8 things you should NEVER do to autistic children | and what to do instead

hello everyone this topic is a bit different for me to talk about but i've been wanting to make this video for a very long time so please bear with me and i hope you enjoy it my first tip is very important and i feel very strongly about this myself because of certain experiences and that is to never hold down or force or confine your autistic child this is so so important especially because there has been some misleading information all out there of people saying that you can't actually hold down an autistic child i do believe this is one of the main sources of trauma for autistic children who live with like normal loving parents who don't do much wrong but this is something i think is very commonly used towards autistic children but it really needs to stop unless the child is hurting themselves or someone else there should never be a reason to hold them down being held down and especially as an autistic person can be extremely traumatizing it completely removes the trust you have with this person a trust that might have taken years to accumulate you can tell i'm almost starting to cry just thinking about it because this is one of the worst memories i've had with certain people that still live in my life and i find it very difficult to relate to them even as adults because they've held me down as a child and i will say this a few times in this video and i think this goes for parenting and education and that is a humble approach it's very easy to say oh my child is hurting themselves because they're hitting their own legs but i don't believe that's a humble approach because if you're a neurotypical person you wouldn't handle the situation in the same way as a neurodivergent child or adult so of course you might not hit your knees or your body or the floor but an autistic child for them it might be the only way of letting these emotions out and hitting the floor is absolutely safer than going out in the world and being aggressive or anything like that of course we want to find better ways of dealing with our emotions than anger but sometimes especially i think for some of us that are a bit older who never really learned how to deal with these things anger is sometimes the only way to deal with certain emotions i often hit the floor or a pillow or even like my legs i did it just this morning when i get very angry or very overwhelmed and yes it hurts my hands and yes it hurts whatever part i'm hurting but it's actually not so severe so if you have an adult we want to find other more emotionally safe ways to deal with it and if you have a child there are so many better ways we can deal with overwhelming emotion which brings me on to tip number two and that is to find and encourage better ways of dealing with our emotions if you can teach an autistic child to handle their emotions in a positive and loving way i think you've done 90 of the work because emotions can be so overwhelming and they can also be very difficult to handle around loved ones who don't know even agree with or accept your emotions i've worked a bit with autistic children and one of my favorite ways to work with children is to give options to child you should never say what you want to do especially not to an autistic child because the options are endless so it'll be very difficult to choose instead give suggestions for a neurotypical child you might say do you want to go to the trampoline or to the forest to an autistic child you might say hey do you want to go on the trampoline and we can jump the anger off or let's go to the forest and see if we can feel different textures to calm our minds this is again why the humble and educational approach is so important because children are just like adults and they deserve the same respect so inform your child of what you're doing what i wish someone would have done to me is said hey i can see that this is difficult for you how about this week we try five different things and see if they make you feel better today let's go outside and feel the grass then the next day it might happen again you say today let's go to the trampoline i think this will really help autistic children as they grow up into adults and this is something that i definitely definitely wish i'd learned sooner the third tip for dealing with autistic children which again i think happens way too often shouldn't happen is blaming them there is this misconception about autistic adults and children that we're manipulative but we are really not you have to again have the humble approach to understand that our minds work differently our brain does simply not have the same capacities and run the same way as a neurotypical person's desk just as an example i tried to help my husband with his workouts and one day he said to me he was a bit confused because he said why do you do this he was almost a bit annoyed and he was sure that i must have had something in it for me like why did i want to help him because i didn't seem to enjoy it well the simple solution was that i heard him say that he was struggling and my brain instantly wanted to fix the problem and then all i did for about two weeks every single day was trying to fix the problem now that wasn't necessarily how he wanted to fix the problem but that was just how my brain worked and until he informed me of that i had no idea that he didn't want my health because how could you not want to fix a problem that's just a very basic example of just how it all works and how other people might relate to the child so i think it's very important to never blame your child for their emotions or for how they try to get to certain things instead we want to set examples as adults and also if you find that your child is doing activities you don't approve of like wanting to eat candy then remove candy you simply can't say to a child here's candy but you can only have it when i say that makes absolutely no sense and i think autistic children often see these illogical patterns that adults do so that's why they are more prone to question them because it does not make sense and as autistic people we often act less emotionally based and more logically based it does not make sense to only get candy when an adult says so so by re removing the candy you remove the problem so don't introduce the candy in the first place don't introduce the video game in the first place and then you'll have a much more harmonious time with your child number four something that i think everyone should do even if you don't have autistic children is to adapt your home as an adult it's very easy for me to adapt my home to be more cushiony like i like to call it or be more secure for me as an autistic person as a child i might not have known what things would have helped me but i would have been so appreciative if someone would have just removed all the triggers from my life it would have really helped my mental state and my capacity to function the more i've been able to adapt my life the happier and the more stable i've been and the and this has even lessened my autistic symptoms or whatever you want to call it so for a child this would be things like a low bed so they could get in and out of it themselves they'd be not having the tv on not using perfumes or any sprays or any scents around the home not having the radio on all the time all these things that are increasing the sensory experience for your child let's try to remove them and see if that calms their experience things like this should make it easier for them to fall asleep have their mood be more stable and just make them feel better overall and again we need to stop this conception of doing things that are hard if something is very difficult for your child see if you can find a way to remove that difficulty instead of trying to make them force their way through it because that's not going to help anyone in the long run number five is so so important and i say this to all parents and caregivers and educators and that is to be humble now when i say humble i don't mean to bow or to be obedient i mean the literal opposite i mean be humble enough to realize that you don't know what it feels like to be autistic you don't know what it feels like to be your child you don't even remember how your brain worked as a five-year-old as a neurotypical person so how on earth would you be able to know how your child's framework you have to educate yourself read books talk to your child ask them questions and try to find ways that work for them because the child is the priority right if you have a child the child must be a priority so i think we should move away from this thing of what works for you together as a partnership because you are the adult so you need to find a way that works for the child that you can also help and support them i actually had a comment about this the other week on my other autism video and i had a very similar experience their parent as a teacher my dad was a teacher and he's now a principal so they've obviously met hundreds of kids with autism and they've sort of figured out a way and a very non-humble experience of how to deal with them but that does not make you a better parent or caregiver or teacher thinking you know that what you're doing is right often means that you're not right because it's not humble it's not educated it's not also continuing to grow so they had this experience where their parent would say well everyone is on the spectrum i thought that was very funny because my dad would say everyone's on the spectrum even i am and that can be so discouraging especially if your child is an autistic teenager or young adult to hear that none of their feelings emotions or behaviors or difficulties are actually validated because you're suddenly saying that they have the same difficulties as you do which is absolutely not true and it's a simplification of how autism works and it's also a simplification of how difficult they find life i can say that from first-hand experience that my life might not look as it's more difficult than other people but the people who do know me like my husband the first time i lived with my friend they were just absolutely shocked right of how i live of how i do day to day tasks of how i move around and the struggles i have and i think this is so so important to remember number six is to treat your child with respect autistic or not every child deserves to be treated with respect this means no yelling no blaming nothing you wouldn't do to someone you love they're your partner in life they're not an obedient smaller part of you they're a separate entity and they are completely free and deserve all the love and respect i think sometimes adults are being taught by society to not treat children or people with disabilities with respect because it's sort of very difficult for many people to treat a screaming child with respect because they lose all their sense of everything and then they start screaming or blaming the child but it's so important to not have higher standards for your child than you have for yourself it's also really important to always treat your child with love because you brought the child into this world so it is really yours and only your responsibility to love them number seven is no sugar and a predominantly plant-based diet for some absolute ridiculous reason parents with autistic children in communities seems to have wholeheartedly decided that food has no effect on autistic their autistic children and that they're also not responsible whatsoever for what they ate during pregnancy or if they were male during conception and also what their children eats which is absolutely ridiculous as an adult we all know that if you have a coffee it alters your mood if you have sugar it alters your mood if you have a chocolate bar for dinner it alters your mood so we know that to be true for ourselves so of course that is true to our children there are also countless and countless of actual good studies and i'll link them in description below that show that both depression and autism that symptoms can be relieved through diet it's also very known from especially parents with vegan or whole food plant-based children that a well-nourished child that doesn't eat sugar processed foods or oils are much more stable in their mood so although we're not removing the autism we're removing the things that make life so much more difficult for example many autistic children and young adults are often depressed i was depressed probably starting at the age of five now i shouldn't have been given medication because medication as i mentioned in my video to heal depression can be very very harmful and isn't actually proven to work so instead having a whole food plant-based diet and movement by like going in nature or swimming or dancing all these kinds of things it will help to stable your overall well-being when your overall well-being is up chances for outburst or anger or unstable emotions really go down there are also very interesting studies on eating broccoli sprouts and broccoli has been very good at minimizing autistic symptoms so it's not about the fact that we want to say that these people are not autistic and therefore we want to remove the autism from them but also please don't be attached to the word autism we have to have some nuance when we talk about this and yes you might have accepted that your child has a diagnosis of autism but we also need to find ways of helping the child that doesn't mean eating letting them eat only sugar and candy and processed foods because they they say that they like it of course they like it that food is designed for us to like it instead feed them healthy food and they will be healthier and feel healthier and grow up much much healthier i don't even understand why i have to be so cautious talking about this subject but for some reason i do so please be respectful my tip number eight is consider homeschooling school was by far the worst time experience and part of my life if there is anything in my life that i truly regret is school there is no words to describe how terrible school was for me kindergarten during my montessori years were pretty okay personally from experience having worked at montessori and knowing a lot of people who work with montessori i think montessori can be great for autistic children i do not think however and this is a really really important note that kids with adhd should be at a montessori school the system simply doesn't work for them and it also disrupts the entire environment for all the other kids so if your child has adhd i highly encourage you to find a different school not even a montessori outdoor school but actually a regular school in my experience children with adhd seem to thrive in these classrooms where in montessori schools where they have to often sit still do drawings do sensory experiences it simply doesn't work for them if i could have changed my life in one way i would have kept all the trauma i would have kept all the sadness but i wouldn't have kept the school for my parents homeschooling was absolutely not an option i'd never heard of homeschooling until i was 20 in sweden it's very very uncommon but homeschooling i think for an autistic child can be really really useful because school is an environment just full of triggers and it can be very harmful for your child tip number nine and i think this is so overlooked and i don't know why because again parents need to take responsibility and that is to introduce healthy interests now one of the most common things people say about autistic people is this thing about special interest right so yes we might have special interests but what they don't understand that these special interests they don't occur from within us they are conditioned just like your interests are they depend on what we see around us for example i was never interested in video games because i didn't have anyone in my house while playing video games my parents never talked about video games so of course i wasn't interested instead my special interest was and very much so is classical literature because we had an abundance of literature in my house and we have beautiful libraries in sweden and school was very much encouraging reading so reading became a special interest still to this day and it's also a very healthy one so what i mean with this is we need to introduce healthy ideas and interests just like with your other children introduce things like nature animal science dancing arts literature all these things because how isn't that a better special interest than something like fireworks that's bad for the environment that's bad for their health and that's just bad for everyone around them so introduce healthy interests and let them choose number 10 is love and compassion i think if there's one thing i feel like i needed more of as an autistic child it's love and compassion this understanding and just overwhelming unconditional love i think can heal many many things so please remember to love your child and love them unconditionally and loving someone unconditionally means that no matter how they express themselves you will still love them it means that every action you take is towards loving them it's a quick example that we use in my household that i really like is that would you if you really love someone and want to treat them with respect you have two options to tell them dinner is ready would you scream from the other side of the house dinner is ready or would you simply take the 5 to 20 steps and walk into the room and say dinner is ready it's just a very simple analogy or idea that i think is so so important and i think that's being lost in many families in my family and in my husband's family the dinner is ready was always yelled and we never really understood it and we found it quite disrespectful so we never ever yell at each other like that instead we just take those extra you know two seconds and go up to the other person and talk to them with that is the next tip and that is not scream or yell at your child ever this needs to be a blanket rule because it's also very traumatizing for the child if you feel overwhelmed you need to remove yourself from the situation you need to know yourself you need to be emotionally stable enough to be able to handle engage the situation screaming at an autistic child will forever break their trust and if you're a parent that can be extremely obviously traumatizing imagine being a young child and having put your hope on this one person and then they yell at you and that is forever broken so never ever yell or scream at your child instead choose a more loving approach and my last tip is make life work for them don't try to adapt your child to work for this thing we call life i really hope that every parent knows this by no unfortunately that isn't the case but the world we live in is not ideal all the things we say are normal are extremely extremely dangerous not only for autistic people but for everyone for the climate for the animals it's not normal to go to school for eight hours go home do homework for two hours and then play soccer for two hours and then be on instagram for two hours it's not normal to work for 10 hours and then i mean it is normal but it's not healthy that's what i'm trying to say so don't try to make your child adhere to these social norms such as relationships marriage having children i don't know why so many adults ask their autistic children if they want to have kids because in my experience many autistic parents are very very traumatizing for their neurotypical children and their neurodivergent children because they simply don't have the understanding of how a neurotypical person works they also might not be very interested in the child which can be very damaging for their relationship and if the child is new or diverse they often again clash because there are two people who require extra care but one of them is a child so they can't care for the other adapt your routine your life your experiences your activities to make them work for your autistic child if this sounds like a lot of work uh i don't know what to say right it's like oh i'm sorry you had a child they are autistic uh what are you gonna do just leave them on the street no we can't do that my husband has this wonderful example where he says that people take better care of their cats than their children because we don't put a cat out on the street and leave them when they're 18 right we don't tell the cat hey you've got to pay rent now you're 18. we take care of them until they die whereas with children we sometimes stop taking care of them even when they're 13 or even younger i just think it's really important again to have the humble approach of realizing that parenting can be done better and do we want to do whatever everyone's doing now or do we want to do better do we want to have parents or on their phone while their child is wanting attention do we want parents feeding their kids ice cream when the child would rather play with an animal or eat an apple no we don't want that right we want to raise children who are safe and independent and independents come from education and unconditional love and a feeling and the stable sense of security that will really make your child thrive for as much as they possibly can and i think if you have an autistic child the absolute best gift you can give them is a happy childhood and that i think is the best preparation for adulthood because that will make them be able to be creative and stable in themselves and in their life choices rather than trying to do what they've been told and then just falling into depression which can have very very serious consequences i really hope you liked this video i hope it was helpful i myself love children so much i have worked with children in many different ways and i have never met a child i didn't love i love children i think they're perfect and i have i'm very lucky i think i have infinite compassion for a child i have very little compassion and patience with adults i try to work on that but i've had children spit on me hit me bite me and i really don't care because they're children and i love them all unconditionally so i really hope this video gives you some tips or ideas i think again always asking your child and communicating with them and figuring out things together with them is really really empowering for everyone both for you as a parent and for them as a child and being able to change things just because your child said on monday that they liked swimming then you go on the wednesday and you expect that they want to go swimming then they don't want to but suddenly they're scared of making you feel bad that's not a good situation as an adult you have to be able to adapt because the autistic child can't adapt so you have to be the one adapting i should probably have some sort of disclaimer but i really don't know what to say other than i have a very firm belief that if you want to be a parent you either do it great or you don't do it at all there is no point of being a parent if you don't feel like you want to take responsibility for all these years and do lots and lots of hard work and not sleep and all the things parents do there are so many things you can do instead and if you do have an autistic child i really hope this video could help you communicate with them or create a better relationship with them because if there is something i really miss was having a really solid relationship with my parents i think none of them really understood autism and i think both of them actively fought against the notion that i would have autism i truly believe that everyone can be better at everything and parenting is just one of those things if you want to help another person try to help them from their perspective and not from your perspective thank you so much for watching this video and thank you for all the lovely comments on my last video and uh yeah i'll see you next week with a new video bye

Channel: SagaJohanna

Views: 270,904

Keywords: minimalist, minimalism, vegan, ethical, selfhelp, Sweden, happiness, life improvement, love, sustainable, extreme minimalism, travel

Id: x-7VrQWo6oU

Length: 24min 22sec (1462 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 04 2022