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Should We Label Disabled Kids?
Are labels inherently bad?
When my son was a tot he was diagnosed with autism.
In the years since his diagnosis, I have heard a lot of people talk about ‘not wanting to label their child’ — so not seeking a diagnosis of the child’s disability. That has always seemed an odd choice.
The diagnosis gave my son access to specialist support that he wouldn’t have had without. Support that helped him more than I could have imagined.
Changing Labels
When he was diagnosed it was acceptable to refer to him as being autistic, but preferable to say that he had autism. Saying that someone has autism suggests that it is a part of them, being autistic suggests that the disability defines them. Or so the logic goes.
It felt like the disability did define my son, but I was happy to use the terms that caused less offence, so generally used ‘has autism’.
At some point, I’m guessing at 10 years ago but I’m not certain — time goes way too fast — it was considered good to refer to non-autistic people as neurotypical rather than ‘normal’. People who have a different neural makeup are not abnormal. That made sense so I used it, although it caused confusion because it wasn’t well understood. Words aren’t useful if we don’t all understand…
