Temple Grandin

I finally was able to watch the movie Temple Grandin.  And all I can say is wow.  This movie was so wonderfully done, and I cannot help but think that if it had been in the movie theaters Claire Danes would have given Natalie Portman a serious run for that Oscar. 

 I had heard of Temple Grandin before, I think I first heard her name in a psychology class and knew she was an Autistic women who helped revolutionize sensory therapy for children with special needs.  Then when I worked at the Alcott School I saw the pressure vests she inspired work on many of the children firsthand.

This movie is about Temple Grandin though, her life.  And what an amazing women.  She was born at a time when a diagnosis of Autism usually meant a child was put into an institution and a mother was blamed for being cold and unloving.  There were no therapies or special programs.  Just doctors who said there was no hope for these children.

But, Temple's mother didn't take no future for an answer.  Her mother is just as inspirational as Temple is, in my opinion.  Temple began to speak, went to school, graduated high school, graduated college, and graduated graduate school twice.

In her time at her Aunt's ranch in Arizona she discovered that she could calm herself using the contraption used to contain and soothe cows for inoculations.  She built her own hugging machine and it helped her when she was overwhelmed, and even found that it helped he be more social.  She went onto use this knowledge of how to calm cattle to revolutionize how cattle are led through factories for slaughter.

She now teaches at a university in Colorado and is a role model to many - in the cattle industry and the special education world.  I seriously recommend this movie!