Question for parents about bullying...

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As I read through this forum, a common theme that keeps being mentioned is the AS child being bullied (more than other kids). My 14 y/o son (who has not been formally diagnosed with AS, but exhibits the symptoms) constantly complains of being bullied in school. I have spoken with all of his teachers and none of them are aware of the problem. When I ask my son questions to try to understand what exactly happened, he offers a confusing, non-specific, circular explanation that I can't usually make sense of. It leaves me befuddled and wondering if he's really being picked on, or just misinterpreting the behavior of the other children. He has always been very helpless in fixing problems and, if he has a disagreement with a friend, he is convinced that his friend hates him. For the life of me, I can't figure out why he would be consistently targeted by bullies, but this has been the case in more than one school.

Can anyone share your experiences with childhood bullying of your AS son or daughter?

thanks for the insights!

This one is for the books...at the beginning of the year, my daughter ran off the bus and was ballistic, she said something terrible happened to her on the bus, and she would not talk about it. She was clearly having a meltdown, and it was awful for her. She settled down , and she said that 3 bigger kids (she is 17) were showing her explicit pictures on a cellphone, and mocking her for not wanting to see them. They took her bookbag and called her names..Oh, it was so tramatic, they were laughing at her...I called the school right away and explained what happened, along with info about each of the kids suspected..I had a sheriff come to the home to make a report of harassment, since it was sexual harrassment. This sherriff was as intimidating as they come, and he knew my sister, so he took this case seriously. He went to each of the teen's homes, spoke with them and their parents, had to show the cellphone pics to the kid's parents...I never heard from the school again about this, but the kids were taken off the bus permanently. A few months ago, I received a letter from the Common Pleas Court. The judge had ruled this case , and made the kid responsible write my daughter a very apologetic letter, stating how sorry he was to have done what he did to her.... Who knew anything would come of this? The school wrote it off, but the sheriff made it a point to take it to the higher authorities.....There will always be kids who will bother our children, but we as parents have the right to protect them from harm...

My 16 yr.old (S) was bullied for most of his school years. These were the same kids that he had been friends with from gr.1 to gr.3 and suddenly he didn't fit anymore. I took a cautious approach because I didn't know what to do, I didn't want it to become worse. He was bullied because he was different (I didn't know about AS then), he was gifted so teachers liked him, he was smaller than the other kids, and he was gentle. I went to the principal at the time and nothing changed. A new principal came in gr. 6 and he put a stop to it. He blasted the teacher that year for saying S needed to try to fit better and he blasted the kids. The bullying also took place outside of the school and I finally called all of the children's parents. I saw the boys one day and told them that if they bothered S again, I would find them and make them sorry they had ever been mean to him. I also told them that if they went home and tattled to Mommy I would contact the police and tell them everything. None of them did and not one of them bothered S again. They were also very nice to my other 2 boys T1 and T2. I know it was a bad idea but I was grasping at straws and meant what I said.
T2 was bullied last year. He is AS, as well and is only 1 year younger than T1. T1's friends were very mean. When we got the AS dx. T1 told his friends what T2 has AS, what it is and told them that they could not be his friend if they were going to dis his brother. He lost some. I told the school that if there is any bullying, EVER, to either one of the boys I will have the police join me in talking to the kids and their parents.
It is hard but you have to be a bit of a bully yourself. You have to take a zero tolerance, firm stance with the school. Go to the administration, not the teacher and if they try to tell you they don't know anything, refuse to stand down. The behaviour of bullied children does not lie.

Blessed Mom, Right on MOM!! We do whatever we have to do to protect our kids.

As far as the the situation with the friend,I believe this is part of the all or nothing ,black and white thinking that is common in AS.It does not negate his perception that he is being picked on...Nor does his inability to tell you specific incidents...when you are in the middle of it...you are busy trying to process a confussing situation and try and think of the best possible response,not trying to memorise the words or actions(and the non verbal behavior...you may know that there is something "negative" going on but have no word to describe....aggressive body posture or smirking and teasing voice intonation)Not being able to communicate is not the same as not experiencing.

I think there are some socio-paths who are very good at being more subtle in their abuse.....You may not understanding what they are saying....but you know it is negative because after the person says something and the other kids...stare,point or laugh.
I hope this doesnt sound "preachy".....I just know it was almost impossible to relate my "peer-experiences" to my mother in a way that made sense to her.

Rushfanatic, Awesome job yourself!! (Applause)

My son is autistic, so we have speech and language barriers to deal with, even though he is "age appropriate" and in a regular classroom all day. My son was showing signs of being bullied too and led me to write a thread about it here. I'm slowing figuring out just what the problem is and it's more that my son is totally misinterpreting what he's hearing. In fact, he might be "bullying" them. Not in a power struggle but in that relentless, obsessive "I'm right, you're wrong" manner.
The problem was that my son needed some direction from the aides or special ed teacher, to help him play or otherwise destress during recess. They weren't and it was developing into a sensory overload and behavior issue. This coincided with arguments with a particular set of kids.
The best bet is to ask leading questions to find out why your child is distressed and perhaps sneak in unannounced at school. Your best bet is to find a way to watch your child during recess/breaks and not be seen yourself.
It could be bullying, it could be sensory overload, it could be a communication barrier. It could be a combination of stuff.

I wish I understood it myself. I'm just lucky my husband is here to help protect our kids from this sort of thing. As much as I was teased myself, daily at school for years, I still cannot understand what would drive someone like that and what can possibly be done.

I try to think what to tell my children to help them understand that teasing is the refuge of the weak-minded and poor of spirit as they attempt to fill their empty spaces with the pain of others, but a child sees only that they were minding their own business when someone for no reason came up and did something mean. This confusion and feeling of helplessness begets anger. I still haven't lost all of mine at age 34.

I would have had even more if my mom hadn't supported me in one case... thought my family seldom did anything to help me. I felt very much alone, forced to go to a place I hated by people who would do nothing to help me but tell me to ignore my persecuters. What goes farthest is being your child's champion. Don't let them fight it alone. Weak and frightened creatures fight back with whatever they have. I suppose that's why they target him. Too much of this world encourages killer instinct... instead of gentility.

my son was bullied horribly for years. too many incidents to mention them all. one that really sticks out in my mind was the one that got him dx-ed..........he had gone away to scout camp for a week~you think he'd be free from bullying there, huh ? at any rate, he was working on his music badge, and therefore brought his saxophone. 3 other boys thought it would be funny to put bugs and cereal into his saxophone without telling him, and ask him to play it............he had, what i was told later, a severe meltdown and refused to come out of his cabin. he kept stating over and over that he just wanted to die because he had no friends and no one liked him.............the suicide statement was what brought us to a psych which started us on the long road towards a dx.

That is so similar to what happened to my son. He was so bullied at school and he didn't tell us. Then on vacation we fournd money had gone missing, then he threatened suicide. He sank into a deep depression with many threats of suicide, then anorexia, agression, insomnia and self harm. We now have a sort of diagnosis of AS or AS like symptoms( 2 docs can't agree). To me he clearly without a doubt has Aspergers. We are living a nightmare.
We have since found out about the many times he was bullied and have complained to the school but they deny everything and the lies that the teachers have told to cover their backs are shocking. My son has been blamed for difficult behaviour, whilst the bullies have got off with barely a telling off.
The future seems pretty bleak to me. The stress on the entire family is dreadful. I could do with hearing that people get through this and that it will improve.
I also find it so hard to undestand why we neve saw any symptoms of autism when he was younger. I feel we should have noticed something but he was so bright and fitted in. How can AS just arrive in the teenage years?

Kitts22~ things do get better............we are a million miles away from where we started ! with ALOT of therapy and effective meds for the depression, son is doing so much better...........there were a few bleak years, though. Son didn't get dx-ed until he was 13. he flew under the radar, so to speak for many years. teachers, and us, wrote off alot of his behaviors as being "eccentric and highly intelligent". we've found most teachers don't have a clue what aspergers is, and therefore don't even know what to be looking for............i had one teacher haul us in for our daughter when she was in Kindergarten because the teacher was concerned that our daughter put her hands over her ears every time the classroom got loud~ gee, its a shame she wouldn't even consider that my daughter has sensitive ears...or might have aspergers............we were told that in abusive homes children often do this.