Healthwork ( Read more... )

My prior Blogging Against Disablism Day posts are (2006), (2007) (2008) , (2009), (2010), (2011), (2012), (2013), (2014) and (2015)

The local branch of the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network threw a party this afternoon. It was officially billed as a Celebration of Autistic Community. Autistic children, adults, families, professionals ( Read more... )

I have recently become secretary for a group on which board of directors I serve. I’d say I don’t quite know how it happened but I know exactly how it happened. The board leadership changed at the start of the year. For the January meeting, the outgoing secretary continued to take minutes as there were not enough board members present to hold ( Read more... )

One of my side hobbies in my practice of medicine is cultural competency ( Read more... )

I’m still on the e-mailing list for my high school, from which I graduated 22 years ago this spring. It’s a combination of habit and lingering interest. I’m following the technical theatre program, which is about to get its own dedicated performance space for the first time in the school’s 39 year history. It has been sharing with the cafeteria ( Read more... )

Tonight was the International Disability Day of Mourning.

( cut for talk about killing people with disabilities )

In 2013 an autistic woman wrote an essay called “You Should Tell Your Kids That They’re Autistic. It’s a good piece. I’ve shared it with my department and printed out a copy to hand to some parents of patients. I linked to it awhile back in my piece, “Label your kids - and your cans ( Read more... )

As a (still) mostly closeted autistic, I didn’t participate in Autistic Speaking Day last year. The year before, I had written about why I was still in the shadows. And so last year, when the day came and went, I couldn’t think of anything to add ( Read more... )

Today I attended a conference largely aimed at parents of children with a particular condition. The specific condition doesn’t matter here. The information sheet handed out about the agency that sponsored the conference, an agency which, I might add, does a lot of great things, wrote that this condition is “one of the most devastating of all” ( Read more... )

I am reading (re-reading) a book written in 1952. The book opens in 1940 with the birth of the author’s daughter, and ends in 1952 when the daughter, Karen, is 12. It’s a true story, possibly one of the first books written by the parent of a child with a disability about that experience. My edition came out in 1983 and includes a forward by the ( Read more... )