Something is seriously wrong inside all your hearts!  Tonight, Britton and I will pray for you.  We both hope that Jesus has a long talk with each of you.  He could've been your brother, your best friends brother!  Then would you still make fun?"
Two of them jokingly put their sweatshirts over their heads and continued to giggle.  I hope the popcorn gave them all horrible belly aches.  :(

Yeah, I know... I'm sure it only made them laugh harder as we left the theater.  Britton wouldn't take his sweat shirt off his head all the way home.  ALL THE WAY HOME!  He went to his room and cried for about an hour.  I'm going to say for the millionth time, If only he was REALLY retarded we'd be so much better off!!!
 I opened my bible for some comfort only to read the story of the ten lepers.  "UNCLEAN" they had to yell, as they were always "outside the city."  They weren't allowed in.  They were required to wear a shawl over their heads and even wrap it around the lower half of their faces.  Cloaks of shame were required.  As I thought about their forced isolation, I thought about my life. It's exactly what I have done for so many years.  When you try to be part of our lives, I pick up my cloak and push you away.  "UNCLEAN" I scream, to keep you back, to keep you away, to keep you at a "safe distance."  But the real truth is... I'm protecting myself from your judgment, from your painful words.  If I keep you far enough away, you will never be able to really judge me.  When strangers judge, it's no big deal.  I chalk it up to ignorance and move on.  But when someone I care about, or wish was my friend judges, that requires the cloak.  I read in Leviticus 13:45 "The person with such an infectious disease must wear torn clothes, let his hair be unkempt, cover the lower part of his face and cry out, "Unclean, unclean!" I suppose I just scream, "Autism, stay back!"  As the years have past, I have become far more comfortable with everyone else who is also "Unclean" or at least have children with Autism.  Our tragic plight gives us far more in common than any of our other differences.  Like lepers in a colony it's the only place we feel truly safe.  I have had the privilege to be friends with many parents who deal with autism everyday, who never once felt unclean because of it.  God bless you my friends, you have taught me much!

When we judge each others disabilities, (even levels of disabilities) or perhaps each others sins, aren't we just like lepers counting spots?  I love that Jesus told them that they would be "made clean."  I know it's sad, and it's just how I feel, but it's also how many of us feel.  We feel unclean, unacceptable, unreachable, untouchable, unfixable.  As I talked to friends about the situation in the theater, about what the "proper response" should've been.  Each and everyone of them said to me, "There have been times in my life that I felt so unclean.  Times I would've given anything to be able to put my sweatshirt over my head, and yell, so everyone would go away and stop judging!"  Wow, so it's not just autism, it's life.  It's whatever your sin, disability, fear, worry is.  It's the thing that makes you want to put a sweat shirt over your head!
The good news is, none of us have to count our spots.  There's this amazing children's book called, "You Are Special" by Max Lucado.  It's one of Britton's favorites.
It's the story of these small wooden people who were made by Eli, the woodcarver.  All of the Wemmicks give each other stars for being beautiful, or smart, or talented. When you're covered with stars you parade around so everyone can admire you.  But, they also gave each other grey dots for being well, ugly, dumb, crippled, etc.  Then you cower in shame, and hide.  The story is of one small Wemmick, Punchinello, who is covered in grey spots.  He eventually meets a girl who has neither spots nor dots.  None of them stick to her.  She sends Punchinello to the Wood Carver, (their creator) for answers.  The woodcarver says, "Who are they to give stars or dots?  They are Wemmicks just like you.  What they think doesn't matter Punchinello.  All that matters is what I think.  And I think you are pretty special."

So back to the story of the ten lepers.  Remember how there was one leper who was running to the priest, and realized he was healed? He immediately turned around and ran back.  He dropped to Jesus feet and thanked him over and over again.  Jesus says, "Were not 10 cleansed?  Didn't any return to give glory to God except this foreigner?"  Where were the other nine?
The thing that keeps going over and over in my mind is... I wonder....if this leper, the only thankful one,  was HE the leper with the most spots?
After meeting Jesus, no dots, no stars should ever stick again... I don't think I'll put anymore sweatshirts over my head.  :)

Autism Awareness Month?

So here it comes ..... Autism Awareness Month.  One month encouraging all Americans to pause a moment and think about Autism. What is Autism like, or maybe even what would autism be like in their own families?  I don't know that people can really go there... But it's awareness month, and it might be something to consider.  What if YOU, or your child woke up tomorrow, and one of you were struck with autism?  What if? 

If you look at Britton at 5 months old.  Bright eyed, normal, happy child.  THEN,  If you look at the next photo at 11 months old, you see a confused, in pain, very frightened child.  A child
who has been injected with mercury.  A child whose immune system could not process the toxins.  I show you these pictures, so that you too can realize... he was NOT born with autism.  By the time you see the bottom picture he had quickly regressed to less than 10 words.  My beautiful, perfect son, is almost lost here.  I seriously hate that picture.  

I remember about 20 years ago, sitting in a medical library, trying to find just one case similar to what had happened to our son.  (There was no internet back then)  I would sit Britton in my lap, and while he did all this strange hand flapping, whinning and begging me to squeeze his elbows... I would scour every published medical study that even vaguely resembled our situation.  A perfectly normal child, who has a low grade fever for several months and then after his second MMR,  BAM a grand mal seizure and never the same again.  He stopped walking for a few months, and really rather quickly lost all of the language he had developed.  500 words, just gone!  What happened to my baby?  No one knew.  It would be almost four years before I found a doctor who had ever seen autism, and actually knew the word to diagnose him.  I was told it was 1 in 100,000 in 1994.

Twenty years ago, there was no awareness of autism at all.
As much as I hate being one of the first families affected, I am beyond grateful for all we've learned.
Doctors use to make fun of families who even talked about the possibility of recovery.  Now it happens all the time.  Not easy, and not with one magic pill.... but with perseverence and unrelenting dedication of parents who do all the things that just might be the key to breaking into their child's locked and poisoned mind.  Through combinations of detoxing, supplements, diet change, and behavioral therapies, there is a light at the end of this PIT that most of us were thrown into.  A pit made of greed, lies, and disregard for your child and mine.  The Big PHARM machine owns our Congress and money and power is their goal.  Call me bitter, that's certainly how I see it.

Most the children with autism we see now, are not nearly as severe as my son,  The reason?  We really KNOW what caused autism in the first place.  (Yes I'm pointing all my fingers at vaccines.)  Knowing the "enemy" gives us the right weapons to fight.  If your child is not autistic, you are perhaps rolling your eyes over my comment of what causes autism, but with my son, he was normal and then he wasn't.  One day normal, a vaccine, the next day not normal.  It's not rocket science.  Over the months of that fated moment when I felt my pediatrician twisted my arm and demanded that I "catch Britton up"on his vaccines (inspite of his low grade fever since the last vaccine,) I'd give anything if I'd even suspected what I'm telling you now.  AWARENESS!  I'm not trying to scare you, I'm trying to help you make an educated decision.  A choice, and awareness I didn't have.
We aren't the only family that it happened to.  There are thousands of us.  One in 50 children to be exact.  Now it seems, that everyone knows someone who has a child with autism.  Don't you?

If you've met one child with autism, you've met ONE CHILD with autism.  They are not that much alike.  They all certainly have varying degrees of disability, most self stim (that's things like hand flapping, humming noises, walking on tip toes, etc) Truly the list is endless.  I can only speak for my son and say he "looks normal." Unless you watch him more than a few seconds.  A second glance, and you're quick to realize something just isn't quite right.  "Looking almost normal"  can be a benefit and a huge detriment.  When he was small I sometimes was grateful, but there have certainly been moments that people didn't understand (because remember no autism awareness?) and they would tell me how I just needed to apply a little better "discipline."  I lost it once, and screamed, "I'd beat him to death if it would make any difference."  It worked, the person RAN from me.  (I shouldn't laugh, but it's funny NOW)  It was the first time he ever bit me.  We were in Sams Club.  A place I later learned not to take him.  He would duck at the high ceilings.  I have NO IDEAwhy.  Which tells us that there are visual disturbances as well as all the other strange sensations that his senses apparently torture him with.  Sams drove him crazy.  I just stopped taking him there for years and years.   I always say if there's anything common with autism, it is certainly that they all suffer from sensory disorders.  They don't really hear the same, feel the same, see the same...They truly are dealing with things we can only begin to imagine the difficulties of enduring.  I read once of a girl who could hear so well that she heard toilets flush for miles.  Can you imagine that?  Me neither...

Is is any wonder that so many parents have a trust issue with the CDC.  It took them years and years to remove thimerasol (mercury) from vaccines.  And it's a fact that it is POISON, even they don't deny that.  It destroys brain cells, and they admit it!  (Side note, it is NOT gone out of many vaccines.  It is in the largest quantities in the flu shot.)    Other countries removed it years ago, and the CDC can say they that they "voluntarily" removed it, but I'm pretty sure it had something to do with unrelenting pressure from so many parents, screaming and threatening in front of Congress.  But just to add insult to injury Big Pharm decided to leave all the vaccines out there that still contained thimerasol til they were all used up.  Knowing it would destroy more children, KNOWING it was poison.
It's despicable.
My son was not so lucky.  No one except the pharmaceutical company that makes the vaccine knew that mercury was in them back in 1990.  Maybe you're one of those parents who insist that there's a miniscule amount of mercury in each vaccine.  Let me just give you a CDC fact.  If your child receives all their vaccines on schedule til only just the age of 6 months old, he would get a mercury dose up to 87 times higher than the maximum daily consumption of fish that is allowed.
There's no doubt that lots of kids are able to handle this kind of assault to their immune systems and their cerebral anatomy.  (They may end up ADD, ADHD, etc.  But no one is counting them.)
But... 1 in 50 ARE NOT!  My son is one in 50.  How I pray for a test of some kind that will separate out the children who are not capable of handling such a giant toxic load.  It's VERY possible to do.  I bet every parent in America would be willing to pay to have their child tested. Better yet, I bet every insurance would be willing to pay as well.  It's so much cheaper than life long medical bills, for seizures, gastrointestinal diseases and behavior therapy, to name a few.  THAT is not rocket science.  Oh how I wish that some of the big Autism Organizations would research that!  Stop spending all your donated dollars on BLUE LIGHTS and tee shirts with blue lights, and do something that really HELPS all us warriors on the front lines?!  But alas, they too seem to have been bought by the Big Pharm and now spend all their time on genetic research.  (Attempting to prove it's the parent's faults)  The thing is, with it now being 1 in 50, you tell me how it can be genetic.  I guess it is, if you're human, you can't handle neuro toxins injected into your blood stream at two months old.  I guess we humans are just flawed that way.  pshhh
                                      This is Britton now.  Still nonverbal, but at least he has
       made a truce with the fact that he will never be what he could've been...what he was meant to be
                                              By the way, he definitely knows the difference.
                                                He is the bravest person I have ever known.
                       This picture was taken on his favorite hiking trail.  He had just SAID, "Hurry Up!"
                        Randy and I, both flipped out, and he KNEW that he had spoken.
He can't/doesn't talk, but once in a blue moon, all the swelling goes down, or the wires connect,
                         or God intervenes, we don't know.  But it's always a great moment.

One of the things about autism that I'd love for people to be AWARE of... autism parents are not against vaccines.  We are against injecting poisons, neurotoxins, fetal DNA, and various other forms of poisons into our babies.  I know that vaccines have saved lives.  But I also know that they have killed thousands, and maimed millions.  Perhaps that's just the "surplus population" to some, but to me, it's my only son.  Please don't placate me with your, "If I was you, I'd feel the same."  Well you aren't me, but keep vaccinating your child and you or someone you love might be.  Think I'm just trying to scare you?  Well, I am.  Scare you away from being ONE in FIFTY!!
I'd like you to be aware that we have lost almost an entire generation of young men.  Gifted, intelligent, strong, handsome, young men.  Men that God had other plans for.  We have injected future doctors, lawyers, writers, musicians, and preachers.  We have done our nation a horrible disservice by destroying much of our future, and for what?  Greed would be the answer.  With our eyes NOW wide open, with the truth accessible with a few clicks of a computer.  The truth is out there.  If you choose not to put in the effort to even research something so serious, or you choose to bury your head  in the sand because it's easier... you have a 1 in 50 chance...You should be aware of it.