We spend a lot of time looking back, particularly as we get older as there’s more behind us than there is in front of us. I’ve done my fair share of that in these columns this year but investigating our stories helps us to understand our present and gives a guidebook to the future. Life throws various challenges at us on our journey – some we’re born with; some happen to us.
As I’m sure you’ve seen on the ads on the tube some ‘disabilities’ are less visible than others. Not that those disabilities necessarily stop some people. The extraordinary achievements of the Paralympians across the world currently competing in Paris never cease to amaze me.
I’ve mentioned my son’s autism before. In a way, we were lucky. He was diagnosed when he was just two (back in 2001) and whilst there was far less knowledge about the condition (and some quite unhelpful misinformation) than there is now, we managed to get a diagnosis and help via a great local organisation called Kids First – now part of Merton Mencap. They helped us to find support at his primary school then later at a specialist school when he was aged ten.
These days there are far more financial pressures on local authorities, and it appears, far more children seeking diagnosis as it becomes better known. And it is a spectrum – ranging from the non-verbal at one end to the much higher functioning Aspergers Syndrome at the other. My son, Xander, recently managed to get representation with an agency called ‘Visable’ which promotes neurodiverse actors and models. His main employer (ATG theatres) where he works part time as an usher, has also started to develop a new approach to neurodiversity to its credit.
As the years have passed by, I’ve also become more aware of other conditions such as ADHD, which can also impact significantly on the way people behave and work. I’ve always thought labelling is a double-edged sword. I’ve said to my son it’s useful to help explain your condition and behaviour, but at the same time you really don’t want it to define you.
On the other side it’s a challenge we all face in our daily lives when we meet people who behave in a way contrary to what we might, perhaps, expect. We are all unique in our own ways and trying to embrace and understand our differences, manage expectations and challenge those behaviours where appropriate is, I think, the sign of a civilised, tolerant, community, however difficult that might be for us sometimes.
Over the years our approach to things has evolved in my view. My father left my mother with me and my two younger brothers when I was just five, unable to cope with the pressures of being the breadwinner for a young family. But back in the 60’s the labelling was starker, and the ‘treatments’ far more crude. He was given Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT), but it didn’t help and may even have hindered him. He never worked again and was apparently later diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. There might have been some autism there too.
I wish I’d spent more time understanding what happened to him when he was alive, but I didn’t. I may try to find out more though things have moved on, so one wonders how valuable it would be. It might help to explain a few things, but there are dangers of getting too locked in the past.
We try to learn from history but it’s often frustrating. I spent a good part of my career working in the field of social housing so digesting the Grenfell report this week was difficult. The desire to blame and punish, when loved ones have perished in the disaster, is understandable. For me it appears this tragedy is a lot about workplace culture and community engagement. I’ve neatly sidestepped the issue of how we engage and finding the right people to support us this week but it is a subject close to my heart and integral to so many things, so will seek to tackle it next time.