A Mouse that Roars - Standing in Defiance of Autism Speaks

Trauma Trigger Warning for language and ableism

On November 13, 2013, Autism Speaks will unleash the full force of its corporate lobbying budget and political action money on Washington D.C.. Autism Speaks is bombarding the District of Columbia with advertising, showering universities with research funding and overwhelming the locals with overwrought, ableist, tragedy rhetoric in order to fulfill their corporate agenda. Anyone in their way will be crushed underfoot. Any person objecting to or criticizing how they do business will be legally dealt with. Autism Speaks has repeatedly made that point, and it was again made clear when they rescinded a job offer to the mother of an autistic teen who requested reasonable accommodation to care for him during her work day (click here for details on that incident).

Tomorrow, autistic disability rights activist Lydia Brown will face down this bombastic display of corporate wealth and power and try to be heard. She will stand in defiance of Autism Speaks' three day "national policy summit" that excludes the voices of autistic adults who advocate for their peers. I am the mother of one of those "children who will need help all their lives". I am an autism mother. I stand with Lydia Brown in defiance of Autism Speaks. 

Yes, gentle people. I am asking that all of you stand with us against this frightening force lumbering forward with no interest in our families or in autistic people who are growing up and aging. Autism Speaks is inhumanely imposing their idea of what our community needs and attempting to mandate everything from how my son will be housed to funding research that has no real benefit to my son or his peers. Note that no research funding is going to technology that provides more effective augmentative alternative communication devices, when the primary challenge to autistic individuals throughout their lifespan is communication. Assistive technology solutions for autonomous living are not funded by Autism Speaks research money. Mrs. Suzanne Wright refers to autistics as "the autism crisis", dehumanizing them in a most ableist manner. She goes on to equate my son and his peers, who are still very much here as being "missing", a clear reference to the highly offensive "Ransom Notes" campaign launched by New York University discussedhere. Her exact statement in this excerpt from her blog post, entitled Autism Speaks to Washington - A Call for Actionis

"This week is the week America will fully wake up to the autism crisis

If three million children in America one day went missing – what would we as a country do?

If three million children in America one morning fell gravely ill – what would we as a country do?

We would call out the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. We’d call up every member of the National Guard. We’d use every piece of equipment ever made.

We’d leave no stone unturned.

Yet we’ve for the most part lost touch with three million American children, and as a nation we’ve done nothing."

Suzanne Wright

Her entire disturbing post can be read here.

For all those saying that Autism Speaks is understanding neurodiversity, the message is clear that at Autism Speaks, tragedy, ableism, and fear tactics are still the order of the day. My son's challenges are enough without Autism Speaks using them to push their own agenda in his name without his voice in his own affairs. He's not lost. Only Autism Speaks has lost touch with the very autistic people it professes to represent. Autism Speaks has no autistic governing representation of any significance on their board of directors. Please take the time to read Ms. Brown's latest post here.  Read about how autistic adults were treated by people who were participating in the juggernaut Autism Speaks fundraising event machine here when these young autistic activists exercised their right to protest the event. Autistic adults are our children, grown up. Do we want our children to be voiceless and passive, accepting what people who do not understand or care about them decide about their lives? Or do we want to know that they are standing together to defend their own right to speak for themselves and control as much of their own lives as they can?

Autism Speaks promotes ABA thoughtlessly, ignoring documented harmful outcomes like learned helplessness that must be dealt with years after this intervention ends. Parents and autistics of all ages who are capable of self advocacy should be given the right to choose what accommodations, supports, services and help they need. What the wealthy grandparents of an autistic child deem worked for him must not therefore be mandated for all of us. Autism families and autistic adults who don't agree with the way Autism Speaks approaches autism should not be simply subjected to their dictated national policy. No organization has the right to remove my son's right to be heard and mandate whether  and how my son is included in his school and his community.  I will not let Autism Speaks silence my son as he grows up. I will not allow Autism Speaks to usurp my voice as a parent and mandate what it thinks my son needs. Autism Speaks does not have that right.

Autism Speaks has no right to perpetuate policies that leave my son at the mercy of strangers in isolation from his own community, chemically lobotomized because their organization is uncomfortable with his apparent differences and degree of impairment. I look different from people who are white. My nose is wider. I will not narrow it. My skin is darker. I will not lighten it. I am visibly different from Mrs. Suzanne Wright. Should she then speak for what I need because she is in a position to bestow large quantities of money on those who make decisions? I thought this was the United States of America. I can speak for myself and adults with my son's degree of impairment can speak for him, until he can clearly communicate his needs himself. Only someone who knows what road my son will travel as an adult can know what he needs. Sorry that is not someone who is not autistic.

I will stand with Lydia Brown and disability and human rights activists in defiance of the mega nonprofit Autism Speaks.  For those of you who say Autism Speaks has good intentions, I respond that the road to a hellish future for my son and too many of his peers is being paved with their good intentions. We are at the crossroads of a very dangerous turn in the road of nonprofit public policy lobbying. Will this organization dictate the lives of your children? Is the future that you see for your grown son or daughter? A future of poverty and dependence on people paid to care for them after you are gone? Look further. We have the technology to vastly improve the quality of life for my son and his peers. Isn't it sad that the push for assistive technology development for wounded warriors is encouraged but that drive does not exist for our community? We must take a breath, step away from sadness and ask each day how our children will live as independent adults. 

The goal is autonomy. I want the whole American Dream for my son. I want lifetime educational access so he can continue learning until he reaches his highest potential. I want supported employment beyond him pushing a shopping cart. I want him to live on his own in clean, safe, housing beyond poverty. I want him to be an active part of his community. No revamped institutional residential housing is going to be accepted by me for my son. I have seen segregation. That didn't really work out for us people of color at all. We decided that was enough of that. How is that supposed to be ok for my disabled son?

I will be a mouse who roars. Even if I cannot be there in person, I want to be there in spirit, and so today I roar for Lydia Brown, and all those who will stand with her. A friend has a blog with a title that describes the unstoppable force headed Autism Speaks' way tomorrow.  The title is "Small But Kind of Mighty".

Lend your voices to ours, online and in person. Roar for your progeny. Demand more.

Here is my thank you to every brave soul who stands and speaks for my son. In solidarity.

Nothing About My Son Without HIm.

Self Advocacy: Fighting For Understanding, Acknowledgement and Accommodation

When we are future planning for our children, we assume they will get the accommodations mandated by the Americans with Disabilities Act, and that is not always the case. I invited Ondrea to share her recent fight for transit support because the present system uses medical standards to determine eligibility for para-transit support, and this criteria excludes the entire population of individuals who may not have visible impairment, but who still need services like para-transit support to help navigate their communities independently and without harassment. So as Ondrea relates her situation and her determination to fight for the right to ride the Ride para-transit service, we who are parent advocates might take a good hard look at our own communities and see how we can change what eligibility is to gain more autonomy for everyone whose challenges may not be apparent.  Learn more about Ondrea by  clicking here. KC

 By Ondrea Marisa Robinson

The need for services is not easy for anyone with a disability to get, because sometimes the door slams in his/her face when he/she really needs that door open.  The example I am about to give you applies to me:

Image description: RIPTA RIde vehicle #0141
in downtown Providence

I found out that I had to re-apply to receive my ADA, which is the American with Disabilities Act status, in order to ride the RIDE van to and from places in place of managing the transitions for so many buses in order to get from Point A to Point B to Point C. ( I had to get my primary care physician to fill out the medical part as well.)  Once the application was sent in for review, I had to wait a little while before I got a letter in the mail indicating if I was accepted or denied.  The truth is, I did not know I had the ADA after receiving a letter on two different occasions, saying that I was denied.  I was able to actually take the RIDE van to the Autism Project in Johnston, RI, and back home, for free, although I ended up paying $4.00 when I was going there.  (The ADA fee is $4.00 each way although I do have a bus pass.  It makes no sense to me why I have to pay, but that's the rule.)  It seemed like a long time for a letter to be sent, so I decided to call RIPTA and ask what was the status of my application was.

RIPTA Gillig #0517 buspicks up customers
on the #51 line at Kennedy Plaza.

I was told I was denied, because the primary care physician had checked that I was able to take the bus independently and that I did not need an escort.  I can get to and from a bus stop.  I can climb the railings just fine.  I can understand directions.  I won't deny all that, because it is true.  However, I get anxious at times when the bus is crowded, and sometimes it is not pleasant, either, when I have to deal with some people who just say some inappropriate things.  It is bad enough I have to take three buses to get to destinations like Providence or Johnston.  I tried to tell the customer service representative that anxiousness and multiple changes of buses were the issues, but she was going by what the primary care physician said (although I will not deny it).  To me, that's clueless, because if those two ladies were in my shoes, they would know how it feels to have autism.  Having autism related sensory issues and being anxious is challenge enough to have the reasonable accommodation the RIDE van service provides.

It's not fair that I have to be denied, but I'm going to do everything that I can to fight this, and I will not do it alone.  But I must remember I'm not the only one who is going through a situation like this.  Despite what's going on, I'm going to keep on smiling and let God do His work.



Images source: Wikipedia.

Written Testimony Before the U.S. House Committee on Oversight & Government Reform

U.S. HouseCommittee on Oversight & Government Reform

TESTIMONY OF MRS. KERIMA CEVIK, MOTHER OF MUSTAFA NURI CEVIK

Regarding  The Federal Response To Rising Rates ofAutism

November 30, 2012

Main Concerns:

• Re-aligning funding to remove the racial, ethnic, gender and income disparities in access to accurate diagnosis, lifespan supports and services
•  Distributing research funding to increase research in assistive technology supports, quality of service provision, and directly addressing the needs of Autistic individuals and care providing families throughout their lifespan
• The importance of the Olmstead decision for my son and those like him
• Medicaid will be important to my son; continued federal governance is needed

Thank you, Chairman Issa, Ranking Member Cummings and esteemed Members of the Committee, for allowing me to share my family’s concerns and Autism experiences with you.

My name is Kerima Cevik.  I am a resident of Prince George’s County, Maryland and mother to Mustafa Cevik, affectionately known as Mumu, a wonderful 10-year-old boy with multiple intellectual disabilities. When our son was four, we took him to the Kennedy Krieger Institute for evaluation. After three years and four pediatricians telling us “let’s wait and see, maybe he’ll speak” our son was given a grim diagnosis that included the labels “low functioning” and “nonverbal Autism”.  We were told that our son would never speak; he’d never improve, that he would always need help with all his basic needs.  We were also told there was nothing we could do to improve our son’s situation. Then we were left to absorb this harsh reality about our child.

Since his diagnosis, we have seen our boy repeatedly surprise the experts. We videotaped our child doing things we were told he did not have the cognition to do. The team at Kennedy Krieger realized our son was capable of learning and retaining what he learned. He was in fact, not as he appeared. We were told we were at the bottom of the developmental mountain with our son. But he showed them differently. What we’ve learned about our son is that he has the ability to achieve whatever he goal he sets for himself despite the severity of his disabilities. And each developmental roadblock he passes drives us to fight that much harder for his right to respect, acceptance, literacy, and his right to gain the intensive supports he needs to help him be as independent as possible throughout his lifespan.

Our son is very brave. He has survived abuse and neglect in school. He steps outside each day to a world where he is gaped at and made the object of ridicule. I am a woman of color, what our government has labeled “Black of Hispanic origin”. So I know what discrimination is. I cannot explain why this hate exists to my son. He senses it however. He faces racism and ableism patient and unfazed, because he knows he is loved and accepted at home. He has made great strides despite not being allowed to benefit from the treatments and therapies that are supposed to be available at his school and in his community.

My son’s story is not unusual for special needs children in families with racial and ethnic differences. So I was disappointed when I heard a medical professional testifying that late diagnosis and disparity of care were the result of episodic medical visits to pediatricians by minority families.  Racial bias in health care and education is well known and I expected that to be addressed by witnesses at this hearing and it was not. I am respectfully requesting the committee invite witnesses from a broad demographic, who might be able to give testimony about the experience of racial, ethnic, and gender differences and how this directly impacts supports and services for Autistic individuals who are also minorities or women.

It angered me to hear some of the testimony at the hearing because our son is our pride and joy. He is an amazing human being. His strength of will alone is humbling. Is it easy to not work outside the home in order to teach and care for him? It is a great deal easier than what my son deals with each day of his existence. And yet he gets up and jumps into life with all the joy the rest of us may sometimes lack. He deserves better than being called a burden.  He is not a “damaged child”. Autism did not take our son away; our son is Autistic and is learning to meet and master his challenges. I cannot get up in the morning and remove my dark skin; I expect the world to accept me as I am, because my skin looks good on me. While the devastating historical attacks on the self-image of dark skinned people have created a market for skin-lightening treatments, “curing” my dark skin is not the answer. Nor can my son’s brain be removed from his body; it is part of who he is. The answer then, is to accept him as he is, and help him meet the challenges his neurology might present him. The Autistic ability to persevere is giving him the will to work to master skills many of us take for granted. And if funding is balanced and distributed in such a way that my son and all those waiting for services are given the supports and accommodation needed to be fully contributing members of society they will not disappoint. Our son’s continuing story is proof that motivation, will, and courage are the ingredients of successful people.

Funding for Services and Supports

Research is a fine thing and I support it; but our son and his peers will not benefit from any research currently being done because this research is not in areas such as better learning approaches, life skill acquisition, Autism specific healthcare and more efficient and affordable assistive technology. There is very little research on the health profiles of individuals on the Autism spectrum. And what caused my son’s brain to be wired differently and whose fault it may be is probably the least urgent of the questions he needs answered. Autism’s primary challenge is communication, and yet no research dollars are invested in assistive technology and education strategies to maximize literacy in nonspeaking Autistics. I fought to get a single assistive technology evaluation and this evaluation resulted in the professional opinion that our son could use an iPad and TouchChat App as an affordable speech device. He is learning to use it now. This single event could change the entire quality of our son’s life. We must somehow afford a second iPad device and the software to have on hand as a backup communication device should his present device be damaged. Families are borrowing money, fundraising, trying to do anything they can to get the equipment they need for their loved ones to communicate. Imagine how we feel when we are told that funding for iPads and iPod as AAC devices is not approved but funding for a $10,000 dynavox device and the requisite supports and equipment needed to make using it feasible is. If the funding spent on awareness campaigns was spent on iPads the impact on the %25 of the Autistic population that needs communication support and literacy would be life changing. Where funding goes and how it is used in our community concerns us.

Because our son is learning to use an iPad speech device, someday he might be able to testify about his needs directly before your committee. Many older children and adults on the Autism spectrum who do not have verbal speech are erroneously labeled “low functioning” and thought to be incapable of learning. We were told our son would always have the mental age of a 6 month old. His life is changing because we ceased listening to what he could not do and began focusing on what he could.  Shouldn’t more than 2% of funding go to helping our children and Adults on the spectrum become more independent? Much of the aggression associated with some Autistic nonspeaking children and Adults resolves itself when these individuals are given a means to communicate. Yet research is lacking on Autism and literacy.

The Olmstead Decision

When our son was first diagnosed, we were told that at some near future date, we would be placing him in an institution. If you are a parent, probably one of the most horrific things you could be told is that it might be a good idea to institutionalize your toddler. I am so glad we did not heed that advice but instead sought support from the Kennedy Krieger Institute and other resources to help our son. He has made greater improvement at home and in his community. While many of his peers are on medications to reduce anxiety and regulate sleep, he is medication free and is receiving professional help to manage the overwhelming sensory input he deals with daily without medication. Unfortunately life in institutions often came with medication used for chemical restraint, and for many of developmentally disabled children heartbreaking abuse and neglect. Funding for community-based care allows families like ours to be educated care providers and our children to live in whatever degree of independence they can. Whenever a vulnerable population is made to be dependent on an institutional style care setting the risk rises for abuse. The Olmstead decision has saved the lives of hundreds of disabled children and adults and is creating environments that allow us to see our children in our schools and communities and not shut away and harmed. The benefit of my son being out and about in his wheelchair is that his is accepted in his community. Our son is an active part of his community everywhere typical children are. The only way to end the maltreatment of developmentally disabled children and adults is to end segregating them. The idea of our son, after having come so far, being forced to live in prison-like conditions because he is disabled is horrific to me. The federal role in assuring that our son and all those like him are not imprisoned in the guise of providing housing supports because they are in the profoundly disabled category is critical.

A final concern about Medicaid Funding

Although our son is not currently a Medicaid recipient, his degree of disability dictates that at some future date he will be. Many of his disabled peers are able to have the critical medical support services they need through Medicaid. Please do not reduce the role of the Federal government in Medicaid services.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Ruby Bridges, Norman Rockwell, Self-Advocacy and Allies

Adapted from My Presentation for Autistic Empowerment, The Civil Rights Model

We parents are inoculated with fear and ableism from the moment we hear the diagnosis of autism, thanks to the way most professionals present this news to us. Probably the biggest detriment to autism parent advocacy has been the inability to move out of "reactive advocacy," a type of guilt-driven ripple effect of all the fears and suppositions indoctrinated into us on the day our children are diagnosed and at every instant, our divergent children's needs intersect with the systems meant to try and meet them. This is the legacy of the culture of hopelessness and learned helplessness that goes hand in hand with the medical model of autism. This mental state is damaging to us, our families, and our divergent children. It is also emotionally unsustainable. In order to be successful parent advocates to our children, we must not usurp their civil rights ourselves. We must assist them to self-advocate and fight for them to gain a seat at any table where decisions are being made about them.

For those who say that young neurodivergent children like my son, who is deeply autistic and nonspeaking, are incapable of self-advocacy and self-determination, I quote Kassiane Sibley, who says, “ advocacy begins with No!” “No!” does not require oral language. It can be stated in action and communicated non-verbally. If my being an autistic parent and saying my son is quite neurodivergent, but I must presume he is competent to seem incongruous, I can say that it is not.

I hold these views naturally. I am labeled as a member of five minority groups. My little brother, my older sister, and I were the first three Black students to integrate an all-white elementary school in Illinois. We suffered hardship and maltreatment at a time and circumstance when racist attempts to stop the desegregation of schools continued. But we stood our ground. To stand your ground as a child is hard. It is a lonely business. But it makes you a stronger person. I want my son to stand his ground; therefore, he must see his mother standing up for him, standing by him, and by these actions, I must make it clear I respect him. I want him to instinctively self-advocate before all else. I want him to know and remember children who had to self-advocate and rose to the challenge. Children like  Ruby Bridges.

U.S. Marshals escort Ruby Bridges from school photo credit
unknown 

In 1960, when Ruby Bridges was 6 years old, her parents responded to a call from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and volunteered her to participate in the integration of the New Orleans School system. She is known as the first African-American child to attend an all-white elementary school in the South. She attended William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans. When Ruby Bridges walked to school each day, she was pelted with rotten tomatoes; she walked past racial slurs and foul language painted in graffiti on the walls around her; crowds shrieked threats to torture and kill her and her family. Armed federal marshals, at the order of President Eisenhower, brought Ruby to and from school each day. Her mother could not take this walk past a certain point with Ruby. She had to do it alone. She kept her head up and did not cry. At six, she was a self-advocate of circumstance, as I was in my time and my son is now. Hearing of Ruby's courage in doing this, Norman Rockwell made a life-changing decision. He did not renew his contract with the Saturday Evening Post. Instead, he signed a contract with Look magazine, which allowed him the freedom to paint whatever he wished, and he began with this painting, which tells the story of Ruby Bridges and her brave walks to school. His painting, entitled, The Problem We All Live With, became an iconic image of the civil rights movement in the United States. This painting is the symbol of Rockwell beginning to express his views through his art, after which he began civil rights and justice themes. Norman Rockwell crossed a line. He began to use his position of privilege and his artistic talent to support the cause of a group he was not a member of but whose efforts toward social justice he supported. He took steps towards becoming a civil rights ally. What do autistic disability rights advocates mean when they say the word ally? I have a brief checklist, adapted from the original by Dr. John Raible, that might give some insight into what it does and doesn’t mean to be an ally. I have made some modifications so the list might be used to clarify what an anti-ableist ally is.

I envision the future of autism parent advocacy as the continuing process of acceptance of our own children as they are, preparing them to be self-advocates who can be as strong as Ruby Bridges was and continues to be. I hope to see parents leaving the realm of fear-based reactive advocacy and joining neurodivergent advocates to produce inclusive, proactive ones. Collaborative change that truly benefits autistic people throughout their lifespan. I see the brave autistic civil rights activists of today leading the way for our generation of children’s voices to be heard, and I am relieved that someone like my son echoes his voice. I am proud to stand with him in this fight and know what my role is in it.

"Nothing about my son without my son"

About the Autism Dialogues

Welcome to my blog. It is new. I started it this summer. I am not a writer. My grammar is atrocious.  But I am representative of a demographic of parents who are underrepresented in the autism conversation. I wanted to try and reflect that feeling of being outside of discourse and public policy. I also want to infuse a kind of hope. Hope that, in the long run,  painful as such dialogs may be, they have the potential to change the quality of life for both our children and the only adults who truly understand what it means to be autistic.

Shannon Des Roches Rosa moderated a series of dialogs on The Thinking Person's Guide to Autism. But as I read each day's dialog, I felt outside the conversation. No one appeared to speak from the perspective of my community of parents.

Now I've had a change of heart. I think Kristina Chew and Paula Durbin-Westby wrote eloquently from the perspective of parents in a way other parents in my situation can understand. I am someone who has gone out in search of autistic adults who are nonspeaking like my son, in the hopes that listening to them might give me an insight into how to best help my son. I am also quite painfully familiar with the uglier side of discrimination both as a matter of daily life and as my son’s parent and advocate.

My son will be an adult in the blink of an eye. So I must try to understand self-advocates as much as I can and I hope my son is someday able to advocate for himself. If he can’t do so, I must continue to be his voice. My daughter is a medical interpreter. When you interpret you are the voice of another person. You don’t say what you want or what you think is best for the patient. You translate verbatim as much as linguistically possible. That is what my goal is should he not be able to self-advocate. To be an interpreter for my son.

At some point everyone in this community must grasp that we are part of an effort to gain civil rights for our autistic children. To parents like me, who are not autistic, don't give up. Keep reading. I'm trying too. I'm determined to cross that divide with you.

Two Autism Stories

Several years ago, I attended a meeting of parents and care providers to discuss the lack of county services available for their loved ones on the autism spectrum. At the meeting, an African American medical professional told me something that still gives me pause: "Autism is a disability for the rich," she said. “Only the wealthy can afford the costs of the intensive early interventions we as parents need to help our children succeed." She continued, “As African Americans, we are disproportionately caring for our children on the spectrum as single parents, with limited means, and are dependent on institutions like our public schools to give whatever supports they can."

As I continue my three year fight for appropriate supports for my own child, I ask myself each day, “Was my acquaintance correct? No matter how diligently I try, no matter the effort I make, will I be unable to provide my own child with the help he needs because of financial and racial disparities?”

Two stories show this disparity of care, resources, and options in a way that leaves me with heartbreaking concern. A Journey into the World of Autism is a series of photographs with commentary, about an against all odds, full on battle for the dignity and civil rights of a 14 year old African American boy, Daniel Tuttle Jr. Daniel was given a diagnosis of autism when he was 2 years old. He never received early interventions or any support services. His battle for services is still being fought by a woman who is not his mother. She was his first daycare provider as an infant; when she heard Daniel's mother was out of work and overwhelmed trying to manage his care, she did not hesitate to go through the process of becoming his care provider.

Autism Lives Daily in Our House briefly outlines the story of Jack Drinkwine, a white child diagnosed with autism who is receiving intensive interventions and supports. He has teams of medical and educational professionals working with him to improve his ability to navigate his world. Jack's mother, a university professor, discusses the combination of therapies and supports paid for by a combination of funding that Daniel Tuttle's care provider could never hope to achieve.
Daniels is homeschooled and sent to a speech therapist. Daniel's only other therapy, administered by his care provider, is a GFCF diet and the basic set of the shoebox task system, the foundational exercises in the TEACCH method. Daniel's care provider continues to try to place him in a safe educational environment where he is able to adapt to the classroom and receive at least minimal services and supports. Meanwhile, Professor Drinkwine advises other parents to acquire the intensive interventions for their children that she has, never considering that many parents and care providers do not have the resources available to them that a family with two working parents- a university professor and a high ranking military officer- does.

Is this disparity of service placing African American children on the spectrum at risk for more confrontations with aversive behavioral management techniques, fewer educational and therapeutic supports and a greater risk for either institutional care or catastrophic encounters with the criminal justice system as adults? It is a chilling thought for me as I look at my dark skin and my deeply autistic son.


Please read both articles and let me know what you think:

A Journey Into The World of Autism
Autism Lives Daily in Our House

More on Daniel Tuttle Jr. from DC & NYC Photographer Eli Meir Kaplan:
Against the Odds