ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Carina Morillo - Autism advocate
Carina Morillo is an advocate for the social inclusion of people with autism.

Why you should listen

Carina Morillo is a founding member and president of Fundación Brincar, a non-profit organization in Argentina that has worked since 2010 for a better quality of life of people with autism and their families.

Morillo started Fundación Brincar -- inspired by her son Ivan, who is currently 16 years old and has autism -- because she strongly believes that although life with autism can be challenging, her family and others like it have the right to be happy. In spite of its high prevalence, most people still don't know what autism is about or how to help someone with autism. The foundation offers support services and training to families and professionals, community awareness programs and art and skills training for children, youth and adults on the autism spectrum. Brincar has trained more than 15,000 professionals and families, and it currently offers support services to more than 3,000 families throughout Argentina. The foundation's free virtual library monthly reaches 400,000 people per month throughout Latin America and Spain. Brincar is also founding member of the Argentina Network of Autism, and has become one of the leading autism references for both families, health professionals and teachers in Argentina and Latin America.

Morillo is actively working on the creation of an adult life platform for living with autism. Like many parents, her main concern is who will take care of her son during his adult life. Around one-third of people with autism remain nonverbal, and one-third have an intellectual disability, requiring 24/7 support throughout their life. Existing facilities and services in Argentina and Latin America are limited to school age, with no residence or occupation solutions for anyone older than 18.

Morillo has been awarded the 2016 US Ambassador in Argentina Entrepreneur Prize and the 2014 Argentine Solidarity Prize. In April 2017, Fundación Brincar was declared of Social Interest by the Congress of the City of Buenos Aires for its open community services. Morillo holds a BS in Business Administration degree of Babson College.

More profile about the speaker
Carina Morillo | Speaker | TED.com

TEDxRiodelaPlata

Carina Morillo: To understand autism, don't look away

Filmed: 2016-10-22

Readability: 2.9

673,429 views

Carina Morillo knew almost nothing about autism when her son Ivan was diagnosed -- only that he didn't speak or respond to words, and that she had to find other ways to connect with him. She shares how she learned to help her son thrive by being curious along with him. (In Spanish with English subtitles)

Carina Morillo - Autism advocate
Carina Morillo is an advocate for the social inclusion of people with autism. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:13

"Look at me!"

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That phrase turned me
into an eye-contact coach.

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I'm the mother of Ivan; he's 15 years old.

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Ivan has autism,

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he doesn't speak,

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and he communicates through an iPad,

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where his whole universe of words
exists in images.

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He was diagnosed
when he was two and a half.

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I still remember that day painfully.

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My husband and I felt really lost;

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we didn't know where to begin.

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There was no internet,

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you couldn't Google information,

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so we made those first steps

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out of sheer intuition.

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Ivan would not maintain eye contact,

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he had lost the words that he did know,

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and he didn't respond to his name
or to anything we asked him,

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as if words were noise.

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The only way I could know

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what was going on with him,

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what he felt,

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was looking him in the eye.

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But that bridge was broken.

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How could I teach him about life?

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When I did things he liked,
he would look at me,

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and we were connected.

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So I dedicated myself
to working with him on those things,

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so we would have more and more
eye-contact moments.

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We would spend hours and hours playing tag
with his older sister, Alexia,

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and when we said: "I caught you!"

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he would look around for us,

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and at that moment,
I could feel he was alive.

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We also hold a record for hours spent
in a swimming pool.

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Ivan always had a passion for water.

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I remember when he was two and a half,

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on a rainy winter day,

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I was taking him to an indoor pool,

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because even on rainy days
we'd go swimming.

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We were on the highway,
and I took the wrong exit.

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He burst into tears and cried
inconsolably, nonstop,

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until I turned back.

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Only then did he calm down.

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How was it possible
that a two and a half year old

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didn't respond to his own name,

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yet in the middle of the rain and fog,
where I couldn't see anything,

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he knew the exact route?

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That's when I realized that Ivan
had an exceptional visual memory,

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and that that would be my way in.

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So I started taking
pictures of everything,

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and teaching him what life was like,

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showing it to him, picture by picture.

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Even now, it's the way Ivan communicates

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what he wants,

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what he needs

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and also what he feels.

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But it wasn't just
Ivan's eye contact that mattered.

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Everyone else's did, too.

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How could I make people see
not only his autism,

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but see him the person

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and everything he can give;

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everything he can do;

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the things he likes and doesn't like,

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just like any one of us?

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But for that, I also had
to give of myself.

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I had to have the strength to let him go,

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which was extremely difficult.

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Ivan was 11 years old,

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and he went for treatment
in a neighborhood near our house.

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One afternoon,
while I was waiting for him,

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I went into a greengrocer,

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a typical neighborhood store
with a little bit of everything.

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While doing the shopping,

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I started talking to Jose, the owner.

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I told him about Ivan,

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that he had autism,

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and that I wanted him to learn
to walk down the street by himself,

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without anyone holding his hand.

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So I decided to ask Jose
if Thursdays around 2pm,

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Ivan could come and help him arrange
the water bottles on the shelves,

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because he loved to organize things.

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And as a reward, he could buy
some chocolate cookies,

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which were his favorite.

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He said "yes" right away.

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So that's how it went for a year:

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Ivan would go to Jose's greengrocer,

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help him arrange the shelves
of water bottles

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with the labels perfectly
lined up on the same side,

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and he would leave happy
with his chocolate cookies.

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Jose is not an expert in autism.

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There is no need to be an expert

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nor do anything heroic to include someone.

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We just need to be there --

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(Applause)

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(Applause ends)

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Really, no heroic deed --

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we simply need to be close.

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And if we are afraid of something

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or we don't understand something,

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we need to ask.

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Let's be curious

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but never indifferent.

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Let's have the courage
to look each other in the eye,

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because by looking,

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we can open a whole world to someone else.

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(Applause)

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(Cheers)

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Carina Morillo - Autism advocate
Carina Morillo is an advocate for the social inclusion of people with autism.

Why you should listen

Carina Morillo is a founding member and president of Fundación Brincar, a non-profit organization in Argentina that has worked since 2010 for a better quality of life of people with autism and their families.

Morillo started Fundación Brincar -- inspired by her son Ivan, who is currently 16 years old and has autism -- because she strongly believes that although life with autism can be challenging, her family and others like it have the right to be happy. In spite of its high prevalence, most people still don't know what autism is about or how to help someone with autism. The foundation offers support services and training to families and professionals, community awareness programs and art and skills training for children, youth and adults on the autism spectrum. Brincar has trained more than 15,000 professionals and families, and it currently offers support services to more than 3,000 families throughout Argentina. The foundation's free virtual library monthly reaches 400,000 people per month throughout Latin America and Spain. Brincar is also founding member of the Argentina Network of Autism, and has become one of the leading autism references for both families, health professionals and teachers in Argentina and Latin America.

Morillo is actively working on the creation of an adult life platform for living with autism. Like many parents, her main concern is who will take care of her son during his adult life. Around one-third of people with autism remain nonverbal, and one-third have an intellectual disability, requiring 24/7 support throughout their life. Existing facilities and services in Argentina and Latin America are limited to school age, with no residence or occupation solutions for anyone older than 18.

Morillo has been awarded the 2016 US Ambassador in Argentina Entrepreneur Prize and the 2014 Argentine Solidarity Prize. In April 2017, Fundación Brincar was declared of Social Interest by the Congress of the City of Buenos Aires for its open community services. Morillo holds a BS in Business Administration degree of Babson College.

More profile about the speaker
Carina Morillo | Speaker | TED.com

THE ORIGINAL VIDEO ON TED.COM

Carina Morillo: To understand autism, don't look away | TED Talk | TED.com