Autism Awareness Month
So we are now officially in May and Autism Awareness month is behind us…
April is always an interesting month as the media focuses in on autism for 30 days and the world gets a chance to experience what we see every day: the joys, challenges, inspiration and incredible diversity of the wide spectrum that is autism.
There are, of course, the usual clickbait stories that perpetuate stereotypes, claim to have found miraculous new alternative therapies and cures. But, for the most part, it is an opportunity for some in-depth stories and campaigns that shed light on what autism is, the community, the families, the struggles and difficulties of the journey, the inspirations and triumphs and, importantly, the need for more support, accessible services and acceptance.
For us, it is often a time where friends and family are more interested in hearing about the ins and outs of how we spend our days with our little (and big!) learners. We are not big and loud at TLC; we’ve always been the behind the scenes people (the sidekicks to your superheroes) but in April, we jump on the opportunity to stretch out a little further and spread the word about autism.
Autism Every Day
We are, of course, acutely aware of autism every day. We see the challenges and the sacrifices and we feel honoured to bear witness to the milestones, achievements and successes of every family we work with. So even though Autism Awareness month is now behind us, we want to aim to keep that momentum going and continue to spread the word about autism awareness and acceptance, about what we do, who we do it for and why.
One of our activities where we do this is the City2Surf. And this August, TLC will once again have a team participating to raise funds for Autism Community Network (ACN).
The 14km City2Surf is an annual tradition at TLC, dating back to our roots as CARD Sydney. It’s an event that has, over the years, transformed into our second (informal) team building activity of the year, one we always look forward to. It’s a great way to bring our team together and we always have an amazing time – the atmosphere and energy is incredible and it is hard not to get swept up by it all. The cherry on top of the experience is knowing that the 14km journey is helping us help one of our favourite charitable organisations.
Autism Community Network
We support Autism Community Network because we love the grassroots approach to community and we love that it’s by families for families. ACN is a non-profit organisation which aims to support families and raise awareness about autism spectrum disorders; The ACN is comprised of a network of parents, carers and volunteers across Sydney and providing support and information through support groups, social groups, newsletters, parent forums and much more! If you haven’t checked them out yet, you should.
ACN provides their support services for free to families, so the funds we raise will help them help more families affected by autism.
Please, give what you can and share this post to help us help ACN and keep raising autism awareness and acceptance.
