Why I Don't Believe in Medicating Autism

I met a little boy who had AD/HD once -- and found him utterly charming, though very active. The next time I met him, he was quiet and withdrawn. Why? I asked his mother. She told me it was ritalin.

I was honestly appalled (and ritalin supporters, don't attack me! I know people for whom it works very well, too) at the change in his behavior. This, and later conversations with therapists and psychiatric nurse-practitioners, cemented my opinion of psychosomatic drugs -- I don't like 'em. I think they're overprescribed and too often used by lazy psychiatrists when they want to medicate instead of treat behavior.

So when my children's teachers started pressuring me to put my boys -- both of them -- on Ritalin, I resisted strongly. There was no diagnosis. To the best of my knowledge, teachers don't have professional psychiatric training. They are only repeating things they've been told. How dare they diagnose my sons?

Though this may have been an overreaction, I have since been very grateful for it. I have never medicated my sons. My middle son, it turns out, was never AD/HD as his teachers thought; he has a bad case of the lazies, and is turning it around by himself. My youngest son, Hunter, is autistic, and doing well with behavioral therapies.

I was fortunate in where my son was diagnosed. We were a military family already, which means good insurance in the area we needed it for Hunter. We also lived in Groton, Connecticut, which despite all the bad things I could say about it was right between several major autism study centers. Many of his teachers had experience with autism, though Hunter's particular flavor of autism is unique.

This meant no one ever tried to prescribe drugs to Hunter, though they did ask me if I wanted to look at pharmacological interventions. Instead, his treatment consisted of one-on-one therapies and some modifications of his behaviors at home.

Why They Want To Drug Autistic People

Autism can produce some very out-of-control symptoms such as rage, hyperactivity, and uncooperativeness; even my son's relatively mild case has often resulted in some real scenes. While there are NO drugs that have been approved for use in autism, there are a number of other psychosomatic drugs used to treat mental disorders such as schizophrenia that do treat the symptoms of autism (though this is an off-label treatment). In effect, they turn the kid into a zombie.

Now why would insurance companies prefer to do this rather than pay for therapy? Money, of course. The intensive one-on-one therapy that is necessary for proper treatment of autism is extremely expensive. Few insurance companies are willing to pay thousands of dollars each month when giving kids a pill will make them compliant?

Parents and doctors, too, are culpable. We are living in a world of instant gratification. Everyone wants results yesterday. But proper treatment of autism doesn't give you fast results. When there is a drug available that will ease symptoms, even though the child may not be getting the right treatment for him or her, parents may be thrilled just because of the easing of pressure on them. And doctors are happy when parents are happy.

The Right Way To Treat Autism

Most autism studies are very recent, and it's hard to find good longitudinal studies. But in the literature that does exist, we have figured out a few things.

One-on-one intensive therapy with a trained professional helps autistic people learn how to communicate with the world outside themselves.

Training autistic people in daily tasks is very efficacious. Because autistic people vary in the profundity of autism markers, this training may be very intense indeed -- or it may consist of group therapy with lots of role-playing social interactions.

We have no drugs currently that are proven effective in autism. There are several drugs that treat certain symptoms of autism -- for instance, Temple Grandin took some to calm her anxiety and was very pleased with them -- but there is nothing that takes away the core autism. Never believe a doctor or pharmacy company that tells you there is.

There may be some things parents can do in changing diet that will help autistic children. Autism has been linked to allergies in a number of studies (though not definitively) and a gluten-free, casein-free diet has helped some kids. For this reason, a lot of parents and some scientists think the explosion in autism diagnoses has more to do with a modern diet than it does with anything else.

I have my own methods as well. Conversation is one of the best ways I've found to teach my son how to deal one-on-one with others. I've also emphasized courtesy and formal manners, giving him a very clearly delineated set of rules for social interaction. And lastly, I use a lot of humor and gentle sarcasm to help him figure out the difference between verbal tones, and how to spot subtle meaning differences. With his stepfather's and brother's help, the humor approach seems to be very effective.

Love and support from a stable and informed family, I believe, is the best possible treatment for any autistic child. When a parent tries to understand, tries to learn what is going on in the child's head, the child will respond.

It's a slow process, and progression is slow and often impossible to see. But eventually, your child will respond, and then bloom. Even children who are severely autistic can come out and join the normal world, and many of them excel. Never lose hope, and never stop loving.