I have written about how it is both a blessing and a difficulty to have children diagnosed as having autism here.

When i was a new special ed teacher, I found a friend in the person of the mom of a brilliant student. She also blogs and calls herself KittyMama. KittyMama’s medical career took a backseat when her second born son was diagnosed as having autism.

She writes well superbly, mostly about their family’s daily struggles and her thoughts as a mother. I have cried countless times when I read her posts.

There is one post, however that made me think how really difficult it is to do things that seem ordinary for us folks. Flying.

No, of course, not the fly-with-your-wings sort of thing but taking a flight. In an airplane.

There were instances when people have been asked to not fly with an airplane because of the behavior of the children who were diagnosed as having autism.

Click here (who repeatedly said “bye,bye plane” during the safety speech ) and here (about the toddler who was having a tantrum) to read about what happened why they were booted off the plane.

Oh, on another note, there was this Kindergarten teacher who asked her students for a vote whether the student who was displaying behavior problems should be removed from their class or not. The vote was 14-2. Click here.

Or maybe being kicked out of church. Of the what? Yes, the church. Click here.

Its not about having been booted off the plane or out of the Kindergarten class that really made me a little emotional. It was the reactions, the comments of the people about the incidents.

People can judge what they see but would that even help what the parents are going through? How would they respond to these situations if it was them who were parents of these children?

I know it is not a good situation to be in when in a plane about to take a flight and there is a child having a fit.

I know that it takes a lot of patience and grit, plus the help of an aide or another teacher, to be able to restrain or even help a child who can’t cope in a classroom situation.

I know because I have been there.

It is not a good position to be in charge of a group when everyone else is enjoying a wonderful day of learning and there is this one child who refuses to do what everyone is doing. Coupled with the fact that he/she distracts everyone else.

So what do parents have to say in these situations? Click here, and here.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 4th, 2008 at 7:25 am and is filed under Autism, Being a (Special Ed) Teacher, In the News, Interesting tidbits, Parenting, special education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.