Last week, I received an email from Jennifer, Gayle DeLong‘s autistic daughter. The very child she blamed for her getting cancer. This was the first time and I wanted to make sure that it was right with her for me to tell her story and she said “Happy editing.”
The Negative Impact of the Tragedy Narrative
Jennifer, the daughter of Gayle DeLong had to deal with the negativity that being subjected to quackery does to a child. It just is not the physical abuse.
In her blog, she writes about her mother’s fears for her two children:
“My mom lets her negative feelings ‘get’ to her more than most mothers we know. Heck, we know another special needs mom who has three kids, two of which are autistic, one so much she was kicked out of a school for acting up, and she’s still less negative than Mom. Go figure.”
She had to grow up around the narrative that her disability was ruining everyone’s lives.
In Jennifer’s blog, she quotes her mother, “My daughters will never e the people they were meant to be, my younger daughter will never go to college and make me a grandmother, my older daughter will be a terrible mother, no one cares about us, not even our own (extended) families, services won’t help us, our country will die, narcissistic people who care more about themselves than our kids demand praise and attention, etc. And that is not even going into how much the coronavirus is impacting our lives.”
This made Jennifer cry.
The tragedy narrative is all around and she could not escape it. Having a quack for a mother just made it worse.
Jennifer’s mother went on and on about how her life was ruined by her being autistic. She described her “outbursts” even though her support needs are not very high.
Her mother said her “outbursts” were caused by stress and that is not far from the truth. In 2011 they were less often because she had fan fiction to hyperfocus on.
In high school, it was low-stress but going to college was just the opposite. She was being thrown into a world that does not listen, as most of us know. She describes it as a world with “chaos and despair, where nobody could trust anyone. Not even my pop-culture interests (Doctor Who, Benedict Cumberbatch, various actresses/singers, Cartoon Network cartoons) could console me”
Her advisor complained about Jennifer wincing. She did not yell, did not hit anyone, not being sexually inappropriate, or flipped off the teacher.
Her mother hated the advisor for being pro neurodiversity. All Jennifer knew was anti-neurodiversity and knew she had to be nice to her because she was an authority figure.
Jennifer is scared of the world because of how it treats autistics. People who are autistic who do not act neurotypical.
Jennifer’s mom even talked to another mom who has a physically disabled son. “He makes me look neurotypical by comparison.” They are getting no support either.
“Most people look at them as if they’re freaks and weirdos, who just need a good spanking.”
Jennifer’s mom was referring to Autism Speaks.
Ironically, Jennifer called the child abuse hotline and they suggested the hate group. Jennifer’s mom resented that she even called.
If the tragedy narrative was true, Jennifer would never have graduated from college.
Of course, her mother never listened to her. She was “fighting for kids.”
In July of 2020, the police pulled her over because they were concerned about her walking home from the Library in the rain. She felt guity that the police were involved at all, even something so minor.
Her mother was impressed that Jennifer was even checking books out of the library.
She just wants her mom to know that everything is going to be okay. She is going to graduate school, get a job, get married, give her grandkids, and become the person she expected her to be by the year 3030.
That is a lot to put on a child instead of letting them be themselves.
A Victim of Quackery Speaks Out
May 5, 2020, was the 15-year anniversary that her family started biomedical treatments on her and her sister.
For her mom, Gayle DeLong, it is a bittersweet milestone.
As for Jennifer, she is doing well. As of May 5, 2020, she was in grad school working towards a librarianship degree.
Her sister does have high support needs.
Their mother said that her job was only half done.
In the early 2000’s, the LeLong family had conventional parenting ideals.
Jennifer’s aunt said, “As much as I know you love your daughter, she’s not as verbal as my boys were at her age. Is she okay?” She was talking about Jennifer’s sister.
Their parents watched both girls closely and used ABA on both of them.
Jennifer says it “wasn’t so great for either of us anyway. (To put in perspective, one journal entry from my case manager said I would only go to school this one day if there was no ABA.)”
Eventually, their grandfather called to help their parents understand what was going on. He was in his mid-80s and not built like a young person anymore.
This made the girls’ parents think it was health-related and that’s when the biomedical treatments started.
On May 5, 2005, they filled out the paperwork for the first biomed appointment.
“I still remember my first doctor’s appointment. My parents could only take me on the last day of school, which deeply upset me because the kids at the after-school club were going to see Madagascar and I was missing out. And I kept thinking to myself, ‘If I were Timmy Turner, I could make the principal postpone the day.'”
“Now biomed itself is an interesting concept. It ties into diet (no gluten, casein, or milk, eventually Mom put me on an even more restrictive diet), hyperbaric oxygen chamber (you might be familiar through it with Michael Jackson, who used it to recover from surgeries), chelation therapy and supplements.”
She had mixed feelings about these treatments. The diet she hated with every fiber of her being.
She did not mind the hyperbaric oxygen chamber because she would go in there with a DVD player and watch different cartoons. When she needed to go to the bathroom, the sessions would be cut short and this annoyed her mother.
For chelation, the office was an hour’s drive both ways and they told her the needle was to “drain out toxins.”
Her first thought was “What if the weird stuff they put in me makes me into some weird superhero like The Tick. I’d freak out!”
Now after all this, she is doing alright, considering she had to deal with all the quackery.
She is dealing with the stress she felt of being trapped at home.
Being Blamed for Her Mother’s Cancer
That’s right, Gayle DeLong said she had “autism-induced breast cancer.” She posted on the quack blog Age of Autism an article called “The Lesser of Two Evils: Breast Cancer and Autism.” The lesser of the evils was not Autism.”
A quote from the article:
“I have autism-induced breast cancer (AIBC). While I am not absolutely certain that the 1.9 centimeter lump that grew in my left breast is the result of the stress of raising two autistic children, all indications point in that direction. There is virtually no cancer in my family, I eat organically, I exercise, I’m a good weight. OK, so I live in the toxic dump known as New Jersey, but that is the only other major risk factor. No, the drop in cortisol levels whenever one kid’s school calls or the other kid has a public “flare up” is enough for the cancer to take root.
“So, I speak from experience when I say Stage 1 breast cancer has nothing on autism. The differences are vast and significant. Unlike autism, no one is telling me to “celebrate” my cancer. No one is telling me that cancer is “just a different way for cells to grow.” People have told me that we’ve always had cancer, but no one is using that is an excuse for not doing anything about it. No one is blaming me (or my mother) for my cancer. Unlike a person with autism, society does not say my cancer is my fault. Another difference is that in three years, I’ll either be dead or cured. Autism is not tangible, so it neither exists concretely nor definitely leaves the body. Although cancer could do to me what autism did to Avonte Oquendo, the chances of dying from a tumor that I treat properly are small and growing smaller. “
Jennifer’s Reaction to Growing Up Like This
Jennifer also said in an email, “My dad is thinking of writing a book about how awful I was. Seriously, just because ‘this is an issue that isn’t talked about enough'” and ‘people think autism is all sunshine and rainbows’ and blah blah blah, “they need to know what its really like.”
Her reaction to a book if it ever gets written, “But infantizing your daughter and chastising her to the point where she feels absolutely worthless, (like so many others) is not the way to go about doing it. In fact, a lot of my problems could’ve easily been solved through mental health counseling, but my parents couldn’t help themselves but to see themselves as the victim. Right now, it’s too late to talk him down because he ‘promised Mom on her deathbed that he would do this’ (Not that would do much good anyway, in fact, if I tried to argue with him about it, it would get a lot worse.).”
If you want to follow Jennifer on social media Here are her links:
sources
email from Jennifer
