Hi, I'm new here.

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I apologize that this is such a long post, and thank you in advance for reading.

My son is 6.5 years old, and we are still on waiting lists for evaluation. The neurologist says he is possibly ASD, so we got on the waiting list for TEACCH through the University of North Carolina a few months ago. I tried once before to get him evaluated, went to the developmental pediatrician who spent 5 minutes with us, said she didn't see anything "wrong" and sent us on our way, that was when he was 2.5. Our intake interview with TEACCH is on June 28th.

I have always known that something was a little different about Kyle, when he was finally able to stand up on his own (at about 23 months), he would stand in front of the coffee table for hours and stack his little wooden blocks all the way across the table and as high as they could go, then he would knock them down and start all over again, always to same thing all day long. He started school at 3, and has done very well. That was when I discovered his ability with patterns, he can finish a pattern without really thinking about it on his homework, and he notices patterns in things that most would never see. Now that he is finishing kindergarten, he can add and subtract up to 3 digit numbers in his head. Kyle has very few interests, he loves the computer and strives to learn all he can about all things animals. He wants to have friends, but doesn't have any, my 16 year old NT daughter asked one of her friends younger siblings why they didn't want to be Kyle's friend and they said it was because he was "weird". It's true I suppose, in the eyes of a 7 or 8 year old boy, Kyle is weird, he talks obsessively about different kinds of animals and their habitats, he points out patterns where other kids don't see a pattern, and instead of catching all kinds of bugs and toads like the other boys, he studies them and gets angry when the other boys take them out of their natural habitat. Kyle also has the most amazing memory, he remembers things he's done and who he's done them with amazingly. When he was 2 we went to Florida to visit my dad, and my dad took him to Seaworld for a day, now every time we talk about going to visit grandpa, he says "he's taking me to Seaworld to see the pengiuns, feed the dolphins, and see Shamu" because that is what they did when he was 2. He doesn't associate seeing grandparents with people, but with experiences that coincide with his special interests. When we went to visit my mom in Indiana, we took him to the zoo, so now, every time we talk about visiting "mammaw", he says "she's taking me to the zoo to see the ....." more animals than I can actually name. I have explained to both sets of my parents that it has to be that way. If we don't get to go the places he wants to go and do the things he wants to do, there will be huge behavior issues, I don't give in, but these things are what make him less anxious about traveling. If he knows he's going to go to the zoo, or Seaworld, or something along those lines, he can talk about that and think about that and plan it, so that he isn't so anxious about all the routine changes that come with travel. And Kyle REALLY hates change, there is no amount of preperation for changes in his routine or environment that will make them better. As a matter of fact, he gets more anxious if we try to prepare him. He knows that he has to go on a long car ride to visit grandparents, and we make that okay with a Nintendo DS or PSP.

Welcome to WrongPlanet. It sounds like you are in the right place. Your son sounds great!

Thank you, I think he's the most awesome 6 year old ever, but I'm his mom, so it's not an objective point of view.

Welcome to Wrong Planet!! Your son sounds like me when I was little on the animal obsessions; I'm still an animal lover too!

Welcome to WP. Your son sounds like a really great kid!

If you haven't already, you might want to start reading up on Autism/Aspergers (there is a books thread stickied at the top of this section).

Thank you Alice, I have been doing a lot of reading on it already, but always looking for more books that explain things.

HF,

He sounds a lot like my middle son. He was also a stacker and has a PROFOUND gift with patterns. He was tested recently and the psychologist said she'd never seen anything like it. She has administered this test thousands of times but she's never seen a child reproduce the block patterns the way he did, just as quickly as his hands could move with no hesitation or mistakes.

Your child also sounds like a Natural Learner. This has nothing especially to do with ASDs it's just one of the learning styles people can have. It's fairly rare. There are 9 styles/intelligences and they go something like this: Visual, Auditory, Kinetic, Natural, Relational, Verbal, Spiritual, and so on. My middle son is very strongly a Natural and Kinetic learner and he is very good at visual/spatial things. Visual learners are the most common, but most people have more than one style and may be more strongly gifted in one area or another or more evenly split between some styles. Kyle sounds like he is a Natural learner for sure and may have some special abilities in the visual/spatial area.

We bought this house largely because it has a fabulous back yard that connects with a larger wild plot of land shared by many people. We only own a small slice of it, but some of the neighbors have several acres each. There is a farm on the other side of it. I knew that having this kind of natural area would be important for my son. We have a big bay window in the kitchen and the table is there. I offered my son across from the window so he could look out of it while eating but he said no. He preferred to have a seat closer to the window and feel closer to nature rather than see it better. His greatest love is marine biology especially sharks. He'll talk all day about that...not exagerating. We have to ask him to stop sometimes so someone else can talk. He's a very gifted student with an extremely high IQ. He also has AS and ADHD.

My son is 11 and also wanting friends. People think he's "smart but weird" and it's hard for him to make and maintain friends because he gets overwhelmed by all the social activity at school and really needs to see people one at a time or in very small groups. That's hard to arrange as people need to get to know him better to be willing to be in the small group, and they only get to see him in crowds at school. He will be going to oceanography camp in a couple of weeks. I'm hoping he'll hook up with a friend there.

Your little guy is very much like mine - if you substitute Star Wars and outer space for animals and their habitats

Your son sounds fascinating and enchanting! While few 7 year old boys are going to be looking for those qualities in a friend right now, there will be plenty of adults looking for them in the long run. It can be hard to remember that the vast majority of our social lives are spent as adults, especially when you're a parent of a child who's struggling socially.

I'm Canadian so I'm not familiar with the TEACH program - is it like a social skills group? If you can find a good, gentle, positive one - a social skills group with kids his age who are also on the spectrum can really help him to related to others and know how to interact in a more give-and-take manner. I've also found that trying to find even just ONE activity/interest that is common/popular among kids his age, can go a LONG way in facilitating conversation. Karate, Pokemon, Nintendo DS, etc. Perhaps you can find one thing he's interested in that other boys his age would relate to.

Good luck and welcome

Caitlin, TEACCH is an educational program through the University of North Carolina, they do free evaluations, so I didn't have to go through our doctors and fight for an appointment with someone that wouldn't spend any time at all on evaluation, just look at his medical history, not let me voice concerns and certainly not even observe him, it is the U.S. Military medical system, one of the worst medical systems I have ever had to deal with, so I find a way around it every chance I get. This is a great program, I have a friend that uses some of their techniques with her 11 year old son who has "classic autism", and she has said that they are great. Still haven't even come close to finding anything for social skills, but I have high hopes after he is evaluated and officially diagnosed. Right now, we have a "possibly ASD" diagnosis from a neurologist that spent a total of 90 minutes with us in the course of 6 months of treatment, before we had to find one closer to home because he was almost always so overstimulated by the time we got seen there that he was biting, kicking and punching me in the waiting area. With the 1.5 hour drive and then the 2 to 3 hour wait for a room to clear for us, they were way overbooked and the drive was often too much for both of us. We have been on waiting lists since then, and finally have the intake interview next month.
He plays a lot of video games, he has a DS, a PSP, (the Wii is actually mine but I share), an xbox 360, and a computer of his own. His favorite thing to have on the tv before school is pokemon, but he prefers bakugan, and I try to keep him as up to date as possible on the current "popular subjects" with his peers. He has nerf guns so that he can play with the neighborhood boys, it always ends very badly, with him coming home without his gun and the others refusing to give it back, because he doesn't understand social cues.

Kiley,
Thank you for sharing, Kyle is definitely a kinestetic (sp) learner, he learns best when he's allowed to move around. I can't seem to let him play in larger groups because of his sensory issues, if it gets too loud he puts hands over ears and starts rocking and yelling "stop you're hurting my ears". He's always been like that, so I've always tried to keep him in a quiet environment as much as I possibly can. I was going to look into camps this summer, but the closest one is an hour's drive away and I'm not up to it every day and he doesn't do well without me overnight. The last time we tried a sleepover at a friends house, I barely made it off their street before his mom (my friend) was calling me to tell me that Kyle needed me to come back, that was just a few months ago.

We live in California and they use the TEACCH program here at my daughters school. She was picked to be one of the kids for the TEACCH training this year....she adored all the attention.
Here is a good link to read about the method http://www.autismweb.com/teacch.htm

liloleme, that is great that she gets to benefit from the program. Our schools will NOT use any kind of therapuetic programs that are outside the current staff's abilities. We have a TEACCH center about 5 miles away and will be going to them for evaluation and therapies as needed, which is fine as long as he's getting an education AND much needed services. I really dislike our schools and we are looking forward to next summer when we can finally buy a house and live in the real world.

Hi there and welcome to Wrong Planet. I hope you're able to get a clearcut diagnosis for your son, soon. I understand your frustration as it was quite a journey getting my 5-year-old daughter diagnosed. We had the "possibly ASD" diagnosis for a few months and then one of the pediatricians (who specializes in the field of ASD and is renowned in our city) did the ADOS test on her and decided that she definitely has autism. Maybe your could ask your drs about using that test on your son if they're having so much trouble making up their minds about the dx?
My daughter was only diagnosed a couple of weeks ago. Before that, I'd always just been told by doctors that she had developmental delays; while another dr had said that she was 'globally delayed' (which was actually not correct; it was just the autism making her appear to be globally delayed)