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Have you heard the news? If you have heard the news, did it make a difference? Did it make you stop and think? Were you afraid? Shocked? Or did the news only serve to confuse you even more? Push you even farther away?

I heard it, loud and clear! The very latest data now indicates that one in 91 children have an Autism Spectrum Disorder. As boys are affected approximately four times more than are girls, one in 58 boys has autism. I heard it, loud and clear!! But one of those boys is mine.

I had a mixture of emotions, surprising even to me, a veteran autism mom. At first I was excited, and relieved, to hear the news had gone public. It was not a surprise to those of us who have unknowingly, unwillingly, unsuspectingly already been recruited by autism. We’ve known for quite some time that the number of children with autism is far higher than that which our alphabet soup of governmental run agencies has had the courage to admit to. My initial response was one of excitement and relief. Maybe now? Perhaps now our children’s time has come? How could, would, any dare to ignore us now?

And then the spin began. Within hours, they had spun it into a sensation of more questions and confusion. And why wouldn’t they? Isn’t that what our government and the media do best? Spin it. Keep us from the truth. Now, the sorrow sets in, the reality.

They very first official media reports claimed that it couldn’t be clear whether indeed there truly exist more diagnosis’s of autism or whether we are now better able to count and to recognize autism. WOW! Okay, let’s dissect that for a moment. What they are stating is this; doctors, educators, parents, family members, clergymen, neighbors, all of us, we, in the U.S. of A. have all missed some three million individuals, both adults and children on the spectrum all of these years. That’s right; they’ve been here all along, all three million of them. Apparently we’ve all been either too ignorant or too self-absorbed to notice or to care. I gotta tell ya, somewhere between 40 and 60% of those with autism never speak. A great deal more have no functional speech. I’m thinking, someone would have noticed that! I don’t know the exact percentage of those who exhibit self-injurious behavior or of those still in diapers well beyond an appropriate age, but I’m quite certain someone would have noticed that as well! Now, I’m angry!

The AAP’s (American Academy of Pediatrics) official response was one of doubt as well. They distrust the accuracy even though two different studies, one of which was headed by the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention), confirmed the same rate, one in 91 children, one in 58 boys. No matter, the AAP feels very strongly that we need to do more studies, on the numbers. They have reservations about the accuracy of the numbers. Which way is it? Are we now able to count better or aren’t we? They’re beginning to confuse even me. At any rate, they’d like to have us spend more tax payer dollars counting. Personally, I was hoping for healing. Nothing would make me, a parent, happier than to have the American Academy of PEDIATRICS recoil with something more along the lines of, what do we do next? How do help? What more can be done? Wishful thinking I guess. I’m not sure whether to feel distraught or outraged. No matter. No one with the ability to affect real change, to help, to make a difference, really seems to care anyway.

And then….it hits home! The pain, the agony of the TRUTH! As I write yet another email to every congressional contact I’ve made along the way, it hits me like a ton of bricks. As I begin to type, “If I had a dollar for every time I stood before you and asked, how bad does it have to get? One in 50?” Like a dagger piercing my heart, I feel the realization, that day has come. One in 58 boys currently has an Autism Spectrum Disorder in our country. And I can’t help but wonder, as we continue to waste precious time and resources debating the accuracy of the numbers, how many could have been spared? How much longer? How many more?