Do You Vote For Yourself?

Yes. it's that time again. Blog This Challenge 32: Comfort Food voting has opened and I have a question for you.

Come on, be honest! Do YOU vote for your own entry in challenges? I know it is not the done thing, certainly not considered politically correct and most people would deny it until blue in the face, but I do. Not all the time, but when one of my entries captures my heart (and we all have those favourites) like my Literary Whore, or, yes I will admit it, my Midnight Oil Eat It Out entry for this challenge,  I vote for ME!

I also am a competitive git, and as I said in one of my earlier posts, have this immense fear that when I go look at the poll a big fat zero will be there staring right back at me. We all crave acknowledgement or recognition, it is the nature of the beast. Once we have a taste of it, we want more.

The two challenges I have won, the first one I entered: Challenge 26 Quick Fix Meal and the most recent Challenge 31 My New Super Power, have given me an incredible emotional high and confidence boost. And once you have experienced this, well it is addictive.

You see I do not, like a lot of people who write or blog, truely believe in myself. I still find it incomprehensible that I have 58 followers! 58 people who want to see what I write, who find me entertaining enough to want to come back, who like my blog. I think it stems back (at least in my case) to the life change which comes with being a Mum. It is the most rewarding job on the planet BUT you also lose a piece of yourself, of your individuality. A lot of my self-worth was tied into my former working life. It is a situation where if you do a good job, you receive a pat on the back in the form of personal praise, a bonus system, or review. Motherhood rewards are not that clear cut, and usually come from sources who you know have strong personal ties to yourself. And so you lose that little bit of confidence in your ability. Winning these challenges gives you back a piece of that. Others who do not have a strong personal involvement have chosen to honour you and your entry by voting for you.



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Anyway, enough of my self-analysis, what about you? Do YOU vote for yourself? Just sometimes, maybe? Come on, 'fess up... a bit of self-belief is nothing to be ashamed of.

Oh, and go read all the entires in Challenge 32, and vote for the one you like best. Every one of us who enter would appreciate it more than you could ever realise.

No undue pressure or emotionally charged persuasion from this end this time, but...

Autism, Asperger Syndrome & Absolute Acceptance

I have a link for you. Another mother of a child on the spectrum posted this in a parenting forum. I could kiss her. I do not seem to have the time or the inclination to troll through pages and pages of literature nowadays, but sometimes, when I follow someone else's research, I find gold. This is one of those times.

An Inconvenient Youth: Raising Children with Autism

It is a heartwarming, hand-holding, tear-jerking, hell of a piece. I could have been sitting at that table, I felt like I was home. I also found incredible similarities to my piece written in 2007.

It was especially reassuring to find like-minded parents, mothers and fathers who do not have some insanely driven need to cure their child. This is the way they are. I loved the terminology of this article. My child is definitely a genetic rubik's cube, uniquely scrambled. Suits him and he himself would embrace this explanation.

This excerpt sums up how I think and feel:

And that leads to a bigger issue—one that really burns this group: the implication that accepting your child's autism is not okay. This attitude is due in part, they feel, to Generation Rescue's dominating and oversimplifying the conversation in America about autism. The simple fact is that not all autistic kids can "recover." "We need to reexamine what it means to be a successful adult," says Erin. "To me, now, a successful adult is a functional adult. We need to give these kids an opportunity to have a shot at meaningful jobs and secondary education. Maybe they'll be bagging groceries, but they'll be paying taxes. They'll be law-abiding citizens. It's not just about the money we'd save, it's about the contributions these kids will make that will benefit everyone. I strongly believe that the energy crisis is eventually going to be solved by an autistic 10-year-old boy who is perseverating on batteries. He's got that kind of focus."


At this point, however, society still has a long way to go in terms of tolerating people who behave in unfamiliar ways.

It could not have come at a better time. This week's Who magazine issue (December 21, 2009) contained an interview which really burned me up. Maybe it was a misquote, or the journalist was utilising the magazines trashy reputation for chequebook journalism and decided to misinterpret a comment. I hope this was the case. If not, the fact that one of our once high profile football players, Mat Rogers, states he thinks his son who is diagnosed with ASD:
"will be a normal boy... He will be a normal boy" is horrifying. And if he doesn't conform to Rogers ideal of normalcy? What then? and how do you define normal anyway? I have yet to meet any one I could call normal. Mat Rogers himself would do well to read the linked article, maybe it would make him realise how offensive his comment really was. Not only to other parents of children on the spectrum, but to his own child.

Boy 1 is an incredible person in his own right, and as much as I wish life let him walk this path a little easier, I do not want him to be anyone other than himself! He amazes me with the depth of his wisdom, caring and compassion. He inspires me. I am humbled to be his mother.

Why on earth would you want to alter this? Could YOU look into his eyes and tell HIM he's abnormal...