Finding Your Community as an Autism Parent

Raising an autistic child can be profoundly isolating. Play dates fall apart. Social events become minefields. Well-meaning family members say the wrong things. Friends who do not have children with similar needs drift away. The particular combination of love, exhaustion, advocacy, and grief that autism parenting involves is hard to explain to people who have not lived it.

Finding community — people who get it without needing it explained — is one of the most important things an autism parent can do. Not just for themselves, but for their child, who needs to see their parents supported and not alone.

The wrong communities

Not all autism communities are built the same. Some are organized primarily around tragedy — forums and groups where the dominant narrative is grief, burden, and cure. These communities exist, and they serve real emotional needs. But they can also reinforce a way of seeing your child that makes it harder to fully accept them.

Be thoughtful about where you spend your emotional energy. Communities organized around curing or fixing autism tend to be organized around the idea that something is wrong with your child. Communities organized around acceptance tend to be organized around the idea that something is wrong with the world, and the goal is to change the world.

Both communities have their grief. The difference is what they are grieving and what they are working toward.

Where to look

Local parent groups through your child's school or therapy provider can be a starting point, but they vary enormously in culture. Facebook groups are imperfect but large — you can find both local and interest-specific groups. Organizations like the Autistic Self Advocacy Network have chapters in many cities.

And increasingly, autistic adults are building community spaces that include parents — not as an afterthought, but as part of the same ecosystem. Spending time in those spaces, listening to what autistic adults say they needed as children, is one of the most valuable things an autism parent can do.

What you are looking for

You are looking for people who see your child as a full human being. People who do not flinch at the hard parts but also do not reduce your child to them. People who can hold both the reality of significant challenges and the reality of complete inherent worth at the same time.

Those people exist. WeBearish is trying to help build the community that connects them. Because the isolation does not have to be permanent. And the journey — as hard as it is — does not have to be walked alone.