A little frightened for my son, heart breaking for my nephew

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Hi. I'm new to the site, but have been familiar with AS for a while. I am willing to bet the farm that my 9 yr old step nephew, whom I have known since he was 5, has AS. My suspicions have been echoed by a teacher, and a physician.

I am familiar with AS because my nearly 5 yr old son has been in the "normal" control group of an Autism/Autism Spectrum research project at University California Irvine since he was about 7 months old, and have gone though hours and hours of testing with him, and have filled out countless qusetionairres.

My poor little nephew is picked on and physically bullied at school. He has no friends, except for my son, and the children he sees in Sunday school at church. He displays so many of the characteristics of AS, and the other children see him as strange. My mother used to volunteer in his classroom, and she has also noticed that he is "different" and that the social maturity gap is wideneing as he grows older. The other children just don't know how to relate to him, and they torment him.

OK, so I have suspected that my nephew has done things to my son when they were alone, but I haven't been able to quite catch him in the act. About a year ago, I walked in on them, and my nephew had his hands around my son's throat- I just barely saw it- it was a fleeting glimpse. I mentioned it to my parents and my husband, and they kinda blew me off. I did not say anything to my brother or sister in law. Since that incident, I have been wary of leaving my son alone with my nephew.

Last night we were all at my parent's house again. My son and nephew wer playing upstairs, and I was keeping my ears open, and checking on them frequently. Suddenly, we heard my son cry out in pain. I raced upstairs, and I asked what happened. My son was in so much pain he couldn't speak, and I calmly asked my nephew what happened- I wanted to scream at him, but i didn't. My nephew's answer was "Oh boy. I hope I don't get in trouble for this." I had my husband carry myson downstairs- his foot was now swelling up. My nephew followed us down the stairs, and my brother asked what happened. I said, "I think *** needs to tell you what happened." My brother and sister in law took *** aside in a room, and eventually, the truth came out. He said he was "Teaching " his cousin what "Bigger boys can do to smaller boys."

Sure, my natural reaction is to want to be angry and to protect my child from harm. But, also, I see how truly heartbreaking this is because my nephew is obviously reinacting what happens to him at school. The poor little guy must have such a horrible time at school.

My sister in law refuses to seek further testing for her son. He is taking Concerta for ADHD, and she is satisfied that he is being properly treated. I think I know why she won't pursue this. She has an older sister who is severly ret*d, and has been institutionalized since a very young age. I think she just could not handle imagining that her son might not be "normal". I don't blame her. I can't imagine what I'd do if I was in her shoes.

Last night, my father had a talk with my brother and sister in law, and told them they needed to do something about his behavior and about his situation at school, because it will get worse once he hits puberty. The entire family has agreed that my son and my nephew should not be alone together for a while.

So, anyways, I'm sorry I wrote so much. I just don't know what to do. I want to help my nephew. Can anyone give me some advice on how I could approach my brother and sister in law in a way that is loving and sensitive? Has anyone else had a problem, like this?

Thank You

From what I can tell of your story, the following are true, aren't they?

1. Your brother and his wife know their son may have a PDD
2. They have ignored the problem and it has grown to almost dangerous levels
3. They aren't receptive to outside information on the topic

If these are true, then I question the idea of approaching them at all. It's not as if they are drowning in ignorance and you are refusing to throw them the life vest of knowledge. Rather, you are getting the message loud and clear that it's not your business. There's something to that.

Your business is to keep your son safe. You can and should do that. The separation of the boys seems like a prudent move. However, it's the business of your brother's family to work with your nephew on his problems, and confronting them about his possibly being autistic will most likely be taken as criticism of their childrearing and cause more upset.

I know it's hard to back away, but I'll give you my take: I'm willing to bet that few aspies on the this site would say they haven't had experiences like what your nephew is going through. I was bullied for years. I've seen hundreds of posts describing similar treatment, and dozens of other harrowing life tales from people with AS. There is a lot of suffering in the aspie world. It goes on every day all over the world, and it will for a long time to come, probably. There's very little most of us can do about it. Your becoming upset about the situation and agonizing over whether to tell your brother and sister only adds more suffering to the mix: yours.

If your brother and sister accept advice from your father, perhaps you can tell him about your ideas and have him pass them on. Otherwise, wait until your brother and sister are seeking input, and then give them the fruit of your wisdom.

i have been in a similiar situation for quite awhile myself.........my nephew, who I'm certain has Aspergers, has suffered for years with so many of the "symptoms". we have tried to express our concern to our sister-in-law, and she finally listened once our son and my hubby were diagnosed ( she'd been saying for years how much her son and my son were alike).
unfortunately, my nephew is now 25 and living at home with mommy....he doesn't work, doesn't go out..stays in his room and plays computer. When confronted with the notion that he might have Aspergers, he totally denied it and claimed that he's just "lazy". My sister-in-law can't force him into getting a diagnosis, and she won't kick him out.
It is very frustrating being in this situation. It breaks my heart to see my nephew suffer the way he does ~ his self-esteem is barely there, he obsesses over the placement of objects ( a bit OCD too), he lacks social skills, and hasn't been able to hold down any job. he has so much anxiety related to social situations, that he doesnt go much of anywhere either.
the entire family tried for years to urge my SIL to get help for her son, but she was in complete denial. She was convinced that his problems were due to the fact that she was a single mom. Any time someone would talk to her about getting help for my nephew, she'd get so angry and refuse to speak to that person.
i wish i could offer you more than my sympathy. Other than trying to be a positive element in their lives, there's not much you can do to make them get a diagnosis. Hopefully, someone at school will make a recommendation for testing. ( this is a long shot, though, as most teachers don't want to stick their neck out and make such a recommendation.) i agree with the others, do NOT let your son be alone with your nephew. Supervised, fine...alone, NO.

I would defintely not leave your son alone unsupervised with your nephew either. My heart goes out to you that has to be a hard place to be for you. But you need to keep your son safe plus you don't want your son to mimic that behavior either. I hope your brother will get the help he needs for your nephew and hopefully the school would step in and mention it to your SIL. Good luck and I hope everything goes well. Keep us posted.

Thank you so much for the frank advice, and the sympathy. After hearing confirmation from a person with Asperger's and parents of children w/ AS that my son shouldn't be alone with my nephew, I know that I am doing the prudent thing and not overreacting.

It's so hard to not want to try to "rescue" my nephew and butt into my brother's family's business! When he was 6 years old a teacher expressed her concerns, and so did a doctor. My SIL took my nephew to her family physician, who made a snap diagnosis- ADHD. Yes, my nephew is hyper, but it goes so much deeper than that. I was relieved when they said they were going to get him tested- I have heard that if caught early, intense social therapy can help improve the child's social skills. I heard that after age 8, that window of opportunity starts to close. My nephew is 9.

I hurt so bad for him. I don't have Aspergers, and neither does my husband, but both of us were nerds in grade school. Both of us recall waking up in the morning and that sick feeling in the pit of our stomachs...another school day, getting tormented and left out. My husband said that in Jr. High, he was so depressed he wanted to die. I know how it feels to be the odd man out, and I just wish I could scoop up my little nephew and put him in a safe world where he would never have to hurt.

it sure isnt easy, is it ?

I felt the same way, I hated going to school during that time. Being left out didn't bother me much, but the constant tormenting did. If they didn't like me, why didn't they just leave me alone? I didn't do anything to them to deserve it. I was once told by another student they teased me simply because I existed.

The tormenting I got from my parents was almost as bad. They thought I needed to straigthen out, yet would never say what it was I did that was so wrong and even when I'd talk about a specific thing I was teased about, they would dismiss it saying I had no idea why I was being teased, it was for the reasons they said, not what I thought. That made no sense to me because they were never present when any of the teasing happened. If they weren't present and didn't talk to anyone who was, how could they possibly know? They liked playing these games alot.

For a while, they thought the problem was I watched too much TV, listened to shorwave radio too much, listened to too much rock music, and didn't spend enough time swimming and getting suntanned. They thought denying me TV, music, radio, etc. and only allowing swimming as a recreational activity, along with my getting suntanned, would cure me and straighten me out. It probably caused more problems than it solved.

I'm over alot of what happened in school, but what my parents and siblings did left alot of scars that may never heal.

I don't know if it's too late to respond to these Dec. 16 posts but I just became a member and read them so I will.

About the "denial" of an AS son. My son is now 12 and we didn't know he had AS until he was about 9-10. My husband heard about the syndrome on a radio program called, "Focus on the Family". He was then certain that our son had Asperger's. I was open to that idea but not fully convinced; I've never been into labeling and fitting everyone into a slot and I give alot more room for differences than most; also, I could really relate to my child since I was quite similar to him in many ways and I turned out okay (I think) without being labeled with anything or given special help. We homeschooled our kids and I thought that it worked out great for our son because I could not see him doing well in a classroom environment. I'm confident that we did the right thing. As he became older, it became evident that I could not fill all of his needs, particularly social, at home. Also, he began to resist homeschooling which I think is natural in boys when they want to become a young man and identify with men and yet they're stuck at home with Mom all of the time! When he was 10 we placed him in our local public school. I thought about private school but I honestly believe that the children in private schools usually have grown up together and attended the same churches, as Prisonersix has pointed out in his experiences. I felt that the private school kids would be less accepting than the public school kids who were used to many different kinds of kids coming and going. I told the teachers that my son was a little different and that he'd always been homeschooled and they told me not to worry; they'd seen it all! I did not tell them that he had AS because he had not formally been diagnosed and because I hoped beyond hope that maybe it wouldn't matter and he'd manage to fit in somehow (wishful thinking!) It wasn't long before the teachers were howling for a conference and I had to explain to them what AS was. However, they all took it upon themselves to become informed and accomodate him so that he could begin his first year in school in regular ed. There were very few incidents and they were mild, thank God. This year (6th grade) he has had to go to special ed. (resource room) for Math and Language Arts. I was not happy about this but he likes it and seems to be doing somewhat better but no where near as well academically as when he was homeschooled. I don't know how long I should let him languish intellectually. He has problems thinking about anything except his obsessions which, unfortunately are soda and candy bars and cars.

Back to denial; when he was a baby he was right on target developmentally except for walking. He didn't walk until 15 months. This did not alarm me because I've always just accepted things and not really been one to panic if someone doesn't measure up to the standard norm. But, when he was about 1 1/2 to 2 he seemed to stop developing at the same pace and became a bit withdrawn. The change was subtle and we thought that this was due to the birth of a sibling (we've read about that sort of thing happening out of jealousy). But then by age 4 we knew that he was really into himself and quiet but very exploratory. I kept thinking how much like me he was. We took him to a doctor because he wasn't talking event though we knew that he could. The doctor gave him a little test consisting of stacking blocks and trying to get him to communicate and so on. He told us that we needed to "rule out autism". This was in late 1996 and we thought that the doctor was crazy because our son was nothing like "Rain Man". We did take him to a child psychologist who suggested delayed development and then later at age 6, mild mental retardation. We thought this could be possible, but as I home schooled him I realized that even though he shows no promise as a genius, he's far from ret*d. I wish that the doctor would have explained to us that autism is not so strictly defined anymore but is considered a scale with a wide range of severity and characteristics. I don't really know that we'd have done anything different but I'm sure if I had understood this I would have tried some sensory integration techniques since my son is supersensitive to sound and light. The thing about denial is that maybe some are denying what they percieve autism is and not really what their child is actually like. Does this make sense?

Bland, I can totally see your point. When my 10yo son was diagnosed at age 8 with AS I was horrified b/c it came with an Autistic conotation to it. I am ashamed to admit that, but I was. I guess my face showed it, b/c his dr immediately said "no, not the kind of Autistic Rain Man you are thinking of" and explained the wide spectrum various symptoms that fell under that category. Even now, 2 years later, I am reluctant to tell people he has AS simply b/c I hate the look on their face when they say "what's that?" and I mention the word Autistic. My son is also no where near mentally ret*d - very smart, in fact. He just doesn't digest information the way the public school systems dispenses it and so he gets lost. I have seriously considered homeschooling him, but he doesn't get bullied at school and that's a huge source of socialization for him.

I was in denial too. My son was originally diagnosed with ADHD at age 6, after a short little test that tested nothing, really. For some reason, that was easier to accept than the AS dx. But I have come to realize that my son having AS isn't a horrible disease - he needn't wear a Scarlet "A"....he's a gifted, funny, neat kid - who just does things and sees things differently than most. But I won't lie - it was a long road to come to that realization.

As for you, Groundcontrol - you did the right thing, protecting your son. It sounds as if there is little you can do for your nephew at the moment, until his parents can become more receptive. Good luck!

Court, I know this may sound assinine but I don't think that I was in denial because I did not understand the diagnosis so I disagreed with it. Because of my ignorance and the doctor's failure to fully explain the situation, I simply did not think my son could be autistic. Another blind spot was comparing my son to myself and thinking that we were "okay" or "normal"-Bland