Experiences of pregnancy and birth after getting ASD diagnosis?

Autistic people have the right to choose to have children, same as anyone else. You've made your choice not to have them, which is your right, and this lady is considering having them, which is her right. Let's not tear each other down. Let's allow people to make their own choices, free of judgement. If we all didn't have babies for the fear they'd be Autistic, then plenty of NT parents would also have a reason to be 'concerned', because plenty of NT parents end up with ND children. As long as parents of Autistic children aren't torturing them with ABA and the like, then I think it best not to judge other, official or potential, mums/dads.

Also, this could just be me being ignorant, but I'm pretty sure there is no 'blood test for the markers'. Not yet, anyway. I'm open to being wrong about that, though. Anyway, I could be wasting my breath – you could be a spambot as someone else suggested – but I just don't want the OP to be hurt by these comments, and I don't want any other potential parents who may be reading this to be hurt either. If I can at least mitigate that hurt, I will.

Goodness. Each person must make their own decision, but in truth our off spring are always a surprise and EVERYONE inherits some talents and abilities and some detriments from their parents. It's called being human. 

I had no idea I was autistic when I had my lovely son. He's NT but he has other inherited gifts and problems, because he is human. 

Am I sorry I was born autistic? No! Would I have decided not to have my son had I known? No! Would I tell him not to have kids because neurodivergence is sprinkled about the family tree? No! Is my son glad he was born? Yes! Is he happy I'm his mum? Well, he tells me often I did a good job and he loves me.

NT or ND my grand kids will I'm sure all be just lovely and be deeply loved by their autistic nana as they are.

Anyway, being born ND may bring its challenges, but it can also bring its joys. And we don't have to live a life of 'suffering' with enough love and understanding. And who's to say what any child will turn out like or predict what they might achieve?

Read with much interest.

wow trying to get people to go to your website by insulting a lot of the people who use this one. Well done spambot

Thanks Chloe - that's a really interesting article. I've had the exact same experience when googling for information about being pregnant and autistic, you just get all sorts of nonsense about what supposedly causes or doesn't cause autism in  

I really hope the NAS website will consider creating a page on pregnancy and birth for autistic women at some point, there's barely any information anywhere online at all. Is there a way of suggesting topics for the website?

Hi out_of_step, I started a thread over on Mumsnet as well, and I've had a lot of really helpful replies - this is my thread over there: https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/3718714-has-anyone-given-birth-after-being-diagnosed-with-asperger-s-hfa

There's also this thread, started a few months ago by one of the people who replied to me, which is useful too: https://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/pregnancy/3632252-Autistic-Mums-experiences-of-giving-birth-and-postnatal-care

Just to warn you, reading through some of the negative experiences made me very panicky/anxious, so it might do the same to you. A lot of people do seem to have had a much better birth experience for their second births though, with more supportive midwives. 

Hi lemondifficult,

Thank you for your post- these are all really good questions which i'm sure other community members would be interested in. You may find this article by Lana Grant about her experiences as an autistic woman, pregnancy and motherhood useful.

Here's the link:

https://network.autism.org.uk/knowledge/insight-opinion/autistic-women-pregnancy-and-motherhood 

I hope this helps!

Chloe Mod.

I would be interested in any replies to this thread.