Is Getting High For Autism the Answer?

 

Recently I read an article where parents in Oregon were giving their 11-year-old child with autism medicinal marijuana to “help” with his behaviors and symptoms.

I had to read the article a few times to really digest it and consider it from different angles.

My first inclination was outrage…really?  Parents are now doping up their kid to get him to calm down?  There’s nothing else to do?

After reading it again it just made me sad.  I’m sad for this 11-year-old boy who is afflicted with autism and seizures.  I’m sad for these parents who have had to put their precious child in a state institution…at age EIGHT?

My son is seven years old.  I can’t even imagine–on his worst day–how it would feel to deposit him in an institution because he was too hard to handle.

I don’t condone giving children medical marijuana…but that’s just the superficial element to this story.  It’s not really about doping up this kid, it’s that there doesn’t seem to be anything out there to help him in his situation.

For that, I am extremely sad.

We must do more.  Doping up kids is not the answer.  Maybe it will chill them out for a while, but it’s not going to solve anything or certainly cure or “treat” any of the symptoms.

We live in a society where we want immediate gratification.  If I want something, I’ll buy it.  If I don’t have the cash, put it on credit and pay it off later (or never).  We are in an Internet Generation of immediate results, answers, and solutions.

We can’t treat our children on the spectrum like a Website.  We can’t expect to get a quick fix when it comes to autism.

My heart breaks for these parents–I don’t even know them–but I can imagine how their hopes and dreams and hearts have been smashed to pieces time after time after time.

Autism SUCKS!

We have to demand more from local, state, federal resources.  We have to demand more from the private sector.  We have to demand more from churches and non-profit organizations.  We have to demand more from our public and private schools.

If the studies are true and 1 in 47 boys are now afflicted…how much medical marijuana and how many state institutions are going to be needed in 5, 10, 15 years?

This can’t be the solution.  Doping kids and casting them aside isn’t the final answer…I just can’t believe that is going to be the best solution.

We have to demand more from ourselves…no one outside the Autism Community gives a rats-ass about our plight.  No one is going to just start handing out money to help find realistic treatments and maybe even a “cure”…if it’s not going to be you then who will it be!

No…none of us asked for this.  Our children didn’t ask for this either.  But for some reason, we’ve been given the duty/chore/task/blessing of having a child on the spectrum and together we can only make changes.

What are you prepared to do?  Take the easy way out or do something about it?
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