From 11 years ago, every April 2 is the World Autism Awareness Day. 

Autism is officially a form of pervasive developmental disorder. Children with autism are sometimes referred to as “children of stars”. In China, there are over 10 million people diagnosed with autism, and half of them are teens aged below 14 years old. Currently, the number of teens diagnosed with autism is estimated at 1 person in 68 worldwide and it is increasing year by year. 

We really need to understand people with autism. Only when we understand them, we will respect, accept and care for them properly. 

They are more likely to be considered “aliens” as opposed to geniuses or people with natural talents. They are autistic not because of insufficient attention from their parents or punishment from their parents’ bad behavior. A person with autism is like an eaten apple, which is not perfect but still good. They are unfortunate to be that sixty-eighth person, so we need to appreciate them because we are just one of the other sixty-seven. 

You may not be able to imagine the difficulty of children who are isolated from our world at the starting point of their development. Their parents will use their own and even their family’s substantial amount of money and time to help children with autism catch up to the developmental pace of their peers. 

Every little progress of an autistic child is often the result of tremendous efforts made by the child themselves and his family, so you need to treat people with autism around you with good grace. 

If you see problematic behaviors of people with autism, please do not stare at them or discriminate against them. If your child happens to be a classmate of children with autism, please instruct him to provide the necessary help and care to their peers. If you see a kid hanging around alone for a long time and does not know how to answer your questions, your might want to think about autism and how you might be able to help them before you leave them to their own devices. 

There’s research suggesting that family members, especially parents of people with autism, face the same pressure level as soldiers in war zones. They are guarding their children with autism whose disorders have unknown causes, unspecified treatments and uncertain future, and their hearts can easily become ruptured. 

They have to behave like “grandsons”, as we would say in China, to beg people for their children’s following needs: going to kindergarten, attending mainstream schools and even seeing doctors or dentists. 

Therefore, we need to pay more attention to family members of people with autism, as their lives are really not easy. Till now, Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) has been proved as a scientifically effective intervention method. 

If you have the opportunity to talk to parents, please try to persuade them against other unreliable methods. You need to persuade them to learn scientifically proven intervention methods and put those methods into practice for their children’s best possible development. If just 10% of us could spare just 3 hours a month to give a parent a break from looking after an autistic child we could allow that parent to stroll down the street temporarily relieve the pressure they are under. 

Reach out your helping hands and let your smile overflow your face! Use love and care to connect the world of children with autism to us. 

(Fang Jing is the president of Elim Autism Research Committee. The article reflects the author's opinion, and not necessarily the views of CGTN.)