It's been such a hard day for us. New to boards. Need help

Post Reply New Topic

In which case, both what aann and Chronos said is true: the child was unable to offer sufficient information to the parent as to what was going on, even though what he said was literally true.

Chronos, you made yourself clear - but what I meant was that there are many AS kids who are not ADHD but are impulsive. It isn't excluded from the criterion. I think the DSM criterion is fairly narrow in it's view of AS, for instance, it doesn't include many of the issues I hear both parents and posters on the spectrum bring up: e.g. sensory issues, motor skills, and it doesn't mention meltdowns at all.

I found the DSM-IV criterion here: http://www.dsm5.org/ProposedRevisions/P ... px?rid=97#

ChristineL, I re-read you postings and some things come to mind. About your son blaming his dad, you say he is strict,. That may be confusing to your son. Calm, peaceful, and firm - yes. But there may be many things your husband, a NT, will think is normal fatherly parenting, but your son will react strongly to. It seems that most of what my Aspie son does "wrong" he doesn't see as wrong. It's either out of his control or is in reaction to sensitivities or he just doesn't understand. Therefore, any strictness or punishment will be seen as harsh to him.

I have learned tons from Tracker's free online book, (maybe someone already recommended this): http://www.asdstuff.com/Strange%20Kid.pdf

I hope this helps.

I'd often find myself tired at school only to perk up when I got home. People tend to get tired when they are doing boring, stressful activities, yet at the same time, could possibly stay up as long as 24 hours if they were doing something more enjoyable and relaxing.

A great place to start will be Tracker's book, as others recommended.

After that, a few things to note:

Drugs don't do anything with AS itself, although they can help with related conditions. If they aren't working, then your child may not have the indicated condition.

Number 1 in our family has been looking for and eliminating the environmental stress factors. There is so much in the world of an AS child that is like constant nails on a chalkboard. Can you be your best self when someone is doing that? No. Neither can they. But the problem is, they can be highly bothered by things you and I dismiss, and even by things they are attracted to. For a while my son was deathly afraid of automatic toilets, and some here have talked about the noise of heating systems as being awful. You really have to hunt here, for the sensory factors and then, also, the situational factors. My son loved busy places, but it turns out he can't handle them. Watch for the patterns. Listen to your child and take him seriously.

Understand that most AS kids need some repetitive and physical behavior to self-calm. Commonly called stims, these can be annoying to parents and we often try to get our kids to reign them in, but that is actually counter-productive. You child NEEDS these actions. Whether it be chewing his shirts, rapping his fingers, pacing up and over the furniture - - -please make home the "free" space, where he can release his stresses in these self-calming actions. Yes, teach him time and place so that he can learn to behave acceptably in public, but relax the rules at home. It made such a HUGE, HUGE difference to our family once we figured that out. My child is a pacer, up and over and into the furniture, and a chewer. I had to pick between a beautiful home with a child that melts down frequently, or a worn out home (that pacing of his is destructive) and a happy child that rarely melts down. I picked the later and have no regrets.

100% true. I couldn't stand buzzing smoke detectors as a kid, to the point where I couldn't even bear to look at PACKAGED ones on store shelves.



Even as an adult, I need this. Home needs to be a "haven" where I can be myself and not have to "act."

I hope things are going better for you and him. Have a Merry Christmas.

He has a limited reserve set aside for socializing, and it's a very small one, and he didn't want to exhaust it. He got there. It was really hard and not beneficial in the least. It had already drained his entire reserve of energy for social situations. But being there, he had to burn something, so he was refilling the reserve with equal parts mental energy, physical energy and life force, converting them to social energy by way of a moneychanger who charges a 90% fee on all transactions. He intentionally gave up, stopped pouring himself into a doomed venture, and let whatever would happen happen. And the meltdown that was brewing under the surface came out.

Away from it, he asked for time to do something relaxing and fun.

Actually, right now I want to slap my grandma, who just came in the room and asked me questions like "can I get you some tuna and crackers?" I adore her, she's wonderful. Now that she's out of the room again I'm smiling and perky, but this morning I spent hours at a restaurant with people I didn't know. In the car on the way home I wasn't even sitting up straight. I wanted to read the Bible but I was too tired to even position the book in front of my face. When asked questions I was monosyllabic. Inside I was very close to a meltdown (still am; if someone else comes in here and says anything I am going to have one). She and my mom kept talking in the car. Grandma doesn't even know about my auditory processing problems, but Mom does, but anyway, all that really matters is they were talking, talking, talking, and every single syllable was so painful, so painful, so painful.

But if you could see me now while I'm alone and posting on WP without the fact of your mere presence altering my behavior, you wouldn't know that. Right now you'd see me looking calm. Before I was interrupted (I'm going to be a long time in recovering fully), you would have seen me occasionally pacing, and you would have seen how I moved quickly and happily with a spring in my step.

But you wouldn't really see that, because if you came in I'd run upstairs to my room and have a meltdown. It's going to happen soon anyway.

Okay, now I just paced for a few minutes, and I look happy, feel happy, and will have a meltdown the next time I have to interact with:
A. A familiar person for more than a minute
B. An unfamiliar person at all for any length of time

Right now, I wish I'd thought to bring my PSP with me so I could go play it in bed. But that's not what my posture says. My posture says "I'm relaxed and happy and receptive to interaction with you " and if you trust my posture I will suffer immensely. But I am happy and relaxed. It's very, very precarious, but I am.

Oh, and I agree with Janissy.

Chronos wrote: He should be seen by a child psychologist who specializes in children with AS. Most child psychologists only know techniques applicable to children not on the spectrum, and most of these techniques don't work with children with AS.

Can anybody tell me what therapy techniques are applicable to spectrum kids and which are not? I know that all assisted living homes say they "specialize" in Alzhiemers so it's hard to find which ones actually do. Same is probably true w/ therapists and AS.

DandelionFireworks, reading of your experiences is very helpful for a more complete understanding. Thanks!

aann, use your child's behavior as an indicator. If he's terrified and running away or crying, you've picked a bad shrink. If he comes out of sessions smiling, you've picked a shrink who's not doing any harm (doesn't necessarily mean the shrink's helpful, though). Get a shrink who knows two things:
1. Pain is what the patient says it is. This applies to all symptoms and experiences. Anything subjective is what the one experiencing it says it is, no matter whether or not your books say that's possible.
2. Regardless of what you think of the behaviors someone exhibits, if you're going to treat them, you have to treat them with respect. A shrink should refuse to treat a patient that s/he can't respect or care about. This means everyone needs and deserves, to the greatest extent that will not cause serious bodily harm, to be able to determine his or her own fate, even if that means bad decisions. And it means you can't blame someone for failing if they tried. And a bunch of other stuff, but it's all pretty much common sense.

That's all you need for a shrink that's not going to do any harm. As long as you find one of those, just try it for a couple of months (after all, it can't hurt) and see if it helps.

Most psychologists, when faced with difficult children, usually think the child is depressed, angry, or has some type of behavioral issue that can be modified through forms of positive and negative re-enforcement. They assume the child experiences the world in a normal fashion and can be motived by the prospect of a reward or will correct their behavior to avoid punishments.

Children with AS don't experience the world in a "normal" fashion. They have a different set of stressors than NT children. They have little in the way of innate social skills, often have some form of hypersensitivity and frequently have issues with simple, daily transitions. They process information differently, are often unswayed by the thought of positive rewards, and shut down or melt down in response to punishments.

The psychologists need to be familiar how children with AS view the world.

I'm so very confused. Why is he being given medication for chest congestion? Guaifenicine is an expectorant...

Perhaps the OP meant "guanfacine".