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THE SJ CHILDS SHOW-Building a Community of Inclusion
🎙️ Welcome to The SJ Childs Show Podcast! 🎉
Join Sara Bradford—better known as SJ Childs—as she bridges understanding and advocacy for the neurodivergent community. This podcast shines a light on autism awareness, empowering stories, expert insights, and practical resources for parents, educators, and individuals alike.
Brought to you by The SJ Childs Global Network, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting autistic individuals and their families worldwide, this show is your weekly dose of inspiration and actionable ideas. Visit sjchilds.org to learn more about our mission, find resources, and connect with our growing community.
Catch us on platforms like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Goodpods—or tune in Fridays at 8:30 AM EDT on the Helium Radio Network’s Life Improvement Radio (Channel 1). Together, let’s foster a brighter, more inclusive world! 🌟
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THE SJ CHILDS SHOW-Building a Community of Inclusion
Episode 320-Alien Savant-Remember When Autism Had No Name? A Conversation with Author Janet Elliott
What happens when you uncover a hidden family history that reveals both heartbreak and resilience? Janet's discovery of a banker's box filled with her brother's medical records sparked an unexpected journey into autism's troubling past and ultimately led to her powerful memoir, "The Alien Savant."
Born in the 1950s when autism wasn't recognized as a diagnosis, Janet's brother Michael was simply labeled "mentally retarded" like countless other neurodivergent children of his era. Through intimate family stories and Michael's own remarkable artwork, Janet reconstructs a time when children displaying autistic behaviors were routinely institutionalized rather than supported. Her narrative takes us inside the walls of these facilities, where children with vastly different conditions received generic care rather than tailored education or development opportunities.
What makes this story uniquely powerful is how Janet contrasts Michael's experience with that of her twin grandchildren, both on the autism spectrum but receiving vastly different support in today's world. The evolution from institutional care to individualized education plans represents decades of progress, yet Janet reminds us how recent these changes truly are. Michael's primary mode of communication—detailed drawings that expressed his thoughts when words couldn't—feature throughout the book, offering readers a direct window into his perspective and creativity.
The Alien Savant serves multiple purposes: historical documentation of autism treatment, a loving family tribute, and a call for continued acceptance and understanding. Whether you're personally connected to autism or simply interested in how society's approach to neurodiversity has evolved, this memoir offers valuable insights through one family's deeply personal journey. Find Janet's book on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indigo Chapters, or through her website at myguidedpen.com, and join the conversation about how far we've come and where we still need to go in supporting neurodivergent individuals.
The SJ Child Show is Backford's 13th season. Join Sarah Bradford and the SJ Child Show team as they explore the world of autism and share stories of hope and inspiration. This season we're excited to bring you more autism summits featuring experts and advocates from around the world. Go to sjchildsorg to donate and to get more information. Congratulations on 2024's 20,000 downloads and 300 episodes, Hi.
Speaker 3:Welcome to the SJ Childs show today.
Speaker 2:Sounds like 300 episodes you did just in the last season. Wow, that's awesome.
Speaker 3:That's almost every day you were that was over all time, the 300 we just passed it. Oh, it came. Yeah, should have. I guess they should have made that a little more clear. But hey, this is. You know we're doing this so I can learn what to fix. I love it. It's great to have you here, janet, and I'm excited to talk about your book and learn more about your journey. And yeah, before we get started, tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:Introduce yourself About myself. Okay, about myself. Okay, I'm a mother and a grandmother of eight and I grew up in the. I was born in the 50s and grew up in the 60s and 70s in Scarborough, ontario. I now split my time between Florida. I have a place in Bonita Springs and I spend the summer months back here in Ontario oh amazing, I'm retired. I've been retired about eight years now. I love that.
Speaker 3:I'm testing my audio here. I keep getting a strange feedback. Sorry about that. Everything sounds good at the same time. And tell us a little bit about the journey that started for you with your book. And you know, why did you decide to go down that route? And you know, were you always a writer? Did you have?
Speaker 2:writers.
Speaker 2:I have sort of played around a little bit, but this is my first published book. No, what happened a few years ago? We were cleaning out my parents' house, you know, and getting it ready to sell and I ended up with a lot of the paperwork you know like out of my dad's office and I swear he kept every piece of paper on earth, but anyway. And I also had all of my brother's drawings and you know I went through them. I thought, wow, these are really neat, like I knew about most of them. But oh my oh, but oh my gosh, they're falling apart because they're so old. But I've got to get these put into a book for the family, which was all I originally intended.
Speaker 2:Then I came across a box amongst all these other things, of all his school reports and all his doctor reports and psychiatrist reports, and I mean this was a banker's box full. And I went, oh my gosh. And I started going through it and looking to see what it was all about and I was stunned I mean these were the reports from the social workers in that so telling what went on while he was in residence in some of these places and I thought, oh my gosh, there's a heck of a story here that people need to hear, that people need to know what happened many years ago, back in the 60s, when there was no special education, there was no diagnosis of autism. Any child that behaved in what we now call neurodivergent, any of those children that displayed any kind of behavior that didn't fit what they thought the norm should be, these kids were all pretty much labeled retarded, were all pretty much labeled retarded, mentally retarded, and most of the time it was recommended that they go into institutional life, that they be better off with their own kind. Well, you know, no, they weren't. But that's what happened, and most of the parents didn't know. They had to go along with what these doctors were telling them, and so they did, and these children were all lumped together. I mean, you know, autistic children were with Down syndrome children, and they were just all together and they just got care, not any kind of education, any kind of socialization, none of that. So like at the time my brother was growing up, there were 20 institutions in Ontario and a similar situation throughout all the United States too, and that's where most of these kids landed.
Speaker 2:And it wasn't until the 80s before they started realizing that there were differences, that you know. Then they started working on the autism diagnosis. It was real basic back then. It wasn't again until they got, you know, further into the late 80s and the 90s that they really got a true definition or criteria to assess a child, you know. But we've come a long, long way. There's still lots to do, but it's a lot better situation now for the children now. Now for the children. Now.
Speaker 2:I have twin grandchildren who are both on the spectrum and two totally different situations. They couldn't be more different as they tried. But what's wonderful now is their IEP. Their program continues from the time that they've been little, you know, four years old, but it still goes on in high school here, which I discovered and thought this is wonderful Because they're not there and they're also allowed to stay in high school for five years, knowing that most of them are going to need that extra time to get things worked out, need that extra time to uh, to get things worked out. And, um, they teach some a lot of social skills, a lot of if they're a good candidate for it independent skills, how to live, you know, uh, function by themselves. If they can some, some can, some can't. So yeah. So the book took me a couple of years to write and it's got a lot of my brother's pictures in it. I use quite a few of them because that's one of his ways of communicating with his drawings. Wow.
Speaker 3:And you knew he was autistic growing up.
Speaker 2:Well, no, we didn't have a label for it, but I realized when I was reading through the notes and we certainly realized that once he got old enough that we, you know, we realized that that's what it was, that that's what you know where he fell into. Now he was also hearing impaired and there was some emotional disturbances as well. However, you know the main way he functioned. He was a picture thinker. He worked with his drawings and that's the way he learned. Most things was visually, but, yeah, a lot of his behaviors he would do stimming. That's the way he learned. Most things was visually, but, yeah, a lot of his behaviors he would do stimming. He would wave his arms and make odd noises. That's how he always was. We were used to it and didn't really realize that there were quite a few other children that had displayed the same behaviors and had the same issues. So, not when he was young. We didn't know. My parents didn't know what the name was eventually going to be. They just knew that he needed extra help and specialized help.
Speaker 3:And that's great that they, you know, were able to give that to him. And and how was that for you, as a sibling just to, I, I'm, I'm an only child, but I have a son and daughter that are just as this complete opposite ends of the spectrum for another, and so she will be, you know, his keeper, if you will, of his heart and and whatever for um.
Speaker 2:That's how it worked out at least, and I think it does most families. Um, I'm the oldest of five of us, uh, seven years younger than me, so I had to not look after him, but old enough that I looked out for him because he was that much younger than me. But we accepted the fact that, like initially, all we thought, okay, he can't hear, he's deaf, so we wore a hearing aid and he went to deaf school because that was available. Unfortunately, there was no special education within or they weren't able to handle kids like that that had other problems along with the hearing impairment. So as kids, as siblings, we just accepted his behaviors.
Speaker 2:He had all these odd things that he'd do. It was illegal and he had routines that had to be this way or sorry, not functioning. So we went okay and we went along with it. Everybody did what was needed and we didn't mind that sometimes Michael would have to have extra attention from mom and dad because he needed it. None of us were. I don't think nobody was jealous of the attention that he got. No, not at all. And usually my parents made sure that he participated, like at birthday parties. He was always there, you know, like uh sort of thing and doing his own thing yeah, we have one of those two doing their own thing oh yeah, I love it.
Speaker 3:I love it. Oh, and what, um? When you put the book together, who did you first share it with and what were their thoughts about that?
Speaker 2:Well, probably my sisters, because they're in it. I had to make sure that they were okay. Well, they were okay with what I was doing. Um, probably the. You know, it was a real family thing on that personal level.
Speaker 2:Then I found this wonderful, because I had no idea what it was doing as far as editing and all that sort of thing, and I found this really cool company that they help self-publishers of nonfiction so a memoir falls into that category and they provide all of the different services that you might need, all sort of under one roof. So I thought, well, that works great for me, because I don't know what I need. It's like when I had finished the draft and I thought, okay, it's done. And when, you know, I handed it off to them and they went, nope, there's lots we can do to fix this. I went, oh, okay, it needs fixed. And they did. They took it from being a good book to a really really good book. Yeah, I know, and they're a wonderful company. They're called Book Launchers, okay, and they are an American company, although, it's interesting, the lady who runs it, she's Canadian. So I thought, okay, we've got a connection here, a connection absolutely.
Speaker 3:Yep, wow. And what about Michael? Is he still? He's still around, does, has he?
Speaker 2:seen. No, he passed away. He passed away in 21.
Speaker 3:Okay and had. Did the book come after that then?
Speaker 2:Or okay, that's why we were clearing the house out to sell, my father had, in his will he my mother had passed away in 2005. Dad died in 2009 and in his will, he wanted us to, you know, uh, a possession of the house with the stipulation that we had to have michael stay living there, that we couldn't sell it, that you know, uh, that we had to and we had to look after him. So, uh, that's what we did. Two of my sisters moved into the house and were physically there looking after him, and I wasn't far away, about 30 minutes away from where he lives. That's great, that's, yeah, so that's what we did.
Speaker 3:That's amazing. And what did your sisters think of the book?
Speaker 2:Interesting reactions. The one thinks it's fantastic and she actually helped me. We went to the Geneva Autism Symposium last November with the book and she actually came with me and helped me promote it. And you know the other sister, who's my sensitive sister she was one of the ones who actually lived with him and did most of the teaching him a lot of things that he needed to learn to be there by himself. I think she found it hard to read. It just brought back so many memories for her. She actually found it a little distressing, I think. But she's totally in support of it. And and the youngest sister too, you know like yeah, so oh, I love that.
Speaker 3:I love that when you went to the Geneva conference was Rachel Barcelona there. Did you meet her or see her by any chance?
Speaker 2:There was quite a few really well-known speakers. Temple Grandin was there. I did get to meet her and she got a copy of the book. I love it. The girl from the Love on the Spectrum show.
Speaker 3:Danny, yeah, there's so many right.
Speaker 2:David was her boyfriend. He was there, oh yeah.
Speaker 3:She's so sweet, isn't she? I haven't had a chance to meet her.
Speaker 2:She's a funny soul, like she's just, you know, I I mean, uh, she, she was talking to me and all of a sudden you're wandering off. Okay, because I know, I know what that is. So I'm, I'm fine with that. Yeah, I thought it was kind of funny, but yeah, it was a very interesting conference. There were lots of interesting people who also had booths and different products. They had some new PECS programs and all kinds of different interesting things that they had to contribute. I I did enjoy it very much. That's wonderful.
Speaker 3:Yeah, love a good conference. Oh, I love that. What's in store in the future? Anything you're going to be working on or going to be keep going to conferences and podcasts? Uh, there's nothing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've got another podcast. Uh, this one that'll be coming out in july I've done already. Then there's um. I've already done autism live. You probably know she's.
Speaker 3:She's an awesome, awesome lady is that how we connected, I wonder? I think it was actually just through Shannon. Shannon and I are good friends, okay.
Speaker 2:I did that podcast. It came out during April during Autism Month. Yeah, in fact, I got to be a couple of days before temple grand, like yeah, I got celebrity status I think you know that's on there. If anybody wants to go watch it, it's. It's an interesting little talk we had um, because we decided that she calls herself a pony right, a parent of a neurodivergent individual.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I said I guess I'm a grand pony.
Speaker 3:Oh, that's great. Oh, and how is it being a grandma and everything? Is it wonderful?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, oh, absolutely, absolutely. It really is funny it's what people say about that. You have all the benefits, like all the fun stuff, and you know, and once there's some work to do or cleaning up after everybody, all right, well bye, oh and live here, uh, here in.
Speaker 2:Canada, where I live, I'm like steps to a beach, a really nice beach, and during the summer they have an arcade and all kinds of. So the kids come up and hang out with Nana, like Nana's got a cool house, so that's, that's a fun thing and they're're they're relaxed when they're here with me because I I totally accept them the way they are. Um, they both have their little peculiarities too, you know, and I'm like, yeah, okay, um, whatever, like the uh, my granddaughter they're both 15 now. My granddaughter, she's the quiet one, you know, and very sort of careful about what she says and when she says it. And you know, my grandson is the chatty one he is. It's, it's really interesting, um. So now I don't have anything immediate coming up, though I do have one more podcast to do with, uh, keegan uh, I can't remember his name now because I booked this one a long time ago and he can't do it till August.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I don't remember what I'm doing.
Speaker 3:Oh, that's so nice. It's nice to chat with you and get to know you more. What is one message?
Speaker 2:you hope people read the book might get from it. Um, mainly that if there's somebody who doesn't have a lot of contact with autistic children or adults to be, if they, when they see it, I know what that is and just be a little more accepting of that situation. That was one of the messages I hope that type of person who's reading it, who doesn't really know much about autism, and then for anybody who does, it's sort of a little history for them as to how we got to where we're at, and the ones who are working in the field and working in the agencies and social workers and all of them, well, a little takeaway that, hey, you're appreciated. You know what you do is important, really important, what you do is important, really important. And that, as parents, like anything you can do to help your children's teachers and workers, do it, do whatever you can Offer yourself, say listen, is there anything I can do to help you? And just telling them, just saying listen, I'm so glad you're there, part of the day.
Speaker 2:It makes my day easier kind of thing, absolutely For sure. So that's sort of what I had in mind as I was writing it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, do you have a website we can go to to find the book?
Speaker 2:Yes, it's called my guided pen, so www, my guided pen and um. So there's a bit about the book and you can order it from there. It's available on Amazon Canada as well as regular Amazon, barnes and Noble in the States Indigo Chapters in Canada.
Speaker 3:Is it com? I didn't even think about that. I don't know if Canadian canadian websites have any other, you know?
Speaker 2:different. Well, like amazon is dot ca.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I thought so I thought it was a little bit canadian side of things. Yeah, okay, great. Well, that's wonderful to know for people and, um, the title of the book is the Alien Savant.
Speaker 2:Yep, oops, let me show that, yeah, show us that real quick. There we go. And maybe show us some of the pictures, and that's one of Michael's drawings on the front here. So there's all his pictures and illustrations are all through here, all sorts of ones that he did and describing what he was trying to describe to us. As I said, that's how he used to communicate, because he was non-verbal and they did try to teach him to talk because, uh again, deaf children were not allowed to do sign language.
Speaker 3:oh, I was going to ask you about sign language, but he couldn't even do sign language.
Speaker 2:It wasn't permitted. They wanted all the deaf community to learn to speak, and again it was forced. You can't do that. So when sign language was finally introduced in the 70s and allowed, they started to teach him to do some sign language. Now the problem with Michael. This is where the autism got in the way. He wouldn't maintain eye contact because he didn't like it, so he would do real simple signs that were a concrete, meaning that that was something that you could visually show him. This is the sign for milk, or this is you know, this is the sign for dog.
Speaker 2:Um, so he, he learned those ones, but he couldn't sign a conversation. Yeah, um so he could, he could, just just so. He would use signs and his own gestures, his own made up signs, and then his drawings. If he wanted something from us, he would usually bring it to us as a drawing and he would draw in like a cartoon fashion where each little square would and he would show you this is how it's going to start and this is what I wanted to end up. And or he would cut pictures out of magazines if he wanted a particular thing. He would, um, he would show it to you, bring you a picture and said this is I want this, and he would tell me he wants money yep, I agree, real quick um, but he was.
Speaker 2:He was able to because dad encouraged it for him to go out, as as when he was older, when he was old enough, uh, to go out with his own money and and go out and buy the things he wanted to buy, um, yeah. So he got in trouble, though, though, at one of our dollar stores. He loved the dollar store because he loved gadgets and all that you know, there's so many neat things to look at and but he had this horrible habit of rearranging all their shelves, and because he had to have everything, each thing had to be straight, facing the right way, all fold up, so you know. And they asked him one day to leave, and he wouldn't leave, so they had to call the police, and it was kind of sad because the policeman realized that something was wrong with Michael, so he followed him home, and that's when he said, you know, told my sisters, hey, you know, like, uh, he can't go back in there cause he, you know, he won't behave himself. And I'm like, okay, yeah.
Speaker 3:And what?
Speaker 2:was he doing.
Speaker 3:Come on, let him, let him do it.
Speaker 2:Apparently. Apparently, we found out afterwards that a couple of the employees complained to the manager of the store about him arranging the shelves and he says what? You're mad at him because he's doing your job.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But this is just it you could take, could take, obviously, that's a great talent. If you do want your stock, your shelf stocked, you know, and you can make them understand that's what you want. Hey, he's happy for hours doing that. But this is what I mean about. It's just about being accepting instead of fighting against it. You know, uh, because you're you're not gonna win, uh, because because uh, a lot of the time they can't help it, that they, they can't stop themselves. You know it's yeah and okay. So make it work for you, yeah, or make sure that they know there's a certain time they're allowed to do that and and certain time they're not.
Speaker 3:You know so oh my gosh, it is so true too, oh yeah days of our lives.
Speaker 3:Oh, it's been so great to catch up with you, janet, and I'm so thankful that you worked on this project and put it forth to the community and, you know, allowed us all to kind of take a glimpse of those things and what an important also the history. I think that's a really important part that probably a lot of books don't look at, that, don't shine a light on and highlight that part so that we can really see the contrast of how far we've come and and also know how much work needs to be done all around the world. In some of these other places where you know the, the work is just beginning. So, yeah, true, true, yeah. Thank you so so much for being here and I hope that we can stay in touch.
Speaker 2:I'm sure we will, Sarah. You can always email me with anything interesting you think I need to know.
Speaker 3:Good, good Same here. I appreciate it. I really will. Yeah, thank you so much. This has been a great conversation and I really look forward to staying in touch. Okay, appreciate it. I really will. Yeah, thank you so much. This has been a great conversation and I really look forward to staying in touch.
Speaker 2:Okay, dear.
