Keep Staring....

This came up in my facebook newsfeed today, and it was too good, not to share. I like many other parents of ASD kiddos, have found myself subjected to ignorant NT's that stare, pass shifty glances, and look at me as if I am the worst parent in the world, with the brattiest child in the world. I'd be lying if I said it didn't bother me. The judgement of my parenting skills doesn't bother me, think what you like, until you spend a day in my life, you have no room to judge me. What bothers me is the bigotry against my child. Just because he isn't acting the way these people think he should, they automatically assume he's a brat. Well, I say, spend a day inside his brain, and see how you act! Passing judgement on a stranger, or anyone for that matter, is plain ignorance. Unfortunately, thats all most people are these days. I would like to have this picture made into a button and pin it to my sons coat for when we are out in the world. Maybe then people would think twice about judging him or anyone else. My son for example, hums when we are in the grocery store. I am so used to it, I don't even notice it, but others do. We have gotten quite a few nasty looks from other shoppers. As a matter of fact, just last week my hubby went grocery shopping with us (this is rare, its usually always my aspie and me.) We were in the dairy section, hubby and I were looking at yogurt, LJ was humming away. I didn't notice, just went on doing what I always do. However my hubby did. He looked at LJ and loudly insisted he stop being annoying. LJ looked like he had no clue what his father was talking about. You see, he most times doesn't even realize he is doing it. Yet, when you ask him why he does it, he simply tells you, "I don't like the noises in the grocery store, so I make noise to block it out." Simple as that. I quietly reminded hubby this is what I have been telling him about, this is why people give us dirty looks all the time. He felt horrible and immediately apologized to our aspie. So you see, if you don't live with someone, or know someone with ASD, you don't know why these kiddos act this way. Our job as parents of these kiddos, is to spread awareness, in the nicest way possible. To shed light on ASD in a positive way, to stop these negative judgements.