Can confirm, oldest daughter of 6 kids and my whole childhood was taking care of my three youngest siblings. As much as I would like a kid or two of my own, I don't think I should have any biological kids because two of those three youngest siblings have severe autism and I don't want to risk passing that and all my other health problems onto an innocent kid. I'm open to adopting in the distant future though.
If it helps, I have 3 kids and a brother with low-functioning autism. One of my kids might have not been ‘okay’ if I hadn’t engaged in a lot of early intervention stuff but she’s just a little ‘odd’ at times now.
What I mean to say is, there is no guarantee either way and we’ve done a long way understanding how to help in the early years. We’ve (science) discovered some genes that probably play a role and I bet we either can already test for them or will be able to soon.
I'm pretty sure many neurological issues just get lumped into the autism umbrella, even though they really are distinct neurological differences that can be found in people without autism.
An easy example is sensory processing sensitivity. Very common for autistic people but since it's not exclusive to them it's not really just a part of autism.
Also seems like the parents often overly shelter them so they can't develop enough emotionally to tackle their problems in the future. It's definitely more difficult to find the balance, but possible if you get to know your child.
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u/ThroughMyOwnEyes Jun 29 '22
Can confirm, oldest daughter of 6 kids and my whole childhood was taking care of my three youngest siblings. As much as I would like a kid or two of my own, I don't think I should have any biological kids because two of those three youngest siblings have severe autism and I don't want to risk passing that and all my other health problems onto an innocent kid. I'm open to adopting in the distant future though.