Children like mine face all sorts of challenges in life. Being different is never easy. Some children are aware of their differences and some are not, but either way being different is an uphill battle. It is difficult to be accepted, you are often looked at funny, people are afraid of those who are different and usually don't know how to interact with them or how to act around them. Children and adults with special needs face so many challenges already, they don't need any more.
I, like many others, was riveted by my TV screen on Friday and a for a lot of the weekend. I watched the events of the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School unfold to my horror and disbelief. I cried for those children and their parents. I could not pull myself away from the screen even when my own children came home. I hugged them and held them close but could not bring myself to turn off the TV even in their presence. I sat there, with tears rolling down my face, thinking about those innocent children, the brave and equally as innocent teachers and faculty. I thought of the first responders who had to walk into that horrific scene and will never be able to put it out of their minds eye. I listened and watched for every bit of information that the media handed us.
As I watched the first press conference being given by the chief of police, I thought to myself, he isn't giving us any info but the press is. They are filling in the gaps for us. They have given the gunman a face. They have given us details, we have the whole story. Like most people, I believed them. As the weekend unfolded though, it became clear, that much of what they were reporting was incorrect or false. This is nothing new. We have seen it happen dozens of times, we are used to it and truthfully, I usually don't really care when they report falsely, until now.
When my Facebook feed begins filling up with trending articles asking if Autism or Aspergers is to blame I begin to care. When every major news website is reporting as to whether or not Adam Lanza had Aspergers and if this was what caused him to do what he did, I get angry. When people have to start writing articles in response to that notion in defense of special needs children I become furious.
What happened in Connecticut is a hideous tragedy. I grieve for every parent who lost a child, for any person touched by this tragedy, for Adam Lanza's father who is left behind knowing that his son did something so heinous. I grieve for the country we live in, where tragedies like this occur way too often but I also grieve for every parent of a special needs child who now has another battle to fight because of media sensationalism.
We don't know what caused Adam Lanza to wake up Friday morning and do what he did. We probably never will. It would be great to have something or some illness to blame. It would allow each of us to look at our own children and feel better knowing that we are safe from whatever it is. But as I said, children with special needs fight an uphill battle everyday. They don't need to fight this one too. They don't need people out there speculating that any one of them could do this. Parents like me should not have to worry that schools will worry about educating our children. This should not be super imposed on the face of autism or aspergers. It is wrong. Statistics say that 1 in every 4 children has autism today. Do you really want to look at every fourth kid sideways and wonder? It is obscene, it is unfair, it is just plain wrong.
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