Let's talk about the A word.

Mar 23, 2016

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Maurice (Christopher Eccleston), Alison (Morven Christie) and Joe Hughes (Max Vento) in The A Word. Photograph: Rory Mulvey/BBC/Fifty Fathoms

So. BBC one showed a new drama, The A word, last night about a family discovering their son has autism.

It’s very well acted – unsurprisingly given it includes Christopher Eccleston on fine, if somewhat grumpy form (possibly because he seems to suddenly have become old enough to be cast as grandad, which must be a bit of a shock for all concerned). The young lad playing the autistic boy in question is playing what he’s been asked to play very well.

But.

Despite articles raving about it (The A Word is a beautifully believable drama about autism and family tensions is just one of the many I found) I’m personally having a few problems believing it.

Within this family, we’ve been through the diagnosis process 3 times.

It’s never been easy.

First time around, the GP, who seemed to have his own belief issue with autism as a condition insisted that the problem was down to a chronic ear infection, saw us monthly for 3 months, and then prescribed 6 months of penicillin. I didn’t fill the script, did transfer to a different GP and finally got the referral that we actually needed. The child in question had had his hearing tested regularly throughout childhood, received speech therapy for lack of speech, and was at the time I caved and sought referral beyond being a handful and was regularly physically attacking me if I attempted to thwart his wishes and do something like get him to leave the house. There were other clues that all was not well, but this is supposed to be a normal length article.

I know I don’t know every autistic child (or indeed person) on the planet, but I’ve seen a fair few meltdowns and I don’t think I’ve ever seen one that resulted in the child lying quietly face down on the floor. Or just slapping someone once and then stopping in apparent shock.

Also, during the diagnostic interview in the programme, the doctor(?) asked for school reports, and the family said oh we didn’t bother with those. And then the diagnosis tootled on? I know quite a lot of home educating families who have been told that they can’t access diagnosis as the child isn’t in school and it can’t happen without educational reports. (Which is wrong, incidentally, but unfortunately for a lot of children, medical professionals do not know everything, and very often are prejudiced against anything outside the norm. Our paediatrician was a lot more clued up, and just visited us at home and him at beavers, in order to see him in a social situation.)

What I’m trying to get at is the diagnosis procedure in the program wasn’t in the slightest bit believable. Ignoring the lack of educational reports, it missed out the stage where the parents, tearing their hair out, are either fobbed off, put on a waiting list, lied to, or told that it’s just poor parenting and they need to attend classes. Yes, all of these things happen and accessing diagnosis can take a very long time. (Do NOT get me started on accessing support.)

Oh, and despite us being told that this isn’t yet another Rainman lookalike, it *is* about a little boy with savant like skills for learning music lyrics.

Head. Desk.

Please. Please be aware that autistic people can be male, female, young, old, bright, not so bright, have learning difficulties or not, often have a variety of co morbid diagnosis like epilepsy or joint issues (look up Ehlers Danlos and weep) and so on and so forth. What they rarely are is savants.

Yes, yes, I know the A word is fiction. But it’s fiction that once again cements a stereotype in place, and means that people like me – female, adult etc will be told more often that I can’t be autistic. Like I was by the GP I approached to access diagnosis myself, who couldn’t get me out of the room fast enough.

He was wrong. I am. And many more people are going to be misled by this, and it doesn’t help any of us.

(And as for the throw away prejudiced remark anti home schooling in the trailer for the next episode – really? Just what does the BBC have against home education??)

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Comments

10 responses to “Let's talk about the A word.”

Nicola Miller
23 March 2016
I wish to goodness their research was better. They are paid well enough. There are people who would like to know more about autism and how on earth are they supposed to differentiate between dramatic licence and the truth?
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Midlife Singlemum
23 March 2016
I know someone who was diagnosed with Aspergers in his late 40s. He was happy to know why he is a little socially awkward but he was overjoyed to think that made him some sort of genius. He is a little socially awkward but his biggest problem is a lifelong hangup about not being intellectual enough.
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1. Midlife Singlemum
  24 March 2016
  Otoh look at this https://www.facebook.com/aipac/videos/10153496716383543/
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  1. Jax Blunt
    24 March 2016
    I’d read about that unit before. I don’t really know what to think. Very practical and pragmatic approach at the very least. Doesn’t appear to be any recognition of female autism though?
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    1. Midlife Singlemum
      25 March 2016
      The girls here do go in the army but they also have an option to do two years of community service instead. I dn’t know why there were no women in the video – whether they are not on this program or whether they just weren’t in the video. It is a bigger deal for a boy not to complete his army service though so maybe that was the point of the video. I don’t really know the answer tbh.
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@goriami
23 March 2016
I interpreted it as us coming in to the story after the diagnosis process was underway, maybe I’ve misinterpreted? Anyway, I think they are trying desperately to show the difficulty for the entire family and the way others show no compassion as they just don’t know what to do with the “difficult” child. The thing is if they showed some of the awful meltdowns which children suffer would this not alienate the audience? Would they just switch off? Yes perhaps there is a dumbing down or a sweetening of the scenario, but surely that’s in part as this is drama and secondly perhaps by making the audience a little compassionate to the sweet singing boy it might help the same audience when confronted with something more complicated? It’s a tough one.
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griselda heppel
24 March 2016
This is a really good analysis of the weakness of the drama (which in some ways was better than I expected – I’m afraid my expectations of TV dramas with an autism theme are pretty low). I did wonder why Jo just lay down quietly on the floor. If that was meant to be a meltdown, the writer hasn’t a clue!
Louis Theroux’s programme on BBC 4 afterwards looking at the lives of autistic teenagers in a school in America was much more revealing, honest and as a result, heart wrenching.
Re how easily the parents got their diagnosis, I guess this is to fulfil the demands of fiction (which is why it is deceptive to pretend you can make a realistic drama out of autism anyway – even The Mystery of the Dog in the Night Time has to cut corners to keep narrative tension).
Funnily enough, I thought the one howler ‘The A word’ didn’t make was the ‘Savant’ trope – any child who listens non stop to the same songs over and over will learn the words, and I thought the point was that the parents were deluding themselves that their son’s reluctance to join in with his peers was down to his super intelligence. Don’t know if I’ll keep watching… especially as the subplots were pretty irritating!
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Looking for Blue Sky
26 March 2016
It’s great to read a dissection of the programme and makes me glad I didn’t watch it. I agree with the commentator above who says it is a difficult issue to show on TV when autism looks so different in every child, but certainly it seems to have used many familiar stereotypes.
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Shannon
8 April 2016
When me and my 12 year old daughter watched it (sister of ASD 11 year old). We thought its just not that easy!!! Took until 7 for my daughter to get a diagnosis. It was when she was tiny that I really needed the help. The waiting lists for sensory therapy that we think your daughter really needs but we don’t have it in this borough.etc
Everything is way harder than that car journeys, getting dressed, brushing teeth, staying sane!!
They tried hard with the other parents responses but for us with the exception of very few very special people. People we’re just horrible. Comments like “you can’t tell me having a child like that in the class isn’t affecting my child’s education. You really need to get her a diagnosis. To there’s nothing wrong with her. You teally need to reinforce what we do with her! The thick skin I’ve/we’ve had to grow!
We still enjoyed the programme and will carry on watching. But they could of really given more of an insight into some of the challenges ASD families face. If I’m honest I felt jealous of how easy they had it.
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