Research Article Open Access Volume 4 • Issue 3 • 1000166 J Ment Disord Treat, an open access journal ISSN: 2471-271X Open Access Research Article Journal of Mental Disorders and Treatment J o u r n a l o f M e n t a l D i s o r d e r s & T r e a t m e n t ISSN: 2471-271X Agyekum, J Ment Disord Treat 2018, 4:3 DOI: 10.4172/2471-271X.1000166 *Corresponding author: Agyekum HA, Department Geography and Resource Development Psychology, University of Ghana, Ghana, Tel: 233505517635; E-mail: haagyekum1@gmail.com Received August 02, 2018; Accepted August 08, 2018; Published August 16, 2018 Citation: Agyekum HA (2018) Challenges and Coping Strategies for Parents with Autistic Children. J Ment Disord Treat 4: 166. doi:10.4172/2471-271X.1000166 Copyright: © 2018 Agyekum HA. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Challenges and Coping Strategies for Parents with Autistic Children Agyekum HA* Department Geography and Resource Development Psychology, University of Ghana, Ghana Abstract Studies so far look at the causes and cure for autism, however, little work has been done on the challenges parents of these children face in their upbringing. This study brought out the challenges that parents with autistic children face as well as the coping mechanisms these parents adopt in their quest to cater for their children. Semi structured interviews were used as a form of data collection. Prominent themes the study highlights is the challenges of parents, which was associated with the inability of the parents to have meaningful conversations with their children, the fnancial burden of taking care of them, stigmatization of their autistic children as well as themselves, and the demandingness of the autistic children. With these problems, parents in the study adapted to their situation by accepting the situation of their wards, depending on God for strength, receiving support and encouragement from some family members and friends, joining support groups, as well as taking leave from work to help their children seek proper medical care. Knowing the challenges parents with children with autism face would constitute grounds for support to be given to them by professionals. If the challenges the parents are going through are clearly spelt out, therapists who deal with the families of children with this disorder will know the type of treatments to provide, even if it has not been asked for. Aside helping therapeutic professionals, the fndings will also inform the teachers at special schools as to how to draw their curriculum to meet the needs of the autistic children. Tis goes to show that the fndings of this work will make meaningful contributions to policy making, research and practice. Te aim of this study is therefore to fnd out the challenges and coping strategies adopted by parents with autistic children. Methods Te current study is designed to have a qualitative background, using the phenomenological approach. Tis research design was selected to assist the researcher get a better understanding of the experiences faced by parents of children with ASD and also help in gaining the opportunity to observe the nonverbal cues, aside the spoken word from the interviews that were conducted. Te study was conducted in the Greater Accra region of Ghana. Majority of the research work was done at PACID, an institution for parents who have children with disabilities and certain parts of Accra. A total number of ten parents were interviewed for the purpose of this research. To ensure gender representation, the researcher interviewed two male parents and seven female parents. One of the participants was a sister who was taking care of her brother who had autism. Tere were variations in occupation, which included both the formal and informal sectors of the Ghanaian economy. Most of the Keywords: Autistic children; Coping strategies Introduction Autism Spectrum Disorder is a very common developmental disability which occurs in 1 out of 110 children over the world [1]. Te term has been defned by Bolte [2] as “a neurodevelopmental disorder persisting defcits in social interaction across multiple contexts, alongside restricted, repetitive patterns, interests, or activities as manifested by at least two prototypically infexible behaviors.” Due to its similarity with other disorders like Asperger Syndrome, Atypical Autism and Disintegrative Disorder, the term was changed from Autism to Autism Spectrum Disorder [3]. Tere is no exact cause for autism [1,3] however, there are speculations of it being caused either genetically or by environmental factors [3]. In a similar vein, there is no known cure for the disability [1,4], there is therefore the need for early therapeutic treatment [1]. Parents with autistic children daily go through challenges. Tese challenges may be the inability of the children to fend for themselves, the child’s educational challenges and the stigma and stereotypes that comes with having a child with Autism Spectrum Disorder. At the age of two, most children should be toilet trained; however, this is not the case with children living with autism. At that age they would still have to be assisted in almost every facet of their lives. It makes it very stressful for their caretakers especially their mothers [5]. Although the symptoms of autism tend to last for a long period of time, it is stated that, it is more difcult for the parents to take care of the child when he is younger [6] or when the child is a toddler [7]. Stigma and stereotyping is a very common issue for parents with children with autism. Te mere fact that parents have a child with that condition is a very hard thing to accept and the situation is made worse when the society instead of giving a helping hand stigmatize you. McCabe [8] is of the view that stigma is a major challenge of parents with children with autism. Tis stigma is heightened by the embarrassing comments that people make when they frst realize a parent has a child with that condition [9]. Even though, all these challenges are faced by parents with autistic children, much work has not been done in Ghana to ascertain the particular problems that these parents are facing. With this, there is the need for a research work that will look at the challenges that parents with autistic children in Greater Accra, the capital city of Ghana go through in their daily lives.