The “Eyes” Have It

There is this intense connection by the general population of autism and eye contact.  Yes, poor eye contact is a major “symptom” of autism, but it doesn’t define children on the spectrum.  This subject has become more relevant as Robert MacNeil (or MacNeil-Leher fame) made strong statements about the importance of eye contact on his AutismNOW series.  These statements have prompted a backlash in the autistic community—specifically by those with autism themselves (great open letter to MacNeil here).

Both my sons have difficulty with eye contact, but TJ has had to deal with it the longest.  While this can be a communication barrier, it also helps the child cope.  Sometimes it is just too much stimulation to visually connect with someone.  But not everyone gets that.  There are two incidents that stick out for me—and they both happened in the last year!

The first had to do with a yard duty at my son’s school.  She helps with crowd control in car line and my son was not doing everything to her liking.  She decided to confront him while he was getting into my car by holding the car door open and demanding his eye contact.  I told her to leave him alone and she still demanded he look at her.  Eventually, she backed down, but there are so many things that were wrong with this scenario.  It resulted in complaints at both the school and district level, as well as a consultation with a special needs lawyer.

I attribute this episode to the poor training of educational professionals on interacting with children—especially those with autism.

Then there was the one incident involving a mom I knew that had recently had her daughter diagnosed with autism.  She is in what I call the “whacky camp” and believes that evil gluten caused her daughter’s condition and the true answers are in the holistic community.  Whatever.  Well, one day she came up to my boys when I was about 15 feet away taking care of something.  She started commenting on how beautiful their eyes were.  Seemed harmless, but I continued to listen to her interaction. 

She started zeroing in on TJ (TL wasn’t diagnosed yet) and asking him over and over again to show her his eyes.  I could tell that it stopped being about the color of his eye and more about her testing his eye contact skills.  He was getting a little uncomfortable, but is pretty much a pro now and dealing with these social situations.  She gave up after a few exchanges, and while I could have jumped in to save him, it would have turned a forgettable situation into something TJ would dwell on. 

But, why was she doing this?  I don’t have a clue.  Maybe she felt the need to “check” his autism (like years of therapists and doctors were wrong).  Maybe she was comparing his eye contact with her daughter’s.  Whatever her reasons, it was just inappropriate. Needless to say, that connection ended in a big blowout over our different stances on autism among other things.

Now, I did talk to TJ after his interaction with this mom.  I just approached it “dumbly” (what was so-and-so talking to you about?).  He told me she wanted to see his eyes.  I then decided to open a discussion about eye contact and asked him how it felt when people wanted to “see his eyes.”  He said the most profound thing I have ever heard about eye contact and will close with his quote:

“Eye contact is like homework; I don’t want to do it, but I know I have to.”