Today is World Autism Acceptance Day, in World Autism Acceptance Week as part of World Autism Acceptance Month! Yup, I am aware that is a lot to take in! Yet if you are married to an autistic person and are a parent to autistic children like I am, they aren’t just autistic, one day or one week or one month a year.

They are autistic for 365 days a year.

Having calendar awareness days like this are good. But they still have a long way to go. We don’t want companies/schools etc to just think about autism once a year.

Running Perfectly Autistic, a neurodiversity consultancy and we work with organisations providing talks, training and webinars. We help companies understand the benefits of having a neurodivergent friendly workforce. We often say that neurodiversity sessions and training are great - but they need to be part of a wider picture. Not just a tick box exercise for them to tick off their list and then just move on to the next calendar awareness day.

When the children were diagnosed as autistic, it was a lot to unpack. School didn’t believe us. They told us they ‘were compliant’. A sentence which still makes me shudder. We shared their reports with them. They read them and still thought we were being OTT.

Thankfully the children are now 12 and 14 and understand so much more about who they are. My son only yesterday, told me how he and his friend has been talking about having a sleepover. My son had mentioned to a friend that he gets really anxious, so could the friend stay at ours instead. I explained how amazing it is that he can now advocate for himself. And of course being a good friend, the friend was really happy to come and have a sleepover at our house instead. That way my son has everything he needs to feel settled. And therefore reducing his anxiety.

After our children were diagnosed autistic, my husband was officially diagnosed too. This happens a lot. Parents realise they are autistic or ADHD etc after their children are. That’s how I found out I had ADHD. During the children’s assessment.

So if you have autistic children, the chances are that you may be autistic too. We always say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

If you take anything from my long rambling post today (hello ADHD my old friend!) it is that autism acceptance should be accepted EVERY. DAY. OF. THE. YEAR.

THE END!