Parents of autistic children hope for a little more understanding

McALLEN - At the moment when her daughter starts moaning and wailing in the checkout line at the grocery store, Veronica Garza could really use a friendly face.

Instead, she says, fellow patrons look on with disapproval and disgust: Another terrible parent letting her child throw a tantrum.

But 5-year-old Alexis Garza isn't screaming for a candy bar or toy. Rather, she's bothered by the crack and rustle of the bags in the checkout line, an intolerably aggravating noise in her sensitive ears.

Lacking the words to tell her mother, instead the lovely, autistic child has what her parents gently term "a meltdown."

"If people could just, you know, give a smile," Garza said wistfully. "Show you understand, you realize - ‘It's OK.' ... That would mean the world to the parent of an autistic child."

Autism, a developmental disorder characterized by difficulty communicating or interacting, is increasingly diagnosed in young children - as many as 1 in 150 - but still poorly understood by many of those whose lives have not been changed by it.

Efforts to boost the disorder's public profile in the Rio Grande Valley have met with some success. Initial struggles with school districts have led to better and better programs to teach life skills to autistic children, who often require frequent repetition and a steady routine. And a group of researchers and parents will hold a walk for Autism Awareness Month on April 25 at McAllen Memorial High School.

But outside the support groups and special education classrooms, Garza said, there is still too little tolerance and understanding for parents.

"We've come a long way on the discrimination factor," she said. "But at places like H.E.B., they give you looks, like, ‘Control your kid.'"