By Lisa Dea
It’s a typical evening at home, the kids are finally asleep after the usual bedtime rituals and I’ve just finished watching another television news magazine’s take on autism.
A silent tear rolls down my cheek.
I am stunned.
I am blown away.
With any new TV program, newspaper article, or magazine exposé on autism, I always have such high hopes. Hope for that elusive, balanced viewpoint, for awareness, and compassion, and understanding….hope for the discovery of the cause and hope for a nugget of information that will be that “ah ha” moment for my child’s recovery. But in this era of witch hunts and smear campaigns, propaganda advertising and big pharma, hope, well, it seems a bit fleeting. Or is it?
A silent tear rolls down my cheek…
David Suzuki’s, “The Nature of Things”, a Canadian television news magazine, is a small, life giving oasis in an otherwise bleak mainstream media landscape. The program, “Autism Enigma”, (Watch here, the video is disabled on the Canadian site as far as we can see) highlights the possible and plausible connection between bacteria in the gut and the potentially devastating effects it has on the brain.
I am stunned…finally, someone in the mainstream media is listening, and learning, questioning and educating. Finally….
In nature, it is often the slightest noise or the smallest little piece of snow rolling downhill that starts an avalanche. Maybe, just maybe, one small Canadian news program, from the land of snow and ice, can throw a snowball that will grow into an avalanche.
I am blown away…with hope.
Lisa Dea lives in Vancouver with her family.
It’s a typical evening at home, the kids are finally asleep after the usual bedtime rituals and I’ve just finished watching another television news magazine’s take on autism.
A silent tear rolls down my cheek.
I am stunned.
I am blown away.
With any new TV program, newspaper article, or magazine exposé on autism, I always have such high hopes. Hope for that elusive, balanced viewpoint, for awareness, and compassion, and understanding….hope for the discovery of the cause and hope for a nugget of information that will be that “ah ha” moment for my child’s recovery. But in this era of witch hunts and smear campaigns, propaganda advertising and big pharma, hope, well, it seems a bit fleeting. Or is it?
A silent tear rolls down my cheek…
David Suzuki’s, “The Nature of Things”, a Canadian television news magazine, is a small, life giving oasis in an otherwise bleak mainstream media landscape. The program, “Autism Enigma”, (Watch here, the video is disabled on the Canadian site as far as we can see) highlights the possible and plausible connection between bacteria in the gut and the potentially devastating effects it has on the brain.
I am stunned…finally, someone in the mainstream media is listening, and learning, questioning and educating. Finally….
In nature, it is often the slightest noise or the smallest little piece of snow rolling downhill that starts an avalanche. Maybe, just maybe, one small Canadian news program, from the land of snow and ice, can throw a snowball that will grow into an avalanche.
I am blown away…with hope.
Lisa Dea lives in Vancouver with her family.
Posted by Age of Autism at December 15, 2011 at 5:46 AM in Current Affairs Permalink